FOREST AND STREAM 
1183 
FOUR GREAT GAME FISH OF AMERICA <p 
YOU MAY NOT AGREE WITH THE SELECTION 
BUT HERE IS THE CHOICE OF A NOTED ANGLER 
By Kit Clarke. 
T HE other day, or perhaps the other week, I 
was turning the small pages of a little book 
published more than 250 years ago and 
written by a London merchant named Walton. 
The book in my hand was one of the first edi¬ 
tion of The Compleat Angler, published in 1653, 
and I handled it very tenderly. Turning the 
pages slowly I came upon a paragraph in which 
the author demonstrated that the great law¬ 
giver Moses, the friend of God, was an angler. 
And I think the angler of to-day must be a 
friend of God, or how could he be an angler? 
In all the wide range of human endeavor, in the 
presence of the most forceful exhorter of any 
creed, no power exists that will so permeate the 
human soul with a reverence and love for our 
Creator as will the impressive solitude of the 
wilderness in which the angler pursues his de¬ 
lightful way. 
A thousand times have I sat beside a rippling 
water-brook far from the haunts and conten¬ 
tions of men and felt every fibre of my system 
thrill with the unspeakable joy of God’s kindly 
presence. The splendid, impressive solitude, the 
luxuriant foliage, the happy birds, the caroling 
stream at my feet filled my soul with soothing 
peace, the peace that passeth understanding. 
Go to such places, my young friend, and you 
too, old friend, go there, and with a guileless 
fishing rod in your hand sit by the side of a 
rippling woodland brook and hold communion 
with your Creator. One such hour will make a 
better man of you, a better son, a better father, 
a better citizen, a better lover of your fellow- 
man and of your Creator. 
And then, with a gladsome heart, steal gently 
down the stream and follow the ancient art, for 
it is an art, of angling. Indeed fishing for trout 
in a mountain brook is to-day a fine art in the 
highest degree, and the pretty trout in these 
waters are, in my estimation, the most beautiful 
of God’s created living things. And the trout 
are as refined in their desires as are the human 
beings who seek them since they dwell in the 
rarest and sweetest surroundings. 
Trout may possibly be taken with clumsy and 
offensive tackle but light, artistic and delicate 
tackle will always prove the most successful. 
The archaic legend of the farmer lad steadily 
yanking out trout with a bean pole while the 
angler stood by with fine tackle and no fish 
don’t operate any more and never had any basis 
of truth. 
And the painted and hook-decorated chunks 
of wood which it is alleged black bass just adore 
will never receive the slightest attention from 
trout, since they have always enjoyed respectable 
food. I have seen these modern devices in 
stores made from a lump of wood vari-colored 
and freighted with numerous hooks that appear 
to me deadly beyond description, but have never 
made use of one and never will. I am glad to 
be told that only the grosser of the finny race 
become victims to the deadly device. To me 
they are on a par with gang-hooks, dynamite, 
spawn bait and set lines, and have no place in 
the gentle art of angling. 
No rod weighing over five ounces has any 
place in trout fishing, while my four-ounce rod 
will land any fish I may hook in a brook. Upon 
the wall of my home hangs a handsomely pre¬ 
served trout that weighed over nine poun< 
which I captured with a five-ounce rod. The 
day has gone by when taking fish depends upon 
heavy tackle, for now fish whose weights run 
into pounds, not ounces, are constantly being 
landed on lines of frail cotton sewing thread. 
It is such methods which make angling a true 
art—not a matter of brute force or strength— 
the knowledge of handling the rod, reel and 
line with skill, and not mere muscular power 
in man and tackle to jerk the “continental stuff¬ 
ing” out of a fish and land it over in the next 
county. The rising generation of anglers are 
becoming imbued with this fact and their 
pleasure will be monumental in following the 
art, and at the same time afford the fish equal 
terms of hostility. May the best sport win. 
Whole acres of alleged information have been 
written with a view of instructng the novice in 
the art of angling and most of it has been 
wasted. Theories by the yard have been ad¬ 
vanced to but little purpose. The right way, 
the only way to acquire a knowledge of angling 
is to sit quietly (be sure of that) upon the bank 
of a stream and intently watch a sportsman 
hook, play and land a trout. Follow this method 
a few times and more will be learned than from 
all that has ever been written upon the subject. 
