402 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Juke 21, 1883. 



mi-: iviiriiynriiAaoi's GLVJB. 

 OpHlS famous club will have its EonTfl) annual dinner ai 

 J- the Manhattan Beach Hotel ou Tuesday. June 20. 

 The invitations, requesting members to assemble at the time 



and plaee named at 0:30 P. M., have been issued. These say 

 that the eluh will meet "to discuss the qualities ol many rare 

 and excellent fishes, as well as of some less prized but mi 

 less loothsome mollusks, reptiles, and denizens of the deep. 

 Interspersed with such due admixture of familiar flesh and 

 fowl as may sustain the Strength of the least adventurous, 

 and satisfy tbe yearnings of the most fastidious." 



We fear thai this indicates a backing down Of the club 

 from the high ground it lias occupied, as it certainly in- 

 timates that it is about to make concessions to popular preju- 

 dice by introducing into its feast a "due admixture of 

 familiar flesh." The club has claimed to be a medium for 

 introducing to the public cerlain inhabitants of the water, 

 as well as ■'denizens of the deep." which may prove to be. 

 Wholesome food, but against which there has existed an ill- 

 founded prejudice because of a lack of beauty in either their 

 countenances or in their general appearance. Jn this good 

 work they have had the moral support of those who look 

 beyond the surface of that vague science called political 

 economy. The club lias introduced to public notice the de- 

 spised skate, which is now occasionally sold in the markets, 

 but which was long tabooed for no good reason. The skate 

 is largely eaten in Europe, but not being in fashion here, our 

 1 poorest people would uot touch it because it had the. reputa. 

 tion of Vicing uneatable, and, as n consequence, tons upon tons 

 of this very good fish are thrown away every week, while 

 thousands of people in New York are in want of a dinner. 



The new departure of the Club is to be regretted because 

 the average man will decline water snakes, snails, angle- 

 worms, and shark's liver, when the menu contains "familiar 

 flesh aud fowl," and so the usefulness of the club may be 

 greatly impaired, We hold that a member of the Ichthyo- 

 phagous Club is bound to sink all inherited prejudice, and eat 

 every living thing which the waters produce, even including 

 those vague and possibly horriale things described us "deni- 

 zens of Ihe. deep." To this end each member should insist that 

 there be no "familiar" dishes, and that every other member 

 and guest should eat of every dish that is served, in order 

 khftt the public may know what is good and wholesome. If 

 by any chance a lew ot the members should die from the ef- 

 fects of some poisonous monster's flesh, then those members' 

 names should be inscribed upon the roll of honor, and pass 

 into history as those who have died to benefit their fellow 

 men. Certainly no one can accuse those brave men. who 

 have unhesitatingly swallowed hellbender steaks and fried 

 sra snails, washed down with octopus soup, of being afraid 

 to curry ou the war against prejudice through any fear of 

 personal harm. W(i certainly do not; we know too well the 

 stuff that they are made of. lo suspect that the proposed 

 concession is at all dictated by personal considerations, aud 

 1 ill sure that had they been among the grenadiers of Fred- 

 erick the Great, when their comrades hesitated before a 

 charge which looked hopeless, and their king rode in 

 front and asked: "What! do you fellows want to live for- 

 ever?" they would, with one voice, have answered: "No." 



Reading between the lines of this invitation, we see only a 

 desire to please the new members, and perhaps to cheer 

 them on by devouring the mysterious "denizens" before 

 them, while they (the new members) content themselves with 

 "civilized" food until they can screw their combined courage 

 to the sticking point, and gradually arrive at Ihe point when 

 all pre-couceived notions as to what is edible have vanished, 

 and the effect of an early education which was iilled With 

 prejudice, is partly or wholly gone. 411 have heard of the 

 honor thai is due lo him who makes two blades of grass grow 

 where but one vegetated before, but we think that an equal 

 amount Of merit should attach to those who teach us how to 

 use what the earth or the waters provide, especially such 

 things as are thrown aside as not lit to eat. when no one has 

 tried them to find out whether they are or uot. The [act 

 that our grandfathers did not eat certain things is no reason 

 at all why we should not test them, and a broiled "toad -fish" 

 muy be equal to any other fish, for all that the fisherman, 

 who catch and throw them away, may know. The fisher- 

 men of Connecticut will not eat sturgeon, the royal dish of 

 England, and yet they eat lampreys which the New Yorker 

 turns up his nose at. Neither of these persons have tasted 

 the fishes in question, nor would they do so unless under 

 compulsion. 



