DEVIL-FISHING IN THE GULF STREAM 
189 
looking mouth, armed with a pair of pow¬ 
erful horny jaws, shaped much like a 
parrot’s beak, atopped with two diaboli¬ 
cal eyes set close together, which are posi¬ 
tively capable of sending forth a demo¬ 
niac glare when the creature is angered. 
The grotesque head is mounted on a some¬ 
what oval body, from which radiate eight 
arms, usually united at the body base by a 
membrane. The arms or tentacles are 
provided with rows of suckers, with 
which it clasps and clings to its prey with 
uncanny strength and quickness. 
As a rule, it will not give battle to man 
unless angered or injured, but when chal¬ 
lenged will fight to the last, doing its best 
to pull the object of its wrath beneath the 
surface of the waters. 
THE START FOR THE HUNTING 
GROUNDS 
From the Florida reef the run' across 
the Gulf Stream to the nearest islands of 
the Bahamas is a matter of about 50 miles. 
We started from Miami Beach at noon, 
guests of James A. Allison, on board his 
sea-going motor yacht LApache^ with a 
25-foot motor-driven fishing boat bobbing 
along behind in tow. 
In the party of fishermen were Mr. 
Allison, Captain Charles H. Thompson, 
of Miami, the internationally known au¬ 
thority on the fish of the east coast of 
Florida; Commodore Charles W. Kotcher, 
A. G. Batchelder, and the writer, to¬ 
gether with Captain Peterson and the 
crew of the UApache. 
Assisted by the northeastward pressure 
of the ever-moving Gulf Stream, we 
made splendid progress, and that evening 
cast anchor behind Bimini, a tiny isle 
which rests like a jeweled feather on a 
summer sea, the westernmost outrider of 
the Lower Bahama group. Bimini is a 
quaint little coral dot a few miles long 
and a quarter of a mile wide, quite cov¬ 
ered with clusters of coconut palms and 
tropical plants, its tallest headland rising 
but a few feet above the surface of the 
old Atlantic—an out-of-the-world spot 
then peopled by a few score of Bahama 
negroes, who eke out a precarious exist¬ 
ence by fishing, gathering shells, and, in a 
small way, cultivating sisal, the fibrous 
plant from which hemp rope is made. 
Approaching the island, the ocean bot¬ 
tom for miles offshore is carpeted with 
snow-white sand, and so clear is the 
water that there is no difficulty in study¬ 
ing the vast marine gardens 30 to 50 feet 
below the surface. 
Due to the white sand beneath the sea 
and the glorious blue of the sky, with the 
ever-changing cloud effects overhead, the 
bewildering gradations of color to be 
seen in these waters challenge descrip¬ 
tion and fill the heart of the artist with 
despair, although he paint with the in¬ 
spired brush of genius. 
OVERSEAS CEREMONY 
The Bahamas being colonies of Great 
Britain, of course her authority extends 
even to this little dot. Therefore, Bimini 
boasts a port officer—an English gen¬ 
tleman, who also serves as the Crown 
Commissioner, Police Magistrate, Cus¬ 
toms Collector, and Consular Official 
for examination of passports, as well 
as being physician and school teacher 
to the island’s inhabitants. In short, he 
is the Twentieth Century Pooh Bah, 
who, with much courtesy and dignity, 
meets the foreign craft when it drops 
anchor upon arrival, inspects all qualify¬ 
ing documents, then sadly waves adieu 
from the beach when the visitor sails 
away. 
Up to the day of our arrival, there 
hadn’t been a piece of fresh beef or a bit 
of butter on the table of the Crown’s 
Representative for nine months, much 
less that of a single one of Bimini’s 
humbler inhabitants, for the isle is more 
than a hundred miles from Nassau, and 
even the mail-boat was conspicuous by 
its absence during the period of the Eu¬ 
ropean war, when enemy submarines 
were in South Atlantic waters. 
THE SEA SUPPLIES THE LARDER 
So it is that the sea furnishes food for 
the Biminites, supplemented by a few 
vegetables, ffour, and salt meats, when 
they can get supplies from Nassau. 
Conch, the marine animal which inhabits 
the beautiful spiral shell, so fashionable 
as a parlor ornament a generation ago, 
is the chief article of food, and the na¬ 
tives consume thousands of them each 
year; indeed, it can be considered their 
main article of food. 
After we had received and returned 
the official call of the Crown’s Repre¬ 
sentative, we had visitations alongside 
from several shore boats, manned by 
