236 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Feb. 22, 1913 
Cold Facts and Dry Grins 
By MIQUE WEBB 
{Continued from last zveek.) 
1 DID not have long to wait. Soon 1 had a bite 
that seem to be a heavy one. I gave him 
plenty of time and then struck hard. I felt 
the hook go home, and at the same time felt the 
weight of a fish that made me sit up and take 
notice. There was a little rush, and then a tre¬ 
mendous lunge that caused me to throw both 
thumbs on the thumb stall. I came down hard 
on the line with all my power. I had my pole 
well up and was giving him all the strain I 
could get out of my tackle, but to no avail. He 
seemed to have an engagement somewhere else 
as he made a bee line from me. In his mad 
rush he came to the surface for a moment, and 
we could see that my opponent was a twenty- 
foot shark. Someone yelled, “Save your line!” 
“Cut loose!” etc. I was very busy with both 
hands and could not get out my knife. The 
parson was standing near by, but for some rea¬ 
son did not attempt to interfere, as he was so 
busy laughing or for other reasons he did not 
produce the weapon of severance. That shark 
had an engagement, as I have stated, I think, 
with a dentist in Yucatan, for he did not make 
a turn or bobble while he and I were connected. 
My reel was humming, and from underneath the 
leather there was a dense column of smoke as¬ 
cending from the friction on the line. Momen¬ 
tarily I expected to see it blaze, and believe it 
would have done so but for the fact that the 
whole line had but a few moments before been 
submerged when I was handling the redfish. 
It is astounding how many thoughts can pass 
through the human brain in so short a time 
when that brain is under acute excitement or 
sudden alarm. I thought of a thousand things 
while that line was running off my reel. Main¬ 
ly, however, my thoughts were, what would hap¬ 
pen to Mique when the end came? I knew I had 
fastened the line to the reel barrel, but how? 
Had I tied it around the barrel or had I tied 
a knot in the end of the line as a woman does 
her sewing thread after running it through her 
needle eye? There is a needle eye in the bar¬ 
rel of a reel, you know. I gave it up, but pre¬ 
pared myself for what would come. I braced 
myself against the shock, but fully expected to 
go overboard, and if I did I had made up my 
mind to go on to Yucatan with that shark. It 
was preferable, anyway, to being laughed at. 
The end came suddenly, and with no shock 
at all, but instead a report as loud as the dis¬ 
charge of a pistol. I had tied a knot in the 
end of the line, and when this knot struck the 
eye in the reel barrel, it passed through, being 
water-soaked and much too large for the hole 
it must pass through; it was like the wad out 
of a popgun. My reel was stripped and I had 
absolutely nothing to show for six dollars’ worth 
of the best fishing line I ever used, except a 
pair of slightly scratched thumbs and a very 
dry grin. 
I gazed for a long time at the water that 
could hold a monster, that could hold a fish and 
that could do me as that fish had done. I want 
my readers to remember that previous to this 
time I had never caught anything larger than a 
three-pound bass, hence you can imagine my 
feelings. 
When I turned from my experience I be¬ 
held the parson lying on the boards of the dock, 
rolling from side to side in an agony of laugh¬ 
ter. He had gotten beyond the noise-making 
part of this pleasant occupation. He was now 
like a man with an ague. In his paroxysm he 
was rolling from side to side, and was at times 
very near the edge of the dock. I was exasper¬ 
ated. These fellows had laughed at me until 
my mouth looked as if I had been eating green 
persimmons. I was getting very sore, and must 
confess I lost my head a little. I was getting 
ready to do murder. I dropped my pole and 
empty reel in disgust, but I could not keep my 
eyes off of the parson. He was very near the 
edge of the dock, and it suddenly occurred to 
me, I admit, with some fear at first, that he 
would roll over the edge, and then I didn’t care 
if he did, and then I wished he would, and the 
next moment I was at his side, giving him a 
sudden twist and a push. Over he went, strik¬ 
ing the water lengthways, and with a mighty 
splash. My heart stood still for a moment. 
Could he swim? Yes, for he was at the surface 
in a moment, and I knew he was at home in 
the water. When he went down, his mouth was 
open, and as he came to the surface, he ex¬ 
pectorated a stream of water an inch in diam¬ 
eter and about three feet long, and then struck 
out for the shore with a long, easy stroke, still 
laughing as if he could never be exhausted in 
that nauseous practice. I viewed him with a 
sickening heart, and almost a wish that he had 
never come up. 
“Laugh and the world laughs with you; 
Cry and the world laughs on.” 
I thought of these lines and tried to screw 
up my face into some semblance of a laugh, 
but it was too dry even to produce a substitute. 
My experience made me think of a time 
when I was on the other side of the fence on 
a similar occasion. It was at a summer resort 
near a small country town down South. There 
were some twenty-five or thirty families at the 
resort, and the most of them were there to 
drink the medicinal waters, but there were some 
who had other business on hand, such as look¬ 
ing after the daughters of the afflicted. I be¬ 
longed to the latter class. Fathers and mothers 
were there for their health and their children 
from necessity. Entertainment was scarce. One 
day an advertisement was scattered through the 
hotel, stating that James McFadden would pro¬ 
duce “Hamlet’’ at the town Opera House that 
night. Children five cents; grown-ups ten cents. 
Hamlet at five and ten cents was too cheap to 
miss, and we all decided to go. We went. 
Young ladies and young gentlemen had seats 
in the front of the house, while the old folks 
were in the rear. My sweetheart and I were 
favored with seats in the front row. The 
“Opry” House had formally been a livery stable. 
A stage had been erected in one end, but be¬ 
yond this nothing else had been done toward 
improvement, the whole being so crude that the 
refined senses of the city hotel folks had been 
shocked into laughter. As the majority of the 
girls were at the giggling age, anyhow, it would 
have been hard to keep them from laughing at 
a funeral. The footlights were coal oil lamps 
placed at intervals on the edge of the stage. 
Mr. McFadden came out on the stage, but 
at first we did not recognize him as the actor. 
He was a double-fisted Irishman, with a red 
head and freckled face. His nose did not im¬ 
prove his facial beauty, and looked as if it had 
cost him a great deal of money. He was still 
improving it, as we soon saw that he was about 
half drunk. In addition to his natural beauty, 
a nickel shave had helped a great deal. He 
looked as if his face had had an encounter with 
a barbed wire fence, and the fence had come 
out a good second best. I think he must have 
been shaved with a butcher knife. He was a 
comical object, but entirely serious; the only 
serious person in the house. He balanced him¬ 
self by spreading his legs very near as far apart 
as he could get them and addressed his audience 
as follows: 
“Ladies an’ gent’men—hie—Oi wull now guv 
yer—hie—Ham—hie—fit’s serlilerkoy.” He ac¬ 
cented the Ham in a deep bass voice and let 
out the “fit’s” like escaping steam. We were 
all holding down the laughter as best we could 
up to this point, but now it was too much, and 
we exploded. We could stand no more. Our 
safety valves gave away or the boilers would 
have blown up. 
Mr. McFadden’s face assumed an expression 
of pained surprise. He looked so hurt over the 
interruption that the laughter died away into 
giggles and snickers here and there. We on the 
front bench were suffering. The girls had their 
handkerchiefs stuffed in their mouths, their 
heads hanging down ©r tucked away in the 
crooks of their arms or were looking backward 
or in some way or other were trying to avoid 
a direct gaze at the actor. When the 'hush 
settled on the audience and quiet reigned again, 
he attracted my attention by pointing his index 
finger directly at me, and in angry tones said: 
“What in ’ell yer laffin’ at?” 
