
A MATTER OF A MASCALONGE 63 
theory is not without adherents, myself 
among them. 
On this particular day and for the two 
previous the wind had been coming from 
the east. The house, the conditions con- 
sidered, proved more attractive than the 
lake, and I may as well add that Emile, who 
is a conscientious fellow when it comes to 
taking your dollars, had comforted me with 
the opinion that it would be a waste of time 
to venture out. When I learned that two 
gentlemen from St. Louis had taken one 
eight-pounder, two weighing six pounds 
each and two smaller ones that did not 
come up to the legal limit from Lake Julia 
the previous afternoon, and in the face of a 
strong east wind, then I had determined to 
disregard the accepted theory that a ’longe 
will not strike while the wind blows from 
the east. 
Despite the guide’s efforts to shift the 
wind, it continued from the east. It stirred 
Big Lake almost to the seasick point, and 
as the sun penetrated an occasional break 
in the heavy clouds, it reflected more rad- 
iantly the silvery beauty of the whitecaps. 
We had reached the upper end of a long 
bar at the head of Big Lake. Silently we 
paralleled the shoal water along its east side, 
nestling close to the weeds on its crest. We 
were near its end and our last hope was 
waning when the outer line, my own, tight- 
ened, and the spool rapidly played against 
my thumb, as the boat, of its own impetus 
and washed by the waves, drew out my line. 
I intuitively set the hook. 
““A submerged deadhead,” ventured the 
consoling guide, bringing the boat to a 
standstill. 
Not a movement—not the faintest mani- 
festation of life. The boat was backed a- 
half stroke, the line meanwhile being taut. 
Then something moved. It moved again 
and the tip of my short rod was drawn six 
inches nearer the water’s surface. The 
guide did not wait for orders, for he, too, 
had seen the movement. Shifting his legs 
as a signal for business, and with.a stout 
stroke of the right oar, he headed for deeper 
water. | 
The fish —for I was now certain it - 
was something animate—responded slowly, 
sullenly. We were now fifty feet from the 
bar and still nothing to indicate the species 
of my catch. As we found deeper water, 
down went the line, for as yet there was only 
sulky submission. 
“It’s a big pike,” declared my com- 
panion, which opinion the guide fortified, 
as he nervously shifted his legs and bent to 
the oars. 
Then the fish refused .to be led and lay 
inertly at the lake’s bottom. I had, in the 
interim, regained the line the drifting boat 
had played out. Then a movement, a chal- 
lenge, and the line cut the water as if 
attached to some powder-propelled missile. 
Another interval of passiveness, of which 
I took advantage to gather in a little line. 
I was still working the reel-handle when 
that unknown something moved, fairly 
darted to the surface. | 
Yard by yard the tiny silk line left the 
water, until, ye gods, a ’longe—defiant, 
tenacious, assertive, its eyes glistening and 
its massive jaws distended—leaped into air 
some seventy feet away, described a quarter 
circle and dropped back to do battle in his 
sacred lair. 
“He will go fifteen pounds or better,” 
exclaimed the now excited boatman. 
A momentary stop and the fish was off 
again; not, perhaps, for more than thirty 
feet, yet it seemed twice thirty, after a glance 
at the little line remaining on the spool; 
for, not a half-dozen yards were left me. I 
tried coaxing, but the mascalonge reso- 
lutely refused to be cajoled. A sudden 
impulse seized it, not to do my bidding, and 
charge the boat, but dash it did, and in the 
opposite direction. 
“‘Back water,” was the laconic command, 
and the oarsman’s alertness alone saved me 
defeat, and forefended the freedom the fish 
so desperately sought. 
I tried my reel handle; it yielded. Foot 
by foot I drew the fish nearer the boat. I 
already felt the delights of victory, but I 
reckoned unwisely, for, another run, with 
just time for my hand to clear the handle, 
and the mascalonge was again in the air. 
The sun momentarily peeped through a 
cloud, making more lustrous the rose-tinted 
belly and the round black spots on the back- 
ground of white. 
The much-coveted moment had come— 
my camera within reach and the sun at my 
back—but the mascalonge fell from view 
