Sept. 26, 1908.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
49? 
one of danger, as the water was deep and 
rough, and I should have let the rod go, but 
my fighting blood was up, *and I gripped 
tighter as I braced back for the last round. 
The strain was too much for the line, and it 
parted, changing the scene from tragic to 
comic for the crowd of fishermen, who had left 
their lines and ran to see me make the fight; 
but as for me it but changed me from fisher¬ 
man to astronomer, the full length of the 
milky way passing at close range before my 
eyes, as my head knocked a dent in the floor 
of the dock when I pitched over backward. 
I recall an incident connected with a shark, 
a near tragedy, that occurred at another time 
and place. On the east coast, where a pier 
extended out quite a distance to sea, every¬ 
body fished for everything one season. Some 
of the fellows finally instituted a continuous 
performance in the shape of a shark line off 
the end of the pier, kept baited day and night. 
The line was long, and the slack was kept 
coiled upon the floor of the pier, and some 
one was generally by to pipe all hands when 
the bait was taken. One day, at the lunch 
hour, the'pier was deserted with the exception 
of one man and the ubiquitous small boy. The 
man was seated about midway, and the boy 
strolling about the outer end of the pier. A 
wild scream from the boy attracted the man's 
attention, and looking toward him he saw that 
he was lying full length upon the pier and ap 
parently being jerked along by some unseen 
agent. Hurrying to his assistance, he found 
the boy’s legs tangled in the coils of the shark 
line, and he was being dragged along, in spite 
of desperate efforts to stay his progress by 
holding on to the cracks in the boards or any¬ 
thing his hands could grip. 
The man’s first act was to grab the line, but 
seeing at once that all his strength did not 
check the fish he set about trying to get the 
boy out of the coil of the rope. Desperately 
he worked, and finally he won, but not until 
the boy had all but gone over into deep water 
and beyond the probable hope of rescue. They 
were a badly shaken pair when they returned 
to tell of their experience. 
Lewis Hopkins, 
[to be concluded. ] 
The Mysterious Tuna. 
Pasadena, Cal., Sept. 19 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: I have received so many letters about 
the tuna, asking why it is not taken that possi¬ 
bly I can answer them all to the extent of my 
guessing in Forest and Stream. 
Up to five or sipc years ago a large number 
of leaping tuna from 100 to 250 pounds were 
taken every season at Avalon, Santa Catalina 
Island, but since then it has been almost im¬ 
possible to catch them. I never saw more leap¬ 
ing tunas in my life than in July of 1907. On 
the 25th I went out with “Mexican Joe,” the 
oldest guide, who has been there for forty years 
and who ought to know them, “but who gives it 
up.” When we reached Long Point, and I had 
almost forgotten the objective in the beauties 
of the afternoon—the perfect stillness of this 
water twenty miles off shore—when I heard Joe 
did everything (and that covers a multitude of 
sins), but I did not succeed in even attracting 
the attention of a tuna. In a word they would 
not bite and I tried it from 2 -.20 until 8 in the 
evening. 
Some big tunas are here every year and they 
have been coming for ages, as I have taken 
their bones from the old island mounds, but for 
the past six years they have been, so far as can 
be determined, very scarce, and when here not 
disposed to bite, while previous to that time, 
they were here in thousands of schools and bit 
with an abandon that satisfied all comers. 
Having described this sport in many books, I 
receive many letters asking why the tunas do 
not bite as they did, but it is too much of a 
conundrum for me. The day I describe, last 
July, was a typical one, just the kind of a day 
on which I have often had the sport of sports 
with this splendid fish. The tunas were there. 
IS IT OF LEGAL LENGTH? 
From a photograph by N. E. Spaulding. 
Chicigo Fly-Casting Club. 
Chicago, Ill., Sept. 15. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: The results of the club tournament, 
Aug. 29, were as follows: 
Half-Ounce Bait.—First prize, F. N. Peet; 
second prize, O. E. Becker; third prize, John 
Hohmann; fourth prize, E. M. Ford. 
One-Quarter-Ounce Bait.—First prize, R. W. 
Crompton; second prize, O. J. Loomis; third 
prize, E. A. Snell; fourth prize, E. L. Mason. 
Accuracy Fly.—First prize, E. R. Letterman; 
second prize, H. W. Perce; third prize, N‘; C. 
Heston. 
Delicacy Fly.—First prize, E. P. Sperry; sec¬ 
ond prize, G. A. Hinterleitner; third prize, H. A. 
Newkirk. 
The complete season’s averages and detail 
tournament scores will be announced as soon 
as the secretary can get time to tabulate them. 
Geo. A. Davis, Sec’y-Treas. 
talking to himself. Looking around I saw Joe, 
hat in hand, saluting the largest school of big 
leaping tuna I have seen for many years. “How 
do you do, Mr. Tuna,” said Joe. “I am very 
glad to see you back again.” 
Joe was not disturbed, but I was, as I knew 
—at least I thought I knew—that I should have 
a strike the next moment and warned my ang¬ 
ling companion, Mr. Doneton, of Santa Barbara, 
to stand ready for the strike which I knew 
would come like a whirlwind. I waited expec¬ 
tantly, every nerve tingling, my heart in my 
throat, as the saying is, and slowly on we passed. 
Tunas on all sides, big fellows, ranging up to 
six feet, not ten feet from me, so near that I 
could have put a pair of grains into them; tunas 
in schools and groups, a sight to set any man’s 
blood coursing, and all about us on the beauti¬ 
ful open bay, which was like a disc of steel, 
were tunas with fins out of water slowly swim¬ 
ming along. The minutes flew by, but no strikes 
came. I tried them at all speeds. I cast and 
I had the same bait, the same rod, the same old 
boatman, the same willingness to be “worn to 
a frazzle” as General Gordon has it, but I was 
simply ignored. That is all there is to it. 
I think the situation is this: The tuna is a 
pelagic fish, a world wanderer, now here, now 
there, and this I have demonstrated. Mr. Carls- 
cliffe, of the Tuna Club, who investigated the 
tuna fisheries of Algiers this year, writes me 
that the industry there is so uncertain that they 
burn candles at the shrine of St. Sebastian to 
propitiate the powers that be, and even then 
the tuna does not arrive, and when he does can¬ 
not always be caught. The tuna has been en¬ 
tering the Mediterranean for years and ages, 
but something happens sometimes, and for years 
the tunny fisheries, which are so valuable there 
that the Government (Italy) proposes to take 
hold of them, are failures. 
I received a letter last year from Australia 
asking me for description of tuna tackle, as for 
the first time in the history of the region the 
