188 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Sept. 5, 1896. 
tackle, and have lost more lines and leaders than you can 
imagine, besides having the rod jerked out of their hands, 
bending the crank of the reel and doing damage gene- 
rally. They attempt to reel in the fish, and only the 
most expert of them can get their hand away from the 
crank in time, and a number of them have bad smashed 
fingers and terribly skinned hands in consequence. The 
first time I hooked a fish I caught two or three heavy licks 
on my thumb before I could get it away from the reel 
handle, and it was four or five days before I could use 
that hand again. In fact, after I caught the first fish it 
was a whole week before I could get my hands into their 
normal condition. 
•'There are many amusing incidents in connection with 
fishing for these vicious fish, and I must tell you of one 
that occurred during the first few days when I was still- 
fishing for tarpon, and before I learned that it was neces- 
sary to troll for them. The morning of thp day that I 
was to go down to the bay I telephoned to Mr, John Gray, 
the storekeeper of the place, requesting him to employ a 
first-class oarsman and good boat for me, and have the 
man procure fifteen or twenty mullet. He telephoned 
that everything would be in readiness and everything 
first-class. 
"I arrived that night at 8 o'clock and asked for the oars- 
man. He appeared and said he had sixteen handsome 
mullet. I asked him if he was equal to tarpon fishing, 
and he said he was. Next morning at 5 o'clock I had my 
coffee, and before getting into the boat I looked into the 
well and all the mullet were dead. It is diflS.oult to catch 
mullet in the daytime, but I hired two men and started 
them off for mullet. In two hours' time they returned 
with two measly little fellows, but I was anxious to fi h 
and concluded to use them rather than wait longer, so 
employed two other men to look for bait and started. 
The boat was of hard pine, four times as thick as it 
should have been, and probably weighed 600lbs. 
UB. OtiEVELAKD AND HIS TARPON. 
The holes for the oarlocks were rotten, and after 
every other stroke on Such a matter the oars would 
jump out. The wind was high and the current strong, 
and before we reached the tarpon ground I made up my 
mind that my man was no oarsman and knew nothing 
about handling a boat, and told him so. We arrived at 
the place to fish, and I told him to put the bow of tbe 
boat by a bulkhead and hang on to it, and as soon as a tar- 
pon took my hook to let go, grab his oare, and pull for his 
life as I might direct. During the time I was sitting and 
waiting for a fish I continued to warn tbe man about 
being prepared to move promptly, to keep his oars at 
hand, and also narrated a number of accidents and sud- 
den deaths that I had heard of while tarpon fishing; that 
any awkwardness on his part would not only drown me, 
but drown him, I did not look to see what effect my 
words had on the man, as I was paying strict attention to 
my fishing. In n short time a huge tarpon took my hook 
and went off at forty miles an hcur._ I shouted to the 
man to let go and pull for his life in the direction the fish 
was going. I must confess that I was so excited myself 
that I thought we were going after the fish, but soon 
recognized the fact that my line was leaving my reel too 
fast if we were moving at all. After the tarpon had taken 
aU the line and had nearly taken the rod and reel, I gave 
a jerk to break the line and save my rod, and then looked 
around at my young man, and he was holding to the 
bulkhead with a death grip, and as the fish disappeared 
with my line for good he remarked, 'Gosh I wasn't he a 
big one?' You can imagine with what indignation I ex- 
pressed my views of the young man as a tarpon fisher- 
man, but his reply was such that I could only laugh. 
When I asked why he did not let go of the bulkhead when 
I told him to do so he said: 'I don't know nothin' about 
tarpon fishing, but I do know I ought not to have taken 
this job. Why, Mr. Cleveland, if I had let go of this bulk- 
bead we would both be in the bottom of the sea by this 
time.' I concluded he was not the kind of oarsman for 
me, and packed my bag and went home. 
"It excites the best of them to get hold of these big fish. 
I now have a sea captain to row me, a man about fifty, 
competent in every way to manage a boat, but he becomes 
so excited when rowing after a fish that he often loses his 
head and pulls in the wrong direction. 
"I have got a fresh lot of tackle to-day and sent it down 
to a friend who has a cottage near the fishing ground. 
