528 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Just A Few Stories About Fishing 
Experiences That Forest aad Stream Readers Have Encountered or 
Heard About, and Tell of Here 
It is not always the biggest angler who catches 
the largest fish. Below is presented a picture of 
little Magdalene Covert, aged six, daughter of 
Dr. J. B. Covert of Geneva, New York, smiling 
like the proud little lady she must be to have 
captured by her own efforts a lake trout weigh¬ 
ing ny 2 pounds. Magdalene was doing some 
real fishing from a boat when the big trout seized 
the pearl wobbler at the end of the line. Mag¬ 
dalene held on and got the fish nearly all the 
way to the boat when her father, fearing that 
the fish would come out the victor, grabbed the 
rod and pulled the prize into the boat. It is not 
reported that Magdalene screamed or went 
through the ladylike luxury of fainting. At any 
rate, she won a local trophy of an angling equip¬ 
ment and Forest and Stream is glad to! pay her 
the homage that i? due her. 
THE SILVER KING AT BREAKFAST. 
By F. B. Jones. 
The recent tropical hurricane on and off the 
coast of Texas discloses some of the reasons 
why that is the fisherman’s paradise which I tried 
to describe in my Fighting Red Fish letter in 
your July number; these storms are continually 
cutting out and making new channels, new bot¬ 
toms in the numerous bays, lakes and lagoons, 
along the five or six hundred miles of Texas 
coast line, while the ten or twelve immense rivers 
which drain Texas are daily discharging and de¬ 
positing vast stores of fresh food upon those 
new bottoms. This very naturally attracts im¬ 
mense numbers of all varieties and sizes of fish, 
from a minnow to a whale, a mullet to a musk- 
allonge, all of which can easily find the very 
environment best adapted to their individual na¬ 
tures and nowhere in the eastern part of the 
United States have I been able to find the fight¬ 
ing fish in such variety, such size and in such 
numbers as in the coast country of Texas with 
Galveston or Matagorda bays as central points. 
Shortly after the storm of 1900, old man 
Kellerman and I were camped out at the mouth 
of Char Creek, which empties into Galveston Bay 
some forty or fifty miles N. N. W. of the City of 
Galveston; while preparing breakfast one morn¬ 
ing we were attracted to the shore by a con¬ 
tinued loud sloshing in the water and witnessed 
a sight that my limited vocabulary cannot justly 
describe. The Silver King was at home, at 
breakfast and in all his magnificence—as playful 
and as active as a kitten—seemingly he would 
dive to the very bottom of the bay, seize his 
victim (a large mullet) a.id emerging from the 
water with a rush, throw his prey high in the 
air, as a dog would a rat, fling himself clear out 
of the water and while still in the air, grab his 
breakfast and disappear with the slash that lead 
us to such unusual sight. Not only our tarpon 
but dozens of the monsters from six to eight 
feet in length would be in the air clear and free 
above the water at one and the same time; not 
only one time but for over an hour was the feast 
in progress and when one who recognizes the 
beauties of the Silver King, when just taken 
from the water, understands this magnificant sight 
was just as the sun appeared above the horizon, 
he can possibly imagine the glories of such a 
scene. I cannot decribe it but will venture the 
assertion that no where on this continent will 
you be able to witness such an inspiring sight 
any oftener than in the location described above. 
Kellerman and I were seine fishing and the vast 
school of tarpon kept us out of the water for a 
Little Miss Covert and Her Big Lake Trout. 
week. They tore our six hundred fathom 
seine almost to shreds in our first effort to take 
them. 
As to taking them with a line—having fished 
the coast line from Gutican to South Carolina and 
taken my share of tarpon at all points my great¬ 
est success in numbers and size has been at 
Boliver Point just opposite Galveston in the 
comparatively quiet, still waters formed by the 
Worth Jetties same as three or four miles out 
into the Gulf and at right angle with the coast 
line. Out on the jetties there is or was before 
the storm a fishing pier from which one could 
cast a line and hook a tarpon, shark, red fish or 
trout most any day in the year. My private 
opinion as to the fighting qualities of the tarpon 
is not very light. His notoriety comes from his 
size, his beauty and the publicity given him; cer¬ 
tainly the pull of a hundred pound tarpon is ex¬ 
hilarating but does not inject the elixir of life 
into our system that a dozen other varieties does 
try a red fish—sea bass, a fresh water salmon, 
or a muskallonge and make your own contrast, 
the other varieties named will not suffer. 
WHO WILL SPEAK UP FOR FLORIDA? 
If brother sportsmen living in Florida could 
tender me any information regarding a good 
location in that state, with good hunting and fish¬ 
ing possibilities, I should be glad to receive such 
information, intending to spend the winter in the 
state. I would be particularly interested in in¬ 
formation regarding certain streams along which 
a pleasant trip might be made, with camping in 
view, to be of some months duration. I have 
been greatly interested in the famous Everglades, 
and if such a trip could be made in proximity of 
these, so much the better, for I understand the 
Everglades offer a vast variety of interesting 
points to the outdoorman. But a clear, ordinary 
boat navigable stream would be preferable. 
This trip is made in the interest of Forest and 
Stream, and readers of the magazine living in 
the south would tender me an inestimable 
favour by writing me, in care of this magazine, 
covering the points I have inquired about. 
I should like to meet various sportsmen, and 
intimately study and make clear the sporting con¬ 
ditions in that favored winter country, if so it be. 
Thanking those of the kind readers who will 
come to the aid of a brother sportsman, 
Sincerely and fraternally: 
Robert Page Lincoln. 
THROUGH THE TRAP-SHOOTING 
TOURNAMENT MILL. 
(Continued from page 525) 
number of targets for a day’s shoot. Many- 
veteran shooters there are who can handle 
themselves under any conditions in such a 
manner that they can pay expenses by entering 
the sweepstakes, naturally, at some one’s ex¬ 
pense, but it cost them to season themselves and 
gain this skill and they might argue with reason 
that the less fortunate who are now paying for 
their education will have their innings in the 
years to come. There is a tendency of late to 
do away with sweepstakes and offer more 
trophies under conditions that make it attractive 
to all kind of shooters. It is a tendency that. 
will make the sport more delightful. A club in 
these last days offering many trophies and no- 
sweepstakes will get out as large if not larger 
attendance than the old order of few prizes and 
much money. In the matter of the number of 
targets for a day’s shoot many clubs feel they 
cannot clear expenses with less than 200 birds- 
on the program, but a 150-target program is- 
coming into favor, for it is less tiresome and, 
in the long run the less expensive and less tire¬ 
some program will induce enough more shooters, 
to offset the loss from the sale of the 50 extra 
targets. Fred. O. Copeland. 
Y 
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