Feb. 5, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
221 
by virtue- of his physical strength and endur¬ 
ance, Michealis finally got the fish up within 
reach of Goulding’s gaff and put in the home¬ 
ward trip on his back. 
“Want to stay for another, George?” 
“To blazes with all your tuna. Never again 
will I say a word to a man if he gets his rod 
over his shoulder, or under his leg, or any other 
way to get relief. You need all the help you 
can get,” was the substance of Michealis’ dis¬ 
course. 
“I have seen a lot of tuna caught, but you 
have got to do the job yourself before you re¬ 
alize what it means. It gives you a new respect 
for the fish to get one,” said Michealis the other 
day. “Every boatman ought to go out and land 
one for himself. It is a valuable experience. It 
is a man’s job with all the patent drags and 
things you can get to help you. I never did so 
hard an hour and a half’s work in my life and 
was sore a week after it.” 
The Tuna Club gave another of its famous 
dinners at Hotel Raymond recently, about two 
dozen of the members turning out to talk fish. 
Edwin L. Hedderly. 
The Bass and the Nonpareil. 
Scene —a peaceful Sunday morning and three 
of us, who had the night before made our camp 
on an island a mile away, and from the direc¬ 
tions we got at the village we were looking for 
Isaac, who we were told would show us all the 
good bass grounds, get us bait, and act as gen¬ 
eral handy man for us. So we had rowed over 
to his little house and were just at the door 
when a tremendous row began, and our first 
sight of Isaac was had when he came out of 
the house—like a shot out of a gun—with a 
razor in one hand and a shaving brush in the 
other, and right after him Mrs. Isaac, a big, fat 
old woman, whose face was covered with lather 
and who held a frying-pan in her hand, evi¬ 
dently intended for Isaac. 
At sight of us the old lady dove back into 
the house and Isaac, after a brief introduction 
on our part, explained that he had been giving 
her the usual weekly shave, when he had made 
a miss-cue and stuck the lather brush in her 
eye, with the dire results above mentioned. He 
was timid about going into the house again, but 
backed up by the three of us he ventured at 
last. “Boss,” as we dubbed the old lady, had 
retired to the inner room, and it took some 
time and diplomacy before we could smooth her 
down enough to consent to Isaac’s going after 
some minnows for bait for us. But the sight 
of a dollar for a pair of chickens and some eggs 
and the prospect of a good many more if we 
stayed the intended month won her over, and 
we departed with Isaac and her promise to send 
the fowls over as soon as she could kill and 
dress them. 
While showing extreme poverty, everything 
was clean and neat around the place, and we 
found out later that Isaac’s wife was a first- 
class cook, and all the bread we used as well as 
many pies, etc., we obtained there. 
Now, to describe Isaac, though it would take 
a Dickens to do him justice. A tall, thin old 
man of over seventy, who all his days had pre¬ 
ferred the scant living to be got by hunting, 
fishing and trapping a little, with a few very 
rare and poorly paid days’ work for more pros¬ 
perous neighbors. Though unable to read or 
write, he was a nature student, and for a radius 
of ten miles round, there was not a tree, animal, 
pond or acre of ground he was not thoroughly 
acquainted with. For our purpose he could not 
be surpassed, and I wish I could only repeat 
the quaint way in which he related his experi¬ 
ences when we oiled him up with a good horn 
of seven-year-old rye, of which we luckily had 
a plentiful supply with us. We found him 
strictly honest, and a more willing, faithful man 
round camp never lived. As* none of us was 
particularly fond of cutting wood or getting up 
ON THE PORTAGE. 
very early in the morning, it was a relief on 
raising the tent flaps to find a fire built and 
water hot and to see the grin on Isaac’s face 
when the morning appetizer was offered was 
worth the whole price of admission. 
As this is not a fishing story I will simply say 
we got bass—lots of them—and a few ’longe; 
and when the first of September came, a few 
ducks, but the whole thing for all of us during 
that short month was Isaac, “The Nonpareil” 
as one of our visitors christened him. As our 
old friend Shakespeare says, “Age cannot wither 
or custom stale his infinite variety.” 
