A GAME FISH. 151 



cept for striped bass. Possibly, had I been able to re- 

 cover line as fast as this fish came up stream, I should 

 have saved him. As it was, by the time I had reeled in 

 thirty yards I found my flies free for another cast, and I 

 cast again. It is of no use to lament a lost fish. I had 

 enjoyed the satisfaction of his first strike. Though an 

 angler often says after landing a fine fish, " I was sure of 

 him when I felt him strike," nevertheless, I suppose he 

 never yet felt really sure of a fish until he had him in the 

 landing-net — nor then always. More than once I have 

 seen a fine fish not yet dead thrown overboard from the 

 bottom of a boat, where his teeth were caught in the 

 meshes of the landing-net suddenly lifted to take in an- 

 other. It is safe to be always ready to lose a fish. Nor 

 have I ever known a more remarkable loss than occurred 

 to me still later on that day. Frank had followed clown 

 the bank of the river, and I had twice given him my full 

 basket to empty. After the second emptying, the first fish 

 which I took I put in it, a three-quarter pounder, and, 

 standing on a fallen tree six feet above the stream, cast 

 below over a deep hole, and, as I cast, saw this fish's 

 head coming out of the receiving hole in the top of the 

 basket. Before my left hand could reach him, a flap of 

 his tail sent him like a shot into the air before my eyes, 

 and he vanished in the pool below me. 



"John," said I, "after that I am going home. A soli- 

 tary fish standing up on his tail and putting his head out 

 of the hole in a twelve-pound creel is a wonderful sight, 

 and means something. Let us be superstitious for once, 

 and stop work." 



I have thus given a sketch of six days of Adirondack 

 fishing, and you perceive a gradual improvement in the 

 catch of fish as the season advanced. At the same time, 



