The Unintelligence of Fishes 311 



which it was intended, so I was possibly harboring a mean 

 spirit of revenge against all catfish and the tribe in general, 

 and it was very natural that I should make my story bear 

 on catfish. This was the story, which has one point of re- 

 semblance to Hawthorne's " Twice Told Tales." I told of a 

 ranch my uncle had down on the river where the chief pas- 

 time in the cool evenings was to " jug " for cats — a high- 

 grade and ancient species of angling much in vogue along 

 the bayous when jugs and catfish are running in what is 

 known as the " shank of the moon." 



Everybody could catch cats but my uncle — he invariably 

 lost his jug; and this went on until thirteen jugs (an un- 

 lucky number, note this, as it has an important bearing on 

 the sequel) had disappeared ; then a friend suggested to him 

 that there must be a particularly big cat in his pool to carry 

 off so many jugs ; so he began to work on the problem. He 

 sent down to Natchez and got an extra large pole, but the 

 catfish broke it in the first run. In front of the farm was 

 a tall Red River aspen, about eighty feet high. Uncle 

 rigged a tackle on this and brought the top of the tree down 

 to the water's edge, baited his large hooks, fastened the big 

 line to the tree with a diamond hitch and arranged it so that 

 the slightest bite would release it. 



He watched it a long time, then gave it up, but in the night 

 a mighty swish as of a rushing wind was heard, a terrific 

 crash through the trees, and then a hissing like steam. No 

 one dared to go out, but in the early morning the angler 

 made an investigation and found that a catfish had struck 

 the line and the aspen had jerked it four or five hundred 

 yards into a thick forest of young hemlocks which had 

 broken the fall, and the catfish wasn't hurt at all and had 

 crawled half-way back to the water. On his way he had 

 broken into uncle's chicken coop and had eaten four or 

 five mandarin ducks. At this stage of the game I stopped, 

 and by all rights some one should have smiled or expressed 

 disbelief in some way ; but nothing of the kind occurred, and 



