The Ultimate Guide to Fishing Skills, Tactics, and Techniques

Those who have tasted the lotus of salmon or trout fishing, in that Utopian clime of far away—while reveling in its aesthetic atmosphere, and surrounded by a misty halo of spray from the waterfall, or enveloped by the filmy gauze and iridescent tomes, sung idylls, chanted paeans, and poured out libations in honor and praise of the silver-spangled salmon, or the ruby-studded trout, while it is left to the vulgar horde of black bass anglers to stand upon the mountain of their own doubt and presumption, and, with uplifted hands, in admiration and awe, gaze with dazed eyes from afar upon that forbidden land—that terra incognita—and then, having lived in vain, die and leave no sign.

It is, then, with a spirit of rank heresy in my heart; with smoked glass spectacles on my nose, to dim the glare and glamour of the transcendent shore; with the scales of justice across my shoulder—M. salmoides in one scoop and M. dolomieu in the other—I pass the barriers and confines of the enchanted land, and toss them into a stream that has been depopulated of even fingerlings, by the dilettanti of salmon and trout fishers; for I would not, even here, put black bass in a stream inhabited by salmon or brook trout.

While watching the plebeian interlopers sporting in an eddy, their bristling spines and emerald sides gleaming in the sunshine, I hear an awful voice from the adjacent rocks exclaiming: “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread!” Shade of Izaak Walton defend us! While appealing to Father Izaak for protection, I quote his words: “Of which, if thou be a severe, sour complexioned man, then I here disallow thee to be a competent judge.”

Seriously, from Izaak Walton to the present day, the salmon and trout of Great Britain have been sung in song and story as game-fishes, and it is sufficient to say that they deserve all the praise bestowed upon them. And as our ideas of fish and fishing have derived mostly from English authors, it follows that many American writers and anglers have been obsessed by their teaching, even down to the present day, as in dry fly-fishing.

Now, while we have in America the same salmon as in Great Britain, and several species of trout equally as good or better than the brown trout, we also have many other game-fishes equally worthy, and among them the black bass.

I feel free to assert, that, were the black bass a native of Great Britain, it would rank fully as high in the estimation of British anglers as either the trout or the salmon. I am borne out in this by the opinions of British sportsmen whose statements have been received without question.

“This is one of the finest of the American fresh-water fishes: it is surpassed by none in boldness of biting, in fierce and violent resistance when hooked, and by a very few only in excellence upon the board.” (Fish and Fishing, 1850.)

“I fear it will be almost deemed heresy to place this fish (black bass) on a par with the trout; at least, some such idea I had when I first heard the two compared; but I am bold, and will go further. I consider he is the superior of the two, for he is equally good as an article of flood, and much stronger, and untiring in his efforts to escape when hooked.” (Prairie and Forest, 1874.)

In regard to the comparative gameness of the black bass and the brook trout the following opinions of American anglers are added. Seth Green, one of the fathers of fish-culture and a lifelong angler for trout, among other fishes, has this to say:

“This is among the finest sporting as well as flood fish in America. Bites fiercely at fly or trolling spoon; makes a vigorous fight for life, liberty and happiness, showing a perfect willingness ‘to fight it out on that line if it takes all summer,’ and at last when subdued and brought to the table does honor to the cook who prepares it, and pleasure to the palate that enjoys it.” (Fish Hatching and Fish Catching, 1879.)

Robert B. Roosevelt, who, with Seth Green, was a Fish Commissioner of New York, and co-author of Fish Hatching and Fish Catching, and a notable angler for salmon and trout, says of the black bass:

“A fish that is inferior only to the salmon and trout, if even to the latter; that requires the best of tackle and skill in its inveiglement, and exhibits courage and game qualities of the highest order.” (Superior Fishing, 1865.)

E. E. Millard, a veteran fly-fisher for trout for fifty hears, who has camped many summers on the famous Nipigon, and who is a true and faithful lover of the brook trout, has this to say in comparing the trout and the black bass as game-fishes:

“When the acrobatic bass approaches with every spine bristling it signifies fight, and he dies battling face to the foe—not that the trout tamely submits at the first prick of the steel; far from it. He is a fighter, though not a scientific one, having no appreciation of the finer and more artistic points of the game. He looks the fighter, having the neck and shoulders of the pugilist, but is rather too beautiful, which, however, does not always follow, and there is lacking a little of the Irish in his composition, though when put to the crowning test, he hangs on with bulldog tenacity, lacking only the resourcefulness of the smallmouth bass, the generally recognized champion of finny warriors, and of whom I can well believe that, inch for inch and pound for pound, he is the gamest fish that swims.” (Days on the Nipigon, 1917.)

Now, while salmon fishing is, unquestionably, the highest branch of piscatorial sport; and while trout fishing in Canada, Maine, and the Lake Superior region justifies all the extravagant praise bestowed upon it, I am inclined to doubt the judgment and good taste of those anglers who snap their fingers in contempt of black bass fishing, while they will wade in a stream with brush and logs, catch a few trout weighing six or eight to the pound, and call it the only artistic angling in the world! While they are certainly welcome to their opinion, I think their zeal is worthy of a better cause.

