286 GAME FISH OF NORTH AMERICA. 



looking creature than a forty pound pike, (?) with his scaly, snakish 

 hide, his long, wedge-shaped head, and his nose seemingly fash- 

 ioned to be thrust into other fishes' business, his under jaw project- 

 ing and revealing a fearful equipment of teeth, making his mouth 

 as dangerous as a wolfs, his fins all a-quiver with excitement, 

 and his eyes glaring hke a fiend's as he lurks in his lair among the 

 weeds to spring upon his prey. 



" As a specimen of the g^eed of the mascalonge, was one I 

 caught weighing only five pounds, but from whose maw I took 

 fourteen small fish of his own kind, some of which were still alive, 

 besides several of other species. At another time a gentleman and 

 myself were " skittering," as fishermen call it, along the banks of 

 a deep still pond noted for its pike. Skittering, one of the best 

 methods for taking mascalonge, is done with a long elastic rod, 

 reel and line to match the game, and hook of formidable size, u pdh 

 which is impaled a minnow of from seven to fifteen inches in 

 length. The minnow is twitched along through the water near 

 the surface wdth a motion suggestive of the word skittering. Upon 

 my friend's hook was a minnow eight or nine inches in length,' 

 with which he struck a small pike. As he was about taking the 

 game from the water another and larger mascalonge made a rush 

 for it, and taking it in his mouth retired to deep water to gorge it. 

 After a fe\y minutes the exciting sport of playing this second pike 

 commenced, and within half an hour my friend landed him safe 

 and sure. He proved to be a twenty-five pounder ; in his throa' 

 was the smaller one, weighing three pounds, and in the throat of 

 this latter was the minnow. Rapacity incarnate ! 



" But account has not yet been taken of the amazing strength 

 of the mascalonge. I have hooked and helped to haul on deck 

 sharks of various sizes, have had a hand at every variety of mack- 

 erel, have tusseled with the salmon, but in proportion to size this 

 pike far surpasses them all in ability to test the fisherman's mus- 

 cle, skill, coolness, and fertility of device. A mascalonge of six 

 pounds weight is equal in gamy quaUties to a salmon of twenty. 

 He can swim faster, whirl quicker, pull harder, leap higher, 

 and show more fight and more cunning. The question of a 

 muskellunge leaping has been much debated. Those who know 

 th'm best can vouch for their leaping powers and sometimes 

 prodigious feats. 



