636 
Letter from a Recluse. 

Trout. 
ONLy two days until the opening of the trout 
season in Sullivan county and the outlook for 
anglers is much more cheerful than seemed prob- 
able at the beginning of the present week. Mon- 
day was a horrible day, snow, sleet and rain in 
alternation. On Tuesday the ground was covered 
with snow, the air was cold and raw and the 
roads in frightfully bad condition. The next 
morning brought change. The snow disappeared 
very rapidly as if by magic, meadowlarks ap- 
peared in the fields, and their sweet notes were 
heard all day long, kingfishers were chattering 
and dashing about in the vicinity of the shallows 
and by-streams, robins, bluebirds and song spar- 
rows were active and the voice of spring was 
heard in the land. 
The streams are big, too big, probably, but the 
water is fairly clear, and a man could fish, with- 
out great success possibly, but to be on the water 
and casting the fly once more is happiness enough 
for many anglers. It is to be hoped that by Mon- 
day the volume of water will have decreased and 
that the air will be soft and genial for mid-April. 
The suddenness with which the birds appear is 
wonderful, the weather prophets must send the 
riews per Marconigraph, a day or two in advance. 
Bless their little hearts! we were never more 
pleased to welcome them—the birds, not the 
prophets. Sometimes they are wrongly advised 
and make sad mistakes. Just before the in- 
tensely cold weather early in March a few blue- ° 
birds and robins were seen. With deep snow and 
low temperatures, zero weather, thereafter, they 
must have perished miserably unless they had 
strength for a return flight southward. 
What flies shall we put up for our first cast of 
the season? We have a lengthy list to choose 
from, but are safest among a few of the old fa- 
vorites, standards, tried and true. One of the best 
native fishermen in this county prefers a rather 
large pattern of the professor, Beaverkill, Abbey, 
fiery-brown, cow-dung or a dun colored fly. In 
May he likes the Cahill and golden-dun. As for 
myself, I usually stick to the duns for tail-flies, 
with a spinner or two for droppers. A march 
brown may be useful, as a large brown ephemera 
hatches out on these rivers all through the spring 
months. I have seen little evidence of insect life 
‘as yet. May is the month par excelience when 
we may expect large hatches of the natural flies, 
and June is also good. I fear that the ephemera 
are not as numerous as they formerly were upon 
these streams. I never saw so few on the water 
in September and October as last year. Years 
ago, we always saw a good many rising fish dur- 
ing the months mentioned, and if the water was 
low we often had an opportunity to view a few 
of the monarchs of the river. Sometimes they 
would be in quite shallow water near the lower 
ends of the pools, and appeared to lose a good 
deal of their usual shyness as the spawning sea- 
son approached, I remember one heavy old chap 
of four pounds or better, who behaved with the 
greatest nonchalance despite our attempts to dis- 
turb his serenity. If we threw a pebble so that 
it would drop in the water near him he would 
flourish his big tail, make a half circle of a few 
yards and resume his position without alarm. 
Contrast this behavior with that of two large 
trout in a big, rather shallow pool during the 
previous August. Why, the casting of the fly, 
the slight disturbance it made when it fell upon 
the water was sufficient to send them off at ex- 
press speed to some retreat in the deepest portion 
of the pool. It was seldom indeed that one could 
wade out within fair casting distance without 
scaring them out of their wits. This pool, how- 
ever, was a favorite with the eel spearers by 
torchlight at night. This practice is now, I be- 
lieve, prohibited by law. The eels in all these 
mountain rivers are of fine quality and excellent 
for the table. 
I hope to have unusual opportunities this sea- 
son for watching the birth of natural flies, not- 
ing the behavior of the trout and their taste in 
artificial insects, as the season advances. I would 
like to dress a really good imitation of the large 
spring brown, which would be recognized and ac- 
FOREST: AND: STREAM: 
[APRIL 21, 1906. 