After a few experiences of this kind secure 
a light rod, reel and line and go into an open 
field and practice casting a line, and here, too, 
a few words from an experienced angler will 
be invaluable. It is really not difficult to acquire 
the art or knack of laying out the line accur¬ 
ately to the distance required in trout fishing, 
while long distance casting is merely display 
and will never catch fish. These long-distance 
casting tournaments have always appealed to 
me as buncombe—child’s play, and silly in the 
extreme. When you have learned how to lay 
out a line, attach a leader and flies to the line 
and practice upon a sheet of water. A little 
labor of this kind will soon give confidence to 
the novice and the rest will be easy, for with 
confidence at command skill and success are a 
mere matter of experience. 
It has been many years since I have taken 
trout by any method except with flies, for I do 
not like bait fishing in any form, and in recent 
years have used but these seven flies: Brown 
Hackle, Montreal, Cahill, Coachman, Black 
Gnat, Grizzly King and Professor, and if these 
will inveigle no trout no other flies will do so. 
I use the same flies for bass, with Caddis and 
Red Ibis, but of course in a larger size. 
Don’t wait until you grow old to follow this 
fine sport, but begin in early life, and the older 
you grow the more you will admire and enjoy 
it. The angling instinct blossoms early in the 
human being, as I can testify because of an in¬ 
cident that occurred close to myself. When 
my children were young our summers were 
passed in a cottage beside the pretty Ramapo 
River in New Jersey, and bass were often taken 
from the stream and are yet. In a deep hole 
in the river near my home I had located a fine 
bass and spent two hours of an afternoon in 
a vain effort to cajole a bite but the rascal was 
too wise and simply treated me with haughty 
contempt. 
While at supper, my son, aged five years, 
who had often watched me while fishing, took 
the baited rod and in a few moments rushed 
in with a triumphant smile upon his face and 
the bass hugged to his breast, exclaiming: “I 
got him, papa, but he tried awful to bite me.” 
The bass weighed three pounds, and while I 
do not yet know how the boy managed to land 
him I can vouch for the fact that he has caught 
a great many since then. 
A bass of that size can put up a peppery 
fight and even tax a man’s efforts to land him, 
especially with a very light rod, as this was, 
and I have often wondered how the lad would 
have succeeded had the fish been a trout, for 
I consider the trout a better fighter than the 
bass—an opinion based upon much experience 
and a careful study of the methods of each 
when hooked with the same tackle. 
I have never known an angler who was not 
a gentleman, an upright, honest, good man, and 
I remember, when I was in business in New 
York, an application for credit from a business 
man living in a small town in New Hampshire. 
Inquiry was made and the first reply was very 
conservative and added that the man was ad¬ 
dicted to going fishing, indeed was a most en¬ 
thusiastic angler, the best in the town. That 
settled it, and without hesitation his name went 
upon our books with the full credit limit asked. 
The old friends of Forest and Stream will 
recall that momentous question, and regarding 
which no satisfactory conclusion has ever been 
reached; who struck Billy Patterson? It will 
be even more difficult to decide—-which is the 
gamest fish? 
The lover of the heroic brook trout will stand 
by the little speckled warrior until the last 
armed foe expires. 
The angler who prefers the black bass will 
rise up and fight under the banner of the 
bronze-back slugger until the last enemy flees. 
The follower of the stately salmon will take 
up the pen in behalf of this splendid fish and 
oceans of ink will flow to prove its monu¬ 
mental superiority. 
Along will come the surf-bait-caster and 
demonstrate conclusively that the striped bass 
is actually and alone the monarch of the waters. 
What are we going to do about it? 
There is only one way out, and instead of 
giving all the credit to a single fish make it a 
quartette of equal power, call them the four 
great game fish, place all upon an even level, 
crown each with equal glory and never admit 
any other fish to the honored circle. 
Possibly that ocean pirate, the blue fish, will 
crave admission. Let him crave until his gills 
turn yellow. 
Doubtless the mascalonge, the tarpon, the 
tuna, the channel bass, the drums and others 
will knock at the door for a “place in the sun.” 
Into the soup with the entire bunch, and most 
of them will afford a corking fine chowder. 
The diploma of honor belongs to the four 
game fish named, since all, among their other 
rare qualities, rise to the fly, and no fish that 
swims displays more skill, strategy, endurance 
or courage. 
(The Fish and Fishing Department, with 
Hints, Questions and Answers, will he found 
continued on page 1202.) 
