106 Fishing in North Carolina. 



it will have to be cooked again — -a peculiarity 

 of eel flesh. 



In former years catfish were very plentiful 

 in the Pee Dee River, about the Grassy Islands, 

 where the river is a mile wide. Amongst the 

 hundreds of little grassy islands covered by 

 water in flood, and millions of rocks, in the 

 swifts and eddies, it was great fun to catch 

 them with a 60-yard seine; and often seven or 

 more hundred would be taken in a few hours, 

 brought to bank, cleaned and put into a big old 

 fashioned wash-pot for a well seasoned wet-stew. 

 Served hot, in tin cups, right there on the bank 

 it required no false appetite to be appreciated. 



There is no such easy work as making a land 

 haul with the seine amongst these swifts and 

 eddies, in places one minute ankle deep and 

 the next "ker souse" over one's head. 



But the two staffs are quickly brought to- 

 gether, upstream in swift water and the seine 

 is bagged down stream the lead lines being 

 drawn together; then it is strictly hand fished 

 by all except the bow-legged man at the bag end 

 who allows the slack to wash between his legs 



