io6 SUNSHINE AND SPORT IN 



ports of call on the Spanish Main, where there is 

 continuous traffic of merchant shipping, and where 

 doubtless, frequent efforts are made to tempt them 

 with " bully " beef and other baits, I have known 

 tarpon show far more suspicion than in Florida. 

 The brief annual season, lasting five or six weeks, 

 cannot possibly teach them the danger of fishing- 

 tackle, and so the crudest deceptions succeed. In 

 a splendidly-illustrated book on the game fishes of 

 Florida, now out of print, Mr Turner some years 

 ago predicted that the tarpon of Boca Grande 

 would in the near future learn to fear the gifts of 

 the Greeks, and that the Greeks would in conse- 

 quence have to invent new deceits. That forecast 

 is no nearer fulfilment than when it was made, for 

 luck and muscle still win the game, and tarpon 

 strike as freely as ever. Thanks to mosquitoes 

 and the growing power of the sun, the season ends 

 with May. Thanks to the unwillingness of the 

 fish to take a bait with any freedom before the end 

 of April, it does not therefore last much more than 

 a month. Even during that short period new 

 tarpon are continually coming in from the Gulf, 

 many of which may never have seen a hook. 

 Fortunately, the tarpon is in no danger of exhaus- 

 tion, for it has no market value and is not therefore 

 caught for commercial purposes, having, during 

 most of the year, no enemy more formidable than 

 the sharks, which it can easily outswim. 



Once hooked, the tarpon's carelessness vanishes. 

 Threatened with shipwreck, it dies as befits a king. 

 As often as not, indeed, it does not at the moment 

 die at all, but makes good its escape with a mixture 

 of strength and cunning very exhilarating to its 



