Jan. i, 1910.] 
21 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
lurking place, the suspense as you wonder if 
he will take the bait, the brilliant flash of color 
as he rises to the hook, the desperate lunges 
as he feels it settle into his jaws ,and then the 
purr of reel, the ever-changing beauty in curve 
of rod and slant of line until, nearly drowned 
and wholly exhausted, the trout surrenders to 
strength and cunning superior to his own. 
Well may you gloat, oh fisherman, for as you 
estimate his length and weight and admire the 
many hues of his mottled sides, you may rest 
assured that had wrist or eye played you false 
for so much as the fraction of a second, his 
gleaming form would never have rested in 
your hand. 
At one place where there was no brush on 
the bank, a small treetop lay in the water. 
Here I had received such a vicious strike on 
the previous afternoon that when the trout re¬ 
leased the hook it had shot up into the branches 
of a large tree overhead, where, of course, it 
had wound round and round; getting it loose 
had made so much disturbance that, though I 
tried the place again half an hour later, it was 
without result. Now I approached with great 
care and presently dropped my bait right at 
the edge of the submerged branches. He was 
there beyond all doubt. Scarcely had the bait 
touched the water when there was a leap, a 
flash and a tug; he had seized the hook so 
sharply that he could not reject it in time to 
avoid even my slow return, and the fight was 
cn. Then it was that I discovered the pool was 
fringed with submerged branches left by a 
woodchopper. At the risk of breaking the 
tackle I had to snub each rush short, and at 
the opportunity gave a long, sweeping pull that 
lifted him clear of the water and brush but left 
him flopping on the bank—free of the hook. If 
you have ever seen a football player drop on a 
fumble, you know exactly how I went after 
that fish, and more by luck than skill I got 
him. Part of me dropped in the creek in the 
fracas, I believe, but that was nothing, for my 
prize was indeed a beauty—at least a foot long 
and beautiful in coloring. 
The remainder of the morning was spent in 
fishing unfamiliar pools, so much time was lost, 
but an undercut bank at a sharp curve where 
the brook runs through open meadow yielded 
another fine one. This trout puzzled me not 
a little by taking the hook while I was letting 
out line and very quietly carrying it under a 
partly submerged log which had fallen into 
the stream from the opposite bank. When 
enough line was out to more than reach the 
hole, I began reeling in, but found that I could 
gain slack only by the hardest kind of “pump¬ 
ing.” Suddenly my line came loose with an 
abruptness that nearly caused me to tumble 
backward, for the fish had decided to change 
his tactics from sulking to jumping, so he 
darted out from behind the log and dashed 
straight toward me, leaping and shaking his 
head in a wild attempt to rid himself of the 
barb. But he was well hooked, and after a 
sharp fight he surrendered and allowed me to 
lead him within reach. 
A road crosses the stream near the scene of 
this last struggle, but several small fish struck, 
and obligingly hooked themselves, before I 
reached the bridge. South of the road the 
stream was much wider and deeper, and the 
fish were undoubtedly more numerous. After 
getting several more of the small ones here, I 
came to a pool that was cut deep under the 
bank in another sharp turn. The bank was 
high and nodding grasses hung out over the 
pool. It looked extremely good, so I put on 
the largest worm I had left, spat on the hook 
for luck, crept close, waited a minute or two, 
then dropped the bait close to the bank. 
Scarcely had the worm touched the water, 
when there was a huge swirl and the rod was 
shaken to the butt by a jerk that might have 
been given by a plunging steer. But it was all 
over in a second. Before I could recover from 
my astonishment enough to hook him, he had 
plunged to the bottom and rubbed out the 
barb on the gravel, and the line hung slack, 
except for the pull of the current. Never till 
then had I felt such a strike, and the surprise 
of it had caused my defeat. It was no use to 
continue calling myself names or to try another 
cast at that time, so I tried to comfort myself 
by taking some small ones out of the lower 
pools. 
- We had agreed to start for home at two 
o’clock, so about noon I started for the farm 
house, resolved to prepare for the journey, then 
1 eturn for one last try at the big fellow. Start¬ 
ing in what I thought the right direction, I 
found that following the endless windings of 
the creek, shut in all the time by thick brush, 
had lost to me all sense of direction. Remem¬ 
bering that a watch may be used as a compass 
when the sun is visible, I tried it. “Point the 
hour hand at the sun and half way between the 
hand and the figure XII. is south,” I repeated; 
but when I had located south, I could not be¬ 
lieve it was right, so decided to go to a house 
to be seen in the distance—behind me and ap¬ 
parently across the stream. Presently I reached 
a point where I could see more than the roofs 
through the trees, and there was “Prof.” water¬ 
ing the horses. Another look showed me the 
rig standing by the barn. Then directions 
swung a quarter way round and I made for the 
lunch basket. 