This gentleman, Mr. Henry Henoke, a merchant of Hous- 
ton, never cared for fishing, but has been out several 
times with me and became so enthused that he is now the 
most enthusiastic fisherman I know of in this country. 
He goeSaOUt every'day and hook? hSiXt a dozen tarpon, bu 
as yet has not been fortunate enough to land one. He 
says he has become expert in using the rod and reel, but 
I notice he breaks every line and leader he gets, and his 
hand is so battered with the reel handle that he carries it 
in a sling most of tbe time. He is a man of large means 
and he says he will spend the balance of his life and every 
dollar he has until he kills a tarpon. Every time I go 
down and find his hand freshly battered I know he is hav- 
ing lots of fun, even if he gets no tarpon. He has staying 
qualities and will succeed in the end if he does not lose all 
his fingers, You will never know what real sport is until 
you comedown here and fish for tarpon," I think the 
time has arrived for Mr. Cleveland to explain his mode of 
fishing for tarpon, as it is so unlike the style practiced in 
Florida. He says in this letter that he began by still-fish- 
ing before he knew it was necessary to troll for them. It 
seems like a waste of raw material to have half a dozen 
fish strike in a day and not kill one of them, and I have 
yet to see the objection to letting the tarpon gorge the 
bait and hook so that it will be hooked in tbe gullet below 
the plated mouth. A. N. Cheney. 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
More About the Grayllngr. 
Chicago, III., Aug, 23. — I am advised of one grayling, 
a very large one, being taken on the Little Manistee River 
in Michigan this season, the only one I can trace to that 
stream this year. The Manistee seems better, for Mr. V. 
E. Montague, of Traverse City, writes me quite encoura- 
gingly of that water. He says: 
"Reading in Forest and Stream that you have lost one 
grayling, I hasten to put you on its spoor, but you had bet- 
ter be diligent or some one else will have accomplished its 
destruction, 
"A party returned from the Manistee a few days ago 
and report having taken about fifty grayling in a week's 
time. They left one in the river for Forest and Stream, 
and if you want him I will locate him as nearly as possi- 
ble," 
Mr. Montague adds the following interesting news in 
regard to the Boardman River, which has attained a great 
reputation this year as a rainbow trout stream. " His 
opinion that the rainbow is a gamier fish than the brook 
trout may be founded unconsciously on the fact that they 
are heavier on the average, and so harder to hold. Mr, 
Montague states: 
"Some rainbow trout of 4 and even 4jlb8. have been 
taken this season. They are more plenty and far more 
gamy than the native brook trout, and while not of quite 
so good flavor are good enough for the Joneses. 
"I have only succeeded lately in hooking five, and all 
of them were when it was too dark to see to handle them 
successfully, consequently I lost three of them. The two 
I got weighed 2 and S^lbs, respectively. Talk about sporti 
they can jump higher, faster and with more fury than 
any other fish I ever handled, 
"J, A. Montague, his two sons, Prof, Gruson, Dean of 
Mathematics in the Lewis Institute, and Dr. Millner, of 
Grand Rapids, have just returned from a month's cruise 
to the Agawa River, Lake Superior, and report trout fish- 
ing only too good." 
Amons: the Bass. 
Mr. C. R. Gillett, of this city, has been having some 
very nice sport with the big-mouths at Douglas, Mich,, 
lately. On Aug. 15 he took twenty-fom-, which weighed 
631bs., and the day after that he took eighteen, weighing 
511bs., certainly a very nice catch, Mr. Gillett says he 
takes the boat from Chicago to Saugatuck, across the 
lake, and goes thence to Douglas, where he gets good ac- 
commodations and, as it would seem, good fishing. 
Mr, E. S, Whitaker, of Carthage, Ohio, writes me a 
nice letter saying he is glad to see that I once in a while 
go fishing with his old angling companion Mr, H. L. 
Stanton, of the Natchaug Silk Co, Mr, Whitaker says 
he has fished many a time with Mr, Stanton among the 
Lake Erie islands and also on the St, Lawrence, He re- 
calls that one day when a string of boats caught the 
total of 377 bass, weighing 4071bs., himself and Mr. Stan- 
ton were high boat. He very rightly describes Mr. Stan- 
ton as a prince of good fellows, and wishes he could go 
fishing with him again once in a while as he once did. 
