72 Fisuing ry American WATERS. 
its corners may cut or chafe and part my line. There! he 
has tacked again; be ready to gaff him, if I get him near 
enough, before he makes another run. 
Mosier, I see his mate a keeping alongside of him all the 
time; she’s bout as big as the hooked one. I mean to gaff 
that one first. How like tarnation the feller fights, an tries 
to whip out the hook with his tail; that shows he’s gitting 
tired. When they curl themselves up on the top of the wa- 
ter so that you can’t budge ’em, you had better be careful 
not to hold so hard as to let’em break the line with their tail, 
nor cut it off with their back fin; nor so loose as to let him 
git slack line to unhook, or knock the hook out of his jaw 
with his tail. There! see him straighten out! He has made 
his last fight, and got whipped! His mate has gone. ’Twas 
no use for her to stay an try to help him any longer, for she 
knows he’s dead. Now, with the heave and haul of the tide, 
there is more danger of breaking the line an losing him than 
ifhe was alive; but here he comes, an here goes the gaff—a 
forty-pounder at least! 
S. Well done, Mosier! Struck just in time, for the hook 
has let go. 
Mosier, Jist so; Lhain’t no confidence in them hooks with 
the barb curling out so that you can not git it into the flesh. 
The Kinsey point an Sproat bend, or the O'Shaughnessy with 
the Kinsey point, are the best. 
D. Well, my preconceived notions of bass-fishing have all 
been cast wide. When you first hooked the bass, I thought 
T could take a seat and be a quiet looker-on at the play; but 
T have been so excited by alternate hopes, fears, doubts, and 
surprises, that I want you to pardon me for getting into your 
way several times. The truth is, it astonishes me to see the 
fish on terra firma. IT thought him lost a dozen times; and I 
can not now fully realize how it is possible to play success- 
fully so large a fish, and one so game, in such boisterous 
water, with such slender tackle. Iam really afraid to try to 
make a cast, for I expect if I get a strike that I shall either 
break my rod, or the fish will part my line. 
