VIII 



SOME RARE FISH 



IT IS very strange that the longer a man fishes the 

 more there seems to be to learn. In my case this 

 is one of the secrets of the fascination of the game. 

 Always there will be greater fish in the ocean than 

 I have ever caught. 



Five or six years ago I heard the name "waahoo" 

 mentioned at Long Key. The boatmen were using 

 it in a way to make one see that they did not be- 

 lieve there was such a fish as a waahoo. The old 

 conch fishermen had never heard the name. For 

 that matter, neither had I. 



Later I heard the particulars of a hard and spec- 

 tacular fight Judge Shields had had with a strange 

 fish which the Smithsonian declared to be a waahoo. 

 The name waahoo appears to be more familiarly 

 associated with a shrub called burnii^-bush, also a 

 Pacific coast berry, and again a small tree of the 

 South called wing6d elm. When this name is men- 

 tioned to a fisherman he is apt to think only fun is 

 intended. To be sure, I thought so. 



In February, 1915, I met Judge Shields at Long 

 Key, and, remembering his capture of this strange 

 fish some years previous, I questioned him. He was 



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