Deep-Water Trolling Devices. 
In a recent interesting article on the deep-water troll- 
ing practiced in Lake Tahoe, the writer of the same men- 
tioned the fact that a copper fishing line was the usual 
thing in those waters. It may be curious information to 
learn that the idea of a copper line is not found alone in 
that region, but also much further to the East. Last 
week, on a trip over the St. Clair Flats in the beautiful 
steam yacht Wanda, belonging to Mr. Oren Scotten, a 
wealthy sportsman of Detroit, who had out a party of 
friends, I saw on board the boat some large reels of cop- 
per wire line used in deep-water trolling in the deep and 
swift channels of those waters. These lines were rigged 
for the chugs, or deep trolling devices, common in those 
waters, and carried a weight of lead and swivel amount- 
ing to a pound or two, besides the attached short lines 
which carried out the baits behind the chug, one of 
which baits I noted to be a phantom minnow. The 
method of using this deep troll is to row slowly up the 
stream and let the lead drag on the bottom, the current 
carrying out the baits, the lower of which, the phantom 
minnow, is called a "McGinty bait." The wire line is 
used because it "cuts the water better," I was told. No 
doubt it is less apt to snarl and snag up the ponderous 
and unwieldy rig to which it is attached. I could see no 
sport to this kind of fishing, and this was freely admitted, 
but it was said that this was the only way to do much 
with the pickerel and bass, which bite low in the swift 
water. The wire line was used as a hand line and no 
attempt was made to run it on a rod. 
Singularly apropos of the subject of lines and rigs for 
deep trolling was tUe visit at this office the other day, soon 
after my return from Detroit, of a gentleman who does 
considerable deep trolling in the upper Wisconsin lakes 
for lake trout, which fish is only to be taken by such low 
down methods, so to speak. This gentleman is Mr, Car- 
ter, assistant engineer of the Chicago & Northwestern 
R. R. at Chicago, a very ardent angler and big game hunt- 
er. Mr. Carter brought up the subject himself, and told 
me of a certain device which he had perfected by means 
of which one can hook his fish deep down on a trolling 
chug, and afterward play him on his rod quite independ- 
ently of the t^yolling n§. lim I thought o»e of the most 
ingenious little things I have seen for many a day, and 
the only criticism which arises to one's mind is that 
it implies the use of two lines, which run down deep into 
the water close together and which consequently might 
get twisted together, in which case the device might not 
work very surely. In this connection it occurs to me 
that Mr. Carter would better take up the use of the copper 
line, as that would not be so apt to cling and tangle with 
another line. 
Mr, Carter's device is that of an ordinary chugging rig, 
with the usual swivels for the carrying of the baited line 
back of the chug. This baited line, as is well known, is 
ordinarily attached to the chug, so that in playing a fieti 
the whole machine, weighing 2 or 31bs. in some cases, has 
to be pulled along with the fish, of course forbidding all 
idea of sport, Mr. Carter gets rid of this weight and plays 
his fish on the rod by cutting away from the chug as soon 
as the fish is hooked. He manages this by using no short 
bait line behind the chug at all, but using for that the 
end of his rod line. The chug is dropped down as usual, 
and the rod line goes down with it. At the end of the swivel 
where the bait line is commonly fastened he has a ring 
something like the standing guide on a rod, and into this 
he puts a little split pin with an eye in the top, which fits 
in loosely enough so that it can be pxilled out with a 
sharp jerk on the rod. When the chug is dropped into 
the water the rod line is run through this little eyed pin, 
and plays freely through it. Just above the snell of the 
hook there is a washer fixed large enough to pass through 
this eyed pin. When a bite is felt the fish is allowed t6 
go until the time for striking comes, when it is struck on 
the rod just as though there were no chug on at all. If 
the jerk on the line in doing this does not free the eyed 
pin, the line is tightened until the fixed washer comes up 
against the eye, when a pull is sure to pull the eyed pin 
up out of the ring which fastens it to the chug. The line 
is then free. The angler plays his fish as though it were 
struck in the usual fashion, and on netting the fish the 
little eyed pin of course is found resting on top of the 
washer, upon which it has slipped down. The pin weighs 
nothing, and does not interfere in the least with the sport 
of the rod and reel. When the bait is to be dropped 
again the chug is pulled up, the eyed pin again put in 
place and the whole is dropped down again. The pin is 
kept in place in the ring on the swivel by the spring of 
the compressed legs of the pin, but it does not take 
much force to free it. Mr, Carter was so much im- 
pressed with the necessity of getting rid of that chunk 
of lead if he was to have any fun at Iiis fishing that he 
has long been experimenting with similar devices. His 
first idea was to free the line by means of a peculiar 
knot in the line, which could be freed at the swivel point 
by a sharp jerk, just as the eyed pin is freed, but he found 
that the wetting of the line sometimes tightened up the 
knot so it would not slip easily. This knot was in the 
form of a half sheep-shank, thrown over the bight of 
the loop through the swivel. Its tying would be difficult 
to describe, and it is not so efficacious as the pin and eye. 