Quinte. 
Onondaga Anglers Dine. 
The fourth annual fish fry of the Anglers’ 
Association of Onondaga was held in Syracuse, 
N. Y., the night of Jan. 20. Beside the 600 
members, a number of members of the Mystique 
Krewe, of Kanoonah, sat down to the banquet, 
at which R S. Honsinger, the Anglers’ presi¬ 
dent, presided. An entertainment followed. 
Bass and Steelhead. 
San Francisco, Cal., Jan. 27.— Editor Forest 
and Stream: The members of the San Fran¬ 
cisco Striped Bass Club held a banquet in a 
prominent restaurant here on Jan. 15 and in¬ 
stalled officers for the ensuing year. The new 
officers are: Emil Acceret, President; Chris L. 
Johnson, Vice-President; James Turner, Secre- 
tary; Chas. H. Kewell, Treasurer. 
The prize winners for the season of 1909 were 
presented with their trophies and these were as 
follows: G. J. Blitz, James S. Turner, Alex. L. 
Bowley, Chas. E. Urfer, Monte Button, Fred 
Fianzen, dim Lynch, Chas. P. Landresse, A. V. 
Thornton, James Lynch, Emil Acceret and How¬ 
ard Vernon. Those present at the banquet were: 
Chris. L. Johnson, Chas. H. Kewell, Chas. P. 
Landresse, James Lynch, Frank O’Donnell, M. 
J. Hynes, E. Altvater, A. L. Bowley, George C. 
Browne, Ed. J. Conlin, Jack Duckel, Fred Fran- 
zen, M. J. Geary, Jos. J. Garbarino, Emil Ac¬ 
ceret, Tim Lynch, Harold J. Ladd, Frank Mar¬ 
cus, Frank Messner, James S. Turner, Will S. 
Turner, Otto F. Thiele, Jr., A. W. Thornton, 
Howard Vernon, J. C. Wallace, P. H. L. Wil¬ 
son, Speck Smith, George Hopkins, Howard Mc- 
Avoy, Mr. Robinson, J. X. deWitt, G. J. Blitz, 
H. P. Draper, James A. Watt, Stewart Hynes 
and A 1 Larsen. The dinner was a highly enjoy¬ 
able one and was followed by a fest of story 
telling interspersed with songs and music. 
Clear weather has been the rule of late, and 
in spite of the fact that it has been unusually 
cold a large following of anglers has been tak¬ 
ing advantage of the improved conditions to be 
found in the steelhead streams and have been 
enjoying some fine sport. Fishing on the Rus¬ 
sian River has been very good for the past two 
weeks and some fine catches of fish have been 
brought back to this city. Most of the fish 
now being taken are of the fresh run and 
are of good size, weighing as high as fourteen 
pounds. 
Point Reyes has also been a favorite fishing 
ground, but the tide weir there has not proved 
as productive as the Russian River. Salmon 
Creek has been furnishing some fine sport and 
now that the waters of this stream have become 
cleared a bit, some excellent fishing is antici¬ 
pated. Steelhead have also put in an appear¬ 
ance in the San Mateo Lagoons and the sports¬ 
men of that vicinity are now having good fish¬ 
ing. The striped bass fishermen have not been 
meeting with much success in taking that fish 
with rod and line, notwithstanding the fact that 
the fish seem to be plentiful enough and market 
fishermen have been meeting with splendid suc¬ 
cess. At the San Antonio and Wingo sloughs 
large crowds are in attendance each Sunday, but 
for some reason the fish do not seem to be tak¬ 
ing the clams as they should. The waters here 
seem to be too fresh for the fish and only a 
short distance away catfish are to be found in 
large numbers. 
The close season for black bass is now on 
and will last until the first of June. These fish 
have multiplied very rapidly in California waters 
and are to be found in large numbers in Pros¬ 
pect and Shay sloughs above Rio Vista. In 
some parts of the State the taking of this fish 
is prohibited all*year around, owing to the fact 
that they have just been introduced into some 
streams. A. P. B. 
