AVALON, THE BEAUTIFUL 



if it can be such) is the instinct to kill. I have ob- 

 served this in many fishermen. Any one who 

 imagines that man has advanced much beyond the 

 savage stage has only carefully to observe fisher- 

 men. 



I have demonstrated the practicability of letting 

 MarUn swordfish go after they were beaten, but 

 almost all of the boatmen will not do it. The greater 

 number of swordfish weigh under two hundred 

 pounds, and when exhausted and pulled up to the 

 boat they can be freed by cutting the wire leader 

 close to the hook. Probably all these fish would 

 live. A fisherman will have his fun seeing and 

 photographing the wonderful leaps, and conquering 

 the fish, and when all this is over it would be sports- 

 man-like to let him go. Marlin are not food fish, 

 and they are thrown to the sharks. Diu-ing 1918, 

 however, many were sold as food fish. It seems a 

 pity to treat this royal, fighting, wonderful, purple- 

 colored fish in this way. But the boatmen will not 

 free them. My boatman claimed that his reputa- 

 tion depended upon the swordfish he caught; and 

 that in Avalon no one would believe fish were caught 

 unless brought to the dock. It was his bread and 

 butter. His reputation brought him new fisher- 

 men, and so he could not afford to lose it. Never- 

 theless, he was persuaded to do it in 1918. The 

 fault, then, does not lie with the boatman. 



The Japs are the greatest market fishermen in 

 the world. And some five hundred boats put out 

 of San Pedro every day, to scour the ocean for "the 

 chicken of the sea," as albacore are advertised to 

 the millions of people who are always hungry. It 



253 



