FOREST AND STREAM. 


SEA AND RIVER FISHING 


* A New Game Fish. 
Tue Kestrel was swinging to and fro over 
the kingfish ground near Green Key. The fish 
were not hungry. Only a couple of barracuda 
and a five-pound mackerel had been gaffed so 
far, and I was getting rather sleepy and nearly 
ready to start for home; so, when we gybed the 
sails and made a long turn, I did not bother to 
reel in and the line lay in something like a half 
circle. There was a sharp strike and that curve 
changed to a straight line in half a shake of a 
lamb’s tail. The way that line swept sideways, 
cutting off the tops of the tiny waves, was a 
new experience, and the rush straight away that 
followed was thrilling. My reels are fitted with 
the admirable “‘Rabbeth drag,’ and the fish was 
permitted to take his time and not hurried. 
There ‘were fifteen minutes of very dashing 
play before he showed through the clear water, 
similar to the fight of a kingfish, but remark- 
ably fast, and we finally boated the fish, of which 
I enclose a photograph, very like S. cavalla, 
but more slender, with longer head and more 
widely forked tail, The back was dark, green- 
ish-blue, the sides silvery with many vertical 
dark bars of hour-glass shape, which faded out 
within ten minutes, and when the photograph 
was taken, three hours after, the sides and belly 
had grown quite dusky. 
This fish was 46 inches long, 5% inches deep 
and nearly cylindrical, and weighed 22 pounds, 
while a kingfish of the same length would weigh 
34. On reference to Jordan and Evermann, he 
proved to be a peto (A. solandri), said to be not 
uncommon about Cuba, and distinguished from 
the other mackerels by the long first dorsal, 
which contained twenty-four spines. 
This fish is evidently not a frequent visitor 
here, as my crew had never seen one. He 
proved to be super-excellent on the table. I 
have never hooked a more dashing fighter, and 
hope to meet more specimens of his noble race 
before we leave for the north. 
Among unusual fish taken this winter were 
two specimens of the little tunny, differing from 
the great tuna only in size and some not notice- 
able details of structure. Very compact, full of 
energy, and very handsome in his dress of 
green and silver, but barely eatable, the flesh 
being dark, coarse and strong. Those I took 
weighed about five pounds each, though they 
are reported to reach twenty. 
Over the reefs I have also caught the agujou 
or horned fish, very long, slender and 
cylindrical, with a narrow bill closely set with 
sharp, green teeth, this being also the color of 
the bones. This fish fights very vigorously, and 
on the surface runs up on the line and throws 
himself out of the water. A ten-pounder, four 
feet long, is my largest; but I have seen one 
weighing sixteen. He is admirable on the 
table. 
I wonder why the heavy salt-water rods are 
not filled with a locking reel band as good 
salmon rods always are. The backward pull and 
oscillation in reeling in is very likely to slip 
the band back, so that your reel is loose just 
when you need it tightest. Of course one lashes 
on his reels, but it is very difficult to make the 
lashing rigid enough to hold firmly. The 
“Rabbeth drag” would also be much improved 
by some device to lock the central screw that 
holds the handle to the reel. Mine are con- 
stantly working loose, and have to be tightened 
with a screwdriver many times every day. This 
need was vigorously brought to my notice by 
having the reel handle come off while I had 
hold of a thirty-pound rock fish. As soon as the 
strain was off, he promptly got into a rock hole 
and it took half an hour’s hard work to save 
my line, losing fish, hook and leader. 
The Smithsonian Institution identify the fish 
described in my letter of March 20 as Hymnnis 
cubensis, a rare species allied to the pompanos, 
and hitherto known only from Cuba. 
A. St. J. NEWBERRY. 
Nassau, April 19. 
{Our correspondent, who is now beyond the 
reach of the mails, will find his fish figured in 
ForEST AND STREAM of April 14 identified as 
above. ] 
Maine Ice Out. 
Boston, Mass., April 28.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Boston anglers have been treated this 
week to a look at the 27-pound lake trout from 
Pangus Lake, N. H., mentioned in my last letter, 
it having been on exhibition in a window of Will- 
iam Read & Sons’ store on Washington street. 
It was a real beauty both in proportions and col- 
oring, and the crowds that stood gazing at it were 

informed by a placard that it was taken with a 
“No. 4 Garnet label silk line.” Another attrac- 
tion was a 10-pound Kezar Lake salmon shown 
in the window of. Daniel Stoddard & Co., taken 
from Upper Kezar, Lovell, Me. 
A letter written on Tuesday, April 24, by Fred 
Harriman, of North Lovell, to a Boston angler 
relates that “when we went to bed last night there 
was ten inches of ice on old Kezar, but this 
morning it is gone.” This, the writer says, means 
that the salmon herded about the mouths of the 
brooks are “jumping out of the water like colts,” 
and are hungry for bait. Your readers know this 
is one of the scores upon scores of lakes in Maine 
that have received liberal plantings at the hands 
of the commissioners. When, two years ago, I 
met Commissioner Stanley at Kineo he ventured 
predictions concerning the fishing in that lake 
which are already being verified. 
A report from Sebago says the ice is now en- 
tirely out, that in Jordan’s Bay having been 
Peto (Acanthocybium solanderi)—LrenctH 46 INCHES, WEIGHT 22 PoUNDs, 