The latter device is not on the market, and so far as M^. 
Carter is concerned it could no doubt be made by any 
one who liked. It promises at least a faint amelioration 
of the dismal work of deep trolling. 
Kingfishers Heard From. 
The camp of the Kingfishera for 1896 is, as I presume 
Kingfisher would say, "busted for the season." That 
worthy angler and his friends have passed to the South 
on their way home. I woS so unlucky as not to meet 
them at Chicago, either when they were going into camp 
or coming out. Kingfisher leaves on my desk the follow- 
ing brief but speaking note, which I must accept instead 
of the pleasure of a personal meeting: 
''Bre'r Hough: Called to 'shake,' but found you out. 
Sorry I didn't see you. Sincerely, Kingfisher, 
"P. S. — Had a good time. Caught 519 bass and twenty- 
five maskinonge." 
Arkansas Fish and Game. 
Mr. Jos. Irwin, of Little Rock, Ark., writes that the 
quail crop of his vicinity will be the best for years, and 
that there will be good turkey shooting also. He has en- 
joyed the finest sort of dove shooting and bass fishing 
lately with his friend John Pemberton, on the farm of 
the latter along the Arkansas, and says he shall soon go 
out and try his new Mullins "get there" metal ducking 
boat on the ^ucks and geese. That is a very happy hunt- 
ing ground, central Arkansas, and long may it remain 
so, E. HotTGH. 
1206 BoYCE BoiLDiNS, Chicago. 
The Canadian Salmon Season. 
Campbellton, N. B., Aug. 23.— One of the most suc- 
cessful years for salmon angling on the Restigouche has 
closed. Having had a severe accident early in June, from 
which I have not yet recovered, I only killed twelve fish. 
All the lower pools panned out extra well all the month 
of June. The upp^r pools never fail in July, fish gather- 
ing and lying in theaa until ready to spawn. There were 
two reasons for this catch : salmon came in force on the 
first of June, and the water in the river was in prime 
condition and the slight rains held it up, as well as 
slightly coloring it. Salmon were in no hurry to go on 
up, but played round like kittens. Fine scores were made 
wherever a lay spot existed. Large fish also were in 
order; 36lbs, was reported fifteen times, a few of 39 and 
40lb8. 
I see you have Mr. Mitchell's score of twenty days in 
June, fifty-six salmon, average 33ilbs,, in all l,347^1b8. 
This I believe to be the lowest record on the river, the 
same pools last year only getting ten fish. It is very 
difficult to obtain correct scores. Restigouche Salmon 
Club members' scores are recorded, and they are limited 
to eight fish per day; riparian owners can catch as many 
as they choose. 
The Upilquitch River fished well; over 100 fish were 
taken by one party. The Metapedia River also had fair 
fishing on it and big fish, Mr. Gould and the Restigouche 
Salmon Club were the only parties on it. The Cascapedia 
Club or syndicate soon got their complement of forty fish 
each, some of them returning to the Restigouche to finish 
the season. 
I cannot say the total catch of our anglers, but the 
guardians all unite in saying there are thousands of fish 
in the river; if so, I fear the fighting and continuous turn- 
ing over of the spawning beds will destroy the greater 
portion of the ova. There will be some three millions of 
ova in th^ batohery here this fall. JoftN Mowat. 