It might be well for the Ichthophagi to consider the pro- 

 priety of having different degrees among the memberships, 

 and to mark these degrees by divisions at the table. For in- 

 stance, a new member sits at the foot of the table, and notes 

 are taken of the dishes of which he partakes. H he goes 

 through with the muskrat stew and the toad-fish, he is ad- 

 mitted to a higher seat at the next feast, when, if he devours 

 his water snakes aud fried angle worms with gusto, he is 

 promoted to be a brother in full standing. We are glad to 

 learn that the old custom of the club of holding a new mem- 

 ber on the floor and inserting repulsive "denizens of the 

 deep" one after another down his oesophagus with a pump, 

 has been abandoned. This course only produced nausea in 

 the strongest stomachs, and in several fatal cases the coro- 

 ners strongly condemned the practice. That was one ex- 

 treme, the new departure of pandering to prejudice is 

 another. Tbe true method of inducing the novice to eat of 

 the unusual viands lies between the two. 



Those of our readers who would like to unite witli this 

 body of philanthropists, may have an opportunity ot joining 

 the martyrs lo nightmare and dyspepsia by addressing the 

 officers of the club, which are, as given on our invitation, 

 as follows: President, John Foord. Executive Committee 

 —Eugene 6. Blackford, Robert B. Roosevelt, Fred Mather, 

 Charles R, Miller and Baruet Phillips. We hope that all 

 who propose attending this fourth animal dinner will notify 

 us where we may find suitable data for an obituary notice, 

 as we already have on file complete ones of the older mem- 

 bers in readiness for any emergency. 



Foon aso Spawn-ino of Striped Bass.— In the pro- 

 ceedings of the American Fishcultural Association, in an- 

 other column, will be found some notes on the food of the 

 striped buss, by Prof. II. J. Pice, and also some account of 

 the successful hatching of the fish, by Mr. S. P. Worth. 

 The bass has been hatched in very limited numbers, just 

 enough to experiment with, for years, but the tisheullur- 

 ists have found where they spawn, so thai they can be ob- 

 tained in quantities. Mil Worth is the li rat to obtain the 

 eggs in large numbers. 



JtJKE Woodcock. — A correspondent writes us that at the 

 Manhattan Beach Hotel, at Coney Island, John Breslin pro- 

 prietor, he saw a few days ago twelve woodcock— small 

 young birds. Will Governor Cleveland give Long Island a 

 game protectory 



fyu ^artmtfitn ^owi$t 



SPORT IN CALLAO BAY. 



of interest to i 

 D Stream to he 



a of 



iy fellow-readers of 

 f life, from a rod and 

 globe; and on that 



of experience from the 

 ire i« temporary exile iu 



1 to devise alt sorts of ex- 



of t,l 



occupation of this uu- 

 lich precludes nil pos- 

 y experience lias been 

 deed, to a very limited 

 ■ upper plateaus of the 

 miles inland, abound in 

 ng the rarefied atmosphere. 

 taking there is no game at 

 i occasional flock of bay 

 o, may be so denominated. 



it has but little to do Willi 



this fact, please consider 



willing to receive anythl 



being eaten, and you hav 

 The Doctor and I. bei 



IT mi 

 Fon 



gun standpoint., in this i|uartc 

 supposition 1 give you a few 

 lives of a friend aud myself, wlic 

 this dreary spot, and who are fore 

 pedients to prod dull time along. 



On account of the present inilitai 

 fortunate country by the Chilians, \ 

 sibilily of getting into the interior, 

 confined entirely to the coast, aud, i 

 extent of that. From all accounts t 

 mountains, fifty or seventy-live u 

 L'atue of great variety, and, barring 

 ft i-, easily bagg&d. 'Properly speak 

 this point on the coast, unless ai 

 birds, with a stray curlew or tw 

 But lo my yarn which, Ihough 



game, does deal to a slight extent with fishing line and 

 rifle. 



To premise I will slate lliat our present home is on board 



the United States steamer , at this time lying at anchor, 



close under the lee of the island of San Lorenzo, some Four 

 miles southwest of Callao. I make this reckless statement 

 with a lull realization that it will be apt to blast my reputa- 

 tion for veracity among those acquainted with the present 

 slate of our navy; but, if necessary, I can produce affidavits 

 to prove Ihe fact, and I trust no one will condemn me with- 

 out previously investigating the case. 



Having stretched your imaginations sufficiently to grasp 



strict quarantine, greedily 



gin the fresh fish line capable of 



e our exact status. 



ig the only officers on board who 



_ire fond of fishing, nobly sacrificed ourselves on the altars 

 of our respective stomachs, and volunteered to daily sally 

 forth with hook and line, iu search of what the sea' might 

 yield us. For a fishing ground we chose an old launch, an- 

 chored near I lie island shore, in some three fathoms of water, 

 and thither, withhand lines (neither love nor money will pur- 

 chase a rod in Lime rr Celiac) we daily repaired and sought 

 bilge quantities of fish, called by tbe natives "cabrillo." 

