THE GAME FISHES OF THE WOELD 



sounds, and the rush down is a splendid example of power and 

 peculiarly characteristic of the fish. Zip-zip-zip ! it wiU go, 

 each impetus tearing off feet and yards of line, and there is but 

 one thing to do — ^let it go. Then the fish will sulk like a salmon. 

 I have often looked down and watched a fish fighting on a friend's 

 line, its side against him, head down, fighting every inch and 

 foot and fathom, often breaking away to take it all again, never 

 giving up. 



I cannot better convey to the indulgent reader my own im- 

 pression of the yellowtaU than to describe several days' fishing 

 experience with it in May and in September. It should be said 

 that the yellowtail is so common, so always in evidence, that 

 it is taken as a matter of course, but I venture the opinion that 

 there is no fish in the sea of its size and weight, that is a better 

 or more sustained and courageous fighter. For this reason the 

 directors of the Tuna Club devote particular attention to it in 

 deference to these points with a view to prevent the over-fishing 

 of the free biter and to elevate its catch to a high standard, with 

 fair play as a basis. In other words, the yeUowtail is a splendid 

 game fish, and the Club insists that its members, at least, shall give 

 it the advantage. Hence when an angler takes a thirty or forty 

 pounder on Tuna Club tackle he has accomplished something 

 worth the while, and proved himself an angler of finesse and 

 skiU. The prizes are given in the chapter on Angling Clubs. 



The tackle is of two kinds : (1) the nine-ounce rod. This was 

 devised by Mr. Arthur Jerome Eddy of Pasadena and Chicago, 

 and is sufficiently large to take a sixty- or seventy-pound fish in an 

 hour or so. It was with this tackle that Mr. Wm. H. Simpson of 

 Whalley, Lancashire, England, took the record fish of the Club, 

 sixty and one half pounds. This fine fish, which has never been 

 beaten, has been placed in the fish department of the British 

 Museum, with a replLca of the rod and line ; (2) the so-called 3-6 

 rod. This was suggested by Mr. T. McDaniel Potter of Los Angeles, 

 a director of the Club, to render the capture of the yellowtail 

 more diificult. The 3-6 Club was organized to specialize the 

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