A Dive for a Big Fellow 



bass neglected us, we fell back on the basket of fried 

 chicken always provided. Unfortunately we could 

 not go fishing as often as we wished. We were per- 

 mitted to go but every other day the off days be- 

 ing spent in catching creek minnows for the follow- 

 ing day's sport. 



By some chance there came a day when Bill went 

 elsewhere than bass fishing, so I went alone, loaded 

 with a fine bucket of creek minnows, a fried chicken 

 and the customary hopes for a big day. In this last 

 I was not disappointed. It proved to be the biggest 

 and the saddest in what are now many days of 

 angling experiences. To that time the biggest bass 

 we had caught was a four-pounder, landed by Bill, 

 and used by him as an irrefutable argument that he 

 was a better fisherman than I. To catch one bigger 

 was my burning ambition. 



Upon reaching the river bank I decided to try out 

 some favorite places by using brook trout methods 

 stalking the quarry, one might say. Imagine a big 

 sycamore tree standing out from the banks into a 

 wide mountain stream, its far-flung roots washed by 

 a steady current of clear water slipping along five 

 feet deep over a bottom of solid rock. By crawling 

 out on the bank-fastened roots I was able to gain a 

 place beside the trunk of the old sycamore and to 

 cast a juicy minnow under its spreading branches to- 

 ward the center of the stream. 



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