 They arc a fine food fish, weighing from one to three pounds 

 each, and outwardly much resemble the ordinary fresh-water 

 perch. We also caught mackerel, eels and various other 

 fish, mostly useless for table purposes. Kvery day while 

 Ashing, we lost several books and parts of lines, which were 

 carried off by some immense fish, whose movements, when 

 hooked, were as uncontrollable with our light tackle as 

 would have been those of a locomotive. After a few days 

 this naturally grew a little monotonous, :| nd we determined 

 to try and get a glimpse of the creature that was apparently 

 amusing himself so highly at on 

 each procured a la rge cod-line 

 heavy hooks, and half a pound 

 baited with a good-sized mack' 



to the bottom alongside the launch. We took the precau- 

 tion, luckily, to coil down about lot) yards of each line in 

 the launch free for running. 



The second day of the trial of this device, just as we were 

 winding up our light lines for the day, and when the bottom 

 of the launch was 'well covered with flapping fish and squirm- 

 ing eels, the Doctor's big line started over the side for 

 Callao at about fifteen knots an hour. He made a wild grab 

 for if, missed it, fell down in the bottom of the launch, re- 

 covered himself, spit out a couple of stray eels, and a good 

 deal of strong language, and finally got bold of his rapidly run- 

 ning line. He has ever since wished that he had fallen dow n 

 again, for that line was probably the worst thing he ever 

 got hold of. The Doctor is not of a prevaricating disposition, 

 and. when he took firm hold of that line and excitedly 

 shouted, "I have got him," he doubtless thought he was tell- 

 ing the truth; but it was but another version of that old, old 

 story of the man and the bear, and he only kept up cornmu- 

 niea'lion with the terminus of the line long enough to get 

 two of his lingers cut well iu toward the bone. He let go, 

 remarking with a good deal of unnecessary force, "The 



d—n beast can go to Cotopaxi." Whether or no the 



occupant of the far end of the line heard this expression, I 

 cannot say, hut ] presume it did, for it immediately slopped, 

 doubtless to give the remark due consideration, and to cogi- 

 tate upon the feasibility of taking up the liberal course of 

 travel, opened up for it by the Doctor's quaintly worded 

 remark. 



The sudden stoppage of the line caused us both to think 

 that our game had escaped, but a cautious pull satisfied us 



xp> 



We. accordingly, 



fastened three 



f lead, These machines we 

 '1, and let the bait lie close 



that its flag was still there, and, as it showed no signs of im- 

 mediately renewing the fight, we prepared to do a little work 

 on our end of the line. The fish was ou the Doctor's tackle 

 and the place of honor belonged to him; accordingly, hav- 

 ing duly fortified his hands with a pair of gloves and some 

 old junk, he declared himself ready to begin Offensive ope- 

 rations. Fearing our customer would foul the anchorage of 

 the launch, we got inlo a small boat alongside, the Doctor 

 handling the line very gingerly during lie- transfer operation] 

 When all was ready I took the oars and rowed gently in the 

 direction in which the lini trended, the Doctor meanwhile 

 biking in the slack of the line and coiling it carefully 

 down in the bow. When lie had got iu about seventy-five 

 yards he found it about up and down. He then braced him- 

 self, ground out the words. "Take that you brute, for cutting 

 my fingers." and gave a yank on the line that would have 

 fairly staggered a bull, "it was sufficient. Tin- n b evi 

 dently thought a young earthquake had generated rjghl u 

 der it, and accordingly started for a cooler clime, but in 

 making calculations it forgot to take into consideration the 

 new ties it had so recently formed, and was forced to stand 

 upon the order of its going, The Doctor had his blood up 

 now and fed out line, through a piece of junk, under about 

 fifty pounds pressure. Even with this strain on fhe beast 

 had it all its own way for a long lime, and towed the boat 

 backward and forward like a cork. When the brute tired 

 Of this Kind of fighting it began sulking. It Would lie on 

 the bottom and would not stir more than a few feet, jerk 

 and pull the line as we would. Whenever it did move the 

 Doctor worried it as much as possible, and finally, some 

 forty minutes after the battle began, our lish came to the 

 surface -about twenty feet from the boat. As soon as it 

 broke water our curiosity was appeased, and we saw that 

 our line-breaking, hook-stealing friend was one of the ray 

 tribe. We thought it had given up, but it was apparently sat- 

 isfying itscuriosity also, for as soon as it saw the two objects 

 it was fast lo it made a desperate rush for liberty, That 

 proved to be its last exhibition of fight, aud, though ex- 

 tremely violent, did not continue long. It came to the sur- 

 face again and again, and we shortly had It close alongside 

 the boat. I told the Doctor to keep' a taut line on, while i 

 took it, knife, with a ten-inch blade, and prepared to give 

 the beast a death-blow through the brain. Our scheme of 

 annihilation was very well planned, but "The best laid 

 schemes o'' mice an' men gang aft agley," and when 1. with 

 all my force, struck what should have been the fatal blow, 

 the brute, with a tremendous splash, moved olT a few feet, 

 and 1 rammed that knife countless fathoms down into the 

 bright blue waters of Callao Bay. I stretched my Icinper 

 further than I did my arm, but, although I shortly' regained 

 my usual sweet disposition, my right arm is still several 

 inches in exeesfl of its normal length. You can, perhaps, 

 imagine the. blissful satisfaction I experienced when, shortly 

 after my mishap, 1 succeeded in putlting that knife (with 

 my left band) into a fatal spot in our quarry. 



