The Hardest Fighters 253 



emphasize this, as nearly every notable catch of the sixty-six 

 men of the Tuna Club, who have taken this fish under the 

 rules (over one hundred pounds in weight), was telegraphed 

 everywhere by the Associated Press, after the fashion of a 

 battle ; and a friend, who it chanced was in Paris at the time 

 I made a lucky catch of a very large fish at Santa Catalina, 

 informed me that he read the account the next morning in 

 the French press. The American press in New York had 

 the occurrence illustrated by some occult means the follow- 

 ing day, and I had the pleasure of seeing myself pictured 

 calmly treading water and playing a tuna, which was leaping 

 forty or fifty feet in air. 



The writer of the account ended it by saying in explana- 

 tion, that this method of fishing was extraordinary, but I 

 preferred it. This is an excellent opportunity to deny this, 

 but I am not going to do it ; I really should enjoy seeing a 

 tuna leap fifty feet, climb into the air, as it were. But the 

 leaping tuna does really leap ten or more feet, and presents 

 a beautiful sight, as the jump is a perfect curve with no 

 ragged angles. 



Tuna fishing with a rod is possible at Santa Catalina, Cal- 

 ifornia, because the island affords perfectly smooth water, 

 thirty miles out at sea ; in a word, the conditions are exactly 

 right for playing a large fish up to three hundred pounds 

 with a line not much larger than an eyeglass cord, that 

 known to the angler as number twenty-one, meaning that it 

 has that many threads, and will stand a dead pull of forty- 

 two pounds. 



One morning I sailed out into the vermilion-tinted sea, 

 just at dawn. Patience sat at the helm, and expectation 

 crowned the prow, such is the usual custom among anglers ; 

 yet we had hardly cast off before the tunas charged into the 

 little bay, and we began to dodge flying fishes, which were 

 in the air, while the tunas were boiling around the boat. 

 Two tried anglers became excited. I knocked a flying fish 

 down as it passed my head, hooked it on to the silver Van 