“Prof.” had had better luck than I—more 
fish and bigger ones—but I argued that it was 
due to his better knowledge of the stream. 
Including the few secured the previous day, he 
had twenty-three and I had seventeen; not 
many, but we were satisfied—at least I felt that 
I would be if I could only get the big fellow. 
With dinner eaten and the horses harnessed, 
I attached a new leader and another hook to 
my line, secured some extra fine worms from 
thq old coffee pot, and crept up to the pool of 
my morning’s experience. Excitedly I waited 
for the big trout to forget my presence if he 
had seen me, then carefully dropped the wrig¬ 
gling worm in exactly the same place as before. 
Again came the swirl and the rod-racking 
tug, but this time he was hooked. Back and 
forth he rushed, jerking, leaping, sounding, and 
I was just beginning to feel that my chances 
were better than his, when my faithless rod 
flattened like a reed just above the upper joint, 
giving him the slack he needed, and in another 
instant he was gone. 
And there he may be to this day for all I 
know, for we have never had the much-wished 
opportunity to repeat our trip. But many a 
time since, when the fever was upon me, have 
I felt again that shock to the wrist, heard the 
scream of the reel, and dreamed the fight to 
a far different finish; and many a time have I 
confessed to myself that I would gladly make 
the long trip just to try him again, were I sure 
he still lurked in that same limpid pool. 
W. E. Morton. 
Mr. Conn’s Big Ray. 
Los Angeles, Cal., Dec. 22.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: In a letter received by Tom Manning, 
dated Cape San Lucas, Lower California, C. G. 
Conn tells a most interesting story of a three 
and a half hours’ fight in which a pair of skiffs, 
a barrel buoy, fifteen Mexicans and the crew of 
the schooner yacht Comfort all had a hand, end¬ 
ing finally in the capture and beaching of an 
immense specimen of the sting ray, or sea bat, 
measuring twenty feet across the pectoral fins, 
weighing 2,650 pounds and measuring from nose 
to tail tip seventeen feet eight inches. Its hor¬ 
rible appearing mouth would have taken in a 
large man so far as capacity goes, being no less 
than two feet nine inches. 
Mr. Conn, who was recently elected commo¬ 
dore of the Sophia Yacht Club of Avalon, took 
a large store of harpoons, barrel buoys and simi¬ 
lar heavy gear. He tells the story as follows: 
“We fastened on to two of these big bats and 
lost them, and the third one was finally beached 
and captured. We were soon under full pur¬ 
suit and the Comfort’s tender was following us 
at full speed, but to all appearances this boat 
was standing still, so rapidly was our skiff being 
towed through the water. Our barrel buoy, 
however, kept the ray from taking us out to 
sea, or from sinking to a great depth, or from 
remaining under the water for an indefinite 
length of time. This buoy was made fast to 
about 150 feet of 5^-inch rope, one end of 
which was looped on to the shaft of a har¬ 
poon; at the other the regular rope attached to 
the skiff, several hundred feet in length. When 
the ray made a run it was compelled to tow the 
buoy and the skiff with two men and myself 
in it. 
“After thirty minutes’ fight with it we saw 
that it would be impossible to kill the ray single- 
handed, so I signaled the launch and sent it back 
to the Comfort for another harpoon and a 
length of line. We were still being towed 
around like a newspaper in a gust of wind. In 
its frenzy the fish made for the skiff, diving 
under, striking the bottom with one of its huge 
fins and partly filling it with water. To add to 
our danger, the bat towed the barrel under the 
skiff, striking it before the obstruction could be 
forced under the water and gotten clear. 
“During this part of the conflict both launch 
and skiff were towed together by the ray. Lash¬ 
ing furiously around with its huge wings the 
ray frequently drenched us with spray. For 
over two hours this kind of work continued, and 
it was just as much as our men could do to 
keep their boats from colliding and keep directly 
in the wake of the fish. The constant strain 
proved too much for the fish. Soon it began to 
circle, pulling the three ropes and the barrel 
under the two boats. 
“Better far had we been successful in head¬ 
ing the fish for shore. The combined efforts 
of both crews failed 5 to dislodge it. As a final 
resort part of the crew in the launch was sent 
back to the Comfort, which was brought to the 
scene of the conflict. The three ropes were 