The Doctor thought rny accident very funny, and did not 

 get over his hilarity till he began surveying his capture, 

 Then Ihe o'erwhclming knowledge of his own puissant 

 ptcwess so overcame him, that he WOUld not deign to notice 

 SO insignificant an individual as myself. I felt my own in- 

 feriority, and humbly rowed the king and his game along- 

 side the whaif on V- *-*«- * ^ n - «-• — <■-' ■ -• 



from the water, by 

 small hand-car, wh. 

 smelting works adj 

 The Doctor, whose 

 mainly confined lo 

 quarter-pound has 

 Tennessee, by 



overcome by the 

 realized that, unl 

 gard, I roust catc 

 figures, So the I 

 sallied forth to re 

 descended to act 

 ■n failure, aud 1 



land. There the fish was hoisted 

 and deposited on a 



tO the scale,- at the 

 weigh 813 pounds, 



i..'i Heretofore been 

 uld throw a three- 

 dean atmosphere of 

 a pole, was quite 



n pa 



his own lam-els. and I fully 

 o everlastingly forfeit his ro- 

 iling well up iu the double 

 .* 1 girded up. my loins and 

 position. The Doctor con- 

 bul thi expedition was a bar- 



l yet greater burden to me. 



The day succeeding that, however, tickle fortune smiled 

 upon mi', and I succeeded in hooking two rays. The first 

 one got the line foul of the buoy anchorage before 1 could 

 get him under control, and soon broke away, Shortly after 

 I hooked another, and after about an hour's hard 'work, 

 much similar to that described before, I landed the largest 

 fish, by over a hundred pounds, that it has ever been rny 

 good fortune lo capture iua fair tiglit with hook aud line. 

 Its dimensions were: From tip of nose to tip of tail, six feet 

 two inches; from the extremity of one enormously developed 

 pectoral fin to the extremity of the other, five feet eight and 

 one-half inches; weight, 136 pounds. Its large 'bulging 

 eyes, uncouth rhomboidal shape, audlongflexibieta.il, gave 

 it anything but a fish-like appearance, and made up a tout 

 eiisembte that was extremely hideous, Tbe fish I have been 

 speaking of have it single spike at the base of the tail, and 

 from the limited means at my command for obtaining such 

 information, I concluded them to be &<//« trggon- 



if any of my readers wish to get information as to the 

 edible properties of this fish, I refer them to Col. H., of the 

 Island. He, burning to make a discovery in gastronomy 

 that would pleasantly astonish his fellow gourmets, had a 

 steak cut from one of the fins, and served it up the follow- 

 ing morning as the first course at a breakfast to a few 

 friends, IPs guests were not hunting for discoveries in 

 that line, and, after being helped, they patiently waited for 

 the Colonel's verdict on the newly discovered delicacy before 

 bestowing their meed of praise upon his deserving head. 

 He took a generous mouthful upon his fork, placed it where 

 he thought it was going to do the most good, and, with an 

 ecstatic smile, began munching away at it. The smile 

 quickly began to fade, and soon died away entirely. Then 

 his face assumed a sickly green color, aud remarking, "I 

 am not overfond of rich 'pastry for breakfast. ' he left the 

 room amid the roars of his guests. The new discovery was 

 afterward tried upon a dog, but be. less reckless than the 

 Colonel, would not even deign to put a bit of it iu his mouth. 



A short distance, off the southern end of San Lorenzo 

 there lies a small, barren, uninhabited island called Fronton, 

 and here large quantities of sea. lions daily resort to bask in 

 the warm sunshine. This fact we had noted several times 

 while out sailing, and had particularly observed one spot 

 Where they might be my Closed approached undercover. 

 This we resolved to lake advantage of. and a few days since 



we made up a party ol six, suitably armed, took poe 

 ,, •; ii,. H v ailing launch, and got under way for our pro- 

 posed shooting ground. As we intended tu be gone most of 

 the day we earriea n loal of bread, to stave oil all danger of 

 water famine, and the Doctor thoughtfully compounded a 

 few mild prescriptions, in suitably labeled bottlts, that gaunt 

 hunger might be balked should he attack our jolly crew. 