The black bass is eminently an American fish, and is truly representative in his characteristics. He has the faculty of asserting himself and making himself completely at home wherever placed. He is plucky, game, brave, and unyielding to the last when hooked. He has the arrowy rush and vigor of the trout, the untiring strength and bold leap of the salmon, while he has a system of fighting tactics peculiarly his own.

Among anglers, the question is often raised as to what constitutes a game-fish, and what particular species are to be considered best among game-fishes. In coordinating the essential attributes of game-fishes, each inherent trait and quality must be duly and impartially considered. Their habits and habitat; their aptitude to rise to the artificial fly; their manner of resistance and struggle for freedom when hooked; their finesse and intelligence; and their excellence as flood must all be taken into account and duly weighed.

The black bass is more advanced in the scheme of evolution, and exhibits traits of a higher organization than either the salmon or trout. It is worthy of note that the highest development of fishes is shown in those with spiny-rayed fins as in the black bass, striped bass, channel bass, etc., while those of a lower development have soft-rayed fins as in the salmon, trout, whitefish, pike, etc.

In the animal creation the highest intelligence is exemplified by the parental instinct or care of the young. This is shown in the highest degree among mammals, next among birds, in but few reptiles, and scarcely at all among fishes. In the two hundred, or more, families of fishes, those that evince any parental instinct or manifest any care of their young can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The black bass stands pre-eminent in this respect, and is a bright and shining example to all the finny tribe in its habit of watching and guarding its nest and caring for its young brood when hatched.

Most fishes in fresh and salt water abandon their eggs as soon as emitted and fertilized. The salmon and trouts deposit their eggs in the shallowest water and leave them to the tender mercies of predatory fish, birds, and reptiles during an incubation of two or three months.

The black bass will rise to the artificial fly as readily as the salmon or the brook trout, under the same conditions; and will take the live minnow, or other live bait, under any and all circumstances favorable to the taking of any other fish. I consider him, inch for inch and pound for pound, the gamest fish that swims. The royal salmon and the lordly trout must yield the palm to a black bass of equal weight.

That he will eventually become the leading game-fish of America is my oft-expressed opinion and firm believe. This result, I think, is inevitable; if for no other reasons, from a force of circumstances occasioned by climatic conditions and the operation of immutable natural laws, such as the gradual drying up and dwindling away of the small trout streams, and the consequent decrease in brook trout, both in quality and quantity; and by the introduction of predatory fish in waters where the trout still exists.

Another prominent cause of the decline and fall of the brook trout, is the erection of dams, saw-mills, and factories upon trout streams, which, though to be deplored, cannot be prevented; the march of empire and the progress of civilization cannot be stayed by the honest, though powerless, protests of anglers.

But, while the ultimate fate of the brook trout is sealed beyond peradventure, in open, public waters, we have the satisfaction of knowing that in the black bass we have a fish equally worthy, both as to game and edible qualities, and which at the same time is able to withstand and defy many of the causes that will, in the end, effect the annihilation and extinction of the brook trout.

As to a comparison of game qualities as between the smallmouth bass and the large-mouth bass, I hold that, other things being equal, and where the two species inhabit the same waters, there is no difference in game qualities; for, while the smallmouth is probably more active in its movements, the large-mouth bass is more powerful; and no angler can tell from its manner of resistance whether he is fast to one or the other.

Both species of black bass rise equally well to the artificial fly; though, if there be any difference in this respect, I think the large-mouth bass has the advantage. In a letter Count Von dem Borne, of Germany (who was very successful in introducing and propagating the black bass in that country), wrote me that the large-mouth black bass rose better to the artificial fly than the smallmouth bass. My own experience rather favors this view, and it has likewise been brought to my notice by anglers in various parts of the country.

The current but erroneous opinion that the smallmouth bass exceeds the large-mouth bass in game qualities, has been very widespread, and has been much enhanced by the endorsement of several of our best ichthyologists, who unfortunately, however, are not, and do not pretend to be, anglers, but who imbibed this opinion second-hand from prejudiced anglers who ought to have known better. But as the black bass is becoming better known, and fly-fishing for the species is being more commonly practiced, this unfair and unmerited comparison is fast dying out.

Fish inhabiting swiftly-running streams are always more vigorous and gamy than those in still waters, and it is probable that where the large-mouth bass exists alone in very shallow and sluggish waters, of high temperature and thickly grown with algae, it will exhibit less combative qualities, consequent on the enervating influences of its environment; but where both species inhabit the same waters, and are subject to the same conditions, I am convinced that no angler can tell whether he has hooked a large-mouth or a smallmouth bass, from their resistance and mode of fighting, provided they are of equal weight, until he has the ocular evidence.

I use the expression “equal weight” advisedly, for most anglers must have remarked that the largest bