154 SUNSHINE AND SPORT IN 



occurred ere now, and, so far as I am aware, none 

 has ever been recorded. 



The jewfish, groupers and channel bass are 

 taken deep down, generally when the bait is allowed 

 to sink lower than forty-five or fifty feet. The 

 kingfish and cobia seize the bait, as has been said, 

 close to the surface, and a kingfish of twenty pounds 

 or so gives such dashing sport that it would be a 

 delightful fish on a salmon-rod. On the crane 

 used to haul tarpon its struggles are insignificant. 



In the shallower water round Useppa we find a 

 number of small fish, many of which give the best 

 of sport on an old trout-rod and light tackle to 

 match. Even if a north-easter did not occasionally 

 impose a close time of several days' duration on the 

 Pass, tarpon-fishing might, but for an occasional 

 interlude with smaller game, pall like partridges. 

 The shore waters of Florida are so abundantly 

 stocked with fishes of a dozen kinds that every little 

 bay and inlet will keep the angler's float bobbing by 

 the hour. This profusion of fish is doubtless due to 

 the beneficent influence of a Gulf Stream not yet 

 chilled by its passage across the colder ocean, and 

 some of the riches of those waters must also, no 

 doubt, be attributed to under-fishing, a rare virtue 

 in these times. At any rate, the fisherman of 

 catholic tastes need never know an idle hour. Even 

 on the beaches of the Pass itself, garfish, silver 

 mullet and even small sawfish, sport right up to the 

 water's edge, and a score of fish will dart between 

 the feet of anyone wading along the shore, while a 

 wave heavier than the rest will sometimes throw a 

 whole shoal of mullet up the sandy slope, from which 

 they quickly struggle back to safety. 