cepted in good faith by the trout. There are few 
things more delightful than to hit off something 
that appears to meet exactly the wishes of the 
fish, either from the stock in our book or better 
yet, by tying a few feathers upon a hook and 
taking therewith a good basket of trout. Very 
moderate sport satisfies us in these days of hard- 
fished waters and shy trout, and we care much 
more for size than for numbers or gross weight 
in the basket. In fishing big streams, which are 
usually high early in the season we must often 
fish down to have any sport. The fish are often 
slow to rise, we may cast many times over the 
same water and then take a trout. Sometimes it 
seems necessary almost to hang the fly over the 
fish in order that they may be induced to accept 
it. Again, skimming the drop-fly will take every 
offering one brief extract from a charming de- 
scription that I find in one of my most cherished 
books, ‘Salmonia, or Days of Fly-Fishing,’ printed 
in London in 1828. The author’s name is not 
given, he subscribing himself simply as ‘An 
Angler.’ ” 
Now I had, before those lines were penned, 
been informed that the author of the book was 
probably Sir Humphrey Davy, but living as I do 
hundreds of miles from any important library in’ 
which I could positively verify this fact, I thought 
it best to print the title as I found it, and I stated 
simply “the author’s name is not given,” but in 
your issue of April 7 Mr. D. P. Waters, in com- 
menting on what I wrote, says: 
“I was rather surprised at Mr. Samuels say- 
ing, when quoting from it [‘Salmonia’] ‘author 

THE CERO. 

fish, the tail-fly doing nothing, or, not so often, 
the flies must be well sunk to get results. 
This (Friday) is a perfect day, cool, bright and 
sunny. If Monday is like to-day everyone will 
be happy. THEODORE GORDON. 

The hopes raised by the fine weather on Friday 
and part of Saturday last were not realized on 
the 16th, the opening day of the trout season. A 
deluge of warm rain Saturday night and Sunday 
morning brought away the accumulated snow in 
the mountains and the rivers came down in flood. 
The water was badly discolored. This caused 
great disappointment to the anglers who had 
gathered on the Beaverkill, and several days will 
pass before the rivers can run down to some- 
thing like normal levels, if there is no more rain. 
Some of the indications now point to an early 
spring. On Sunday I heard a queer noise and on 
going to investigate found about 200 little green 
frogs in a small marshy puddle not far from an 
old snowbank. They were croaking weakly in 
an odd hoarse way, but appeared to be very 
happy, swimming, splashing and jumping about. 
This is very early for these creatures to appear 
here, and it remains to be seen if they are right 
in their estimate of the weather conditions to 
come. 
Quote Fairly, Gentlemen. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
It is rarely indeed that I am obliged to ask 
space from you for the purpose of explaining or 
defending anything I have written for your col- 
umns, and perhaps I had better let the present 
incident go by without comment, but as it is the 
second time that a wrong impression has gone 
forth concerning what I really did write I should 
like to offer a few words to set myself right with 
my brother anglers. 
In Forest AND STREAM of Dec. 30 last, in treat- 
ing of the little book “Salmonia,” I used in part 
the following language: “I cannot refrain from 
~~ 
THE KINGFISH. 
) 
unknown,’ ”’ in a way that indicated he was quot- 
ing from my communication. I hardly think I 
should trespass on your patience in asking for a 
correction, but as his letter puts me in a false 
light I hardly want to let it pass unnoticed. 
Possibly Mr. Waters thinks he draws a natural 
inference, that as I stated the ‘“‘author’s name is 
not given” it was to me “unknown,” and un- 
doubtedly it would have been better for me to 
have said that the authorship of the book had 
been attributed to Sir Humphrey Davy and oth- 
ers, but it is a habit with me to print only those 
things that I feel certain of, and as I before 
stated, my opportunities as a bibliographer, both 
in consequence of environment, the infirmities 
incident to advanced years and a long period of 
invalidism, are exceedingly limited. 
Epwarp A. SAMUELS. 
The Kingfish. 
THE kingfish, or cero, of which our correspon- 
dent Mr. J. A. L. Waddell writes, is a fish very 
little known to Northern sportsmen, but is found 
in the West India Islands and the Gulf of Mexico 
and as far south as Brazil. A few specimens 
have been taken as far north as Woods Holl, 
Mass. It is a magnificent fish, often reaching a 
weight of 25 pounds and sometimes it is said of 
100 pounds. Its habits are presumably like those 
of the Spanish mackerel, to which it is closely 
related, 
These fish are very abundant in the southern 
part of the Gulf of Mexico, and are found at a 
number of places in the northern part, but they 
live altogether at sea, and it is necessary—as Mr. 
Waddell learned—to go quite a distance from 
land to catch them. 
At Key West, where these are an important 
food fish, it is said that two men in a small sail- 
boat sometimes catch more than too in a day, and 
the market is occasionally so glutted with them 
that a 20-pound fish may sell for five cents. 
The king cero is closely related to the kingfish, 
