FISHING IN NEWFOUNDLAND 243 



fish, ranging from seven to eleven pounds, and all 

 were extremely gamey. During the first part of 

 those two hours I was kept busy with the camera, 

 but all my plates were soon used. And I had 

 made about eighteen exposures, many of which 

 proved quite successful. It is scarcely necessary 

 to say that of the fifteen fish only enough for our 

 immediate needs were kept, the rest were released 

 without being handled. Later in the afternoon 

 the sky became clouded and the air sultry, an ideal 

 day for mosquitoes and black flies. To say that 

 they came out in thousands expresses it mildly — 

 they were in milhons. Never have I seen them so 

 numerous. Before we could make camp it was 

 necessary to build big smudges all around the 

 proposed site. So great was the torture inflicted 

 by these tiny pests that one of the guides, a man 

 born and bred in the country, broke down completely 

 and cried like a child. Next morning saw us 

 nearing our goal, but the canoe had suffered badly. 

 The paint was almost all scraped from the bottom, 

 and in places the canvas was so severely worn that 

 the wooden sheathing was plainly visible. Two or 

 three miles over falls and shallows, and we entered 

 the dead water, or lagoon, which was the main head 

 of the river and into which fell one of the finest 

 waterfalls I have ever seen. How high it was I 

 would scarcely venture to say ; it was, however, 

 not alone the height, but the beauty of the 

 surroundings which made such an impressive sight. 

 Now the question was, would we find salmon in 

 this quietwater or in the seething pool at the foot of 

 the falls ? Thousands of fish must have come up 



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