How to Sam anv Trott. 193 
proach nearer shore with the rising tide, the sail-boats may 
be working nearer home, so as not to be obliged to stem a 
strong ebb tide in returning to port. The best grounds for 
large bluetfish are outside and near the inlets of Fire Island. 
These inlets are formed by the tides of the Atlantic passing 
through Fire Island into the South Bay; the principal ones 
are opposite Islip and South Oyster Bay. But late in the 
fall the best trolling is off Rockaway and Jamaica Bay, the 
grounds extending from the Highlands, off the Jersey shore, 
to some ten miles below the heht-ship. 
AAs a sample of the sport, I will recount my last day’s ex- 
perience. My respected friend Gilsten having retired nearly 
twenty years avo to the charming village of Fort Hamilton, 
of which he owns the greater part, residing on the border 
of the trolling-grounds, and in close proximity to the favor- 
ite resorts of sheepshead, squeteague, and kingfish, has given 
his exclusive attention to field-sports for many years, angling 
and trolling in the waters between New York City and the 
Narrows until November, when he repairs to his island near 
the coast of Virginia, and shoots duck and wild geese until 
the first of January. Being a gentleman of good taste and 
large experience, as he could not angle in the winter, he has 
kindly employed his time in designing trolls and stools for 
fishing and shooting. Well, my friend Gilsten called at my 
office one evening late last October, and left me two squids, 
with notice that the blucfish were biting generously in the 
Lower Bay, and that he would be obliged if T would try his 
newly-designed models, of which the foregoing samples were 
copies. I therefore acted promptly upon his generous advice, 
and called on my angling friend Charles Gaylor and several 
others, all of whom agreed to meet me promptly next morn- 
ing at seven o’clock at the yacht moored in Jamaica Bay. 
Of course none of them came to time; and as Captain Morri- 
son brought the yacht alongside the dock, a haze, perceptible 
on the waters, was just lifting at the rise of the sun. A gen- 
erous breeze flapped the sails of the trolling crafts lying-to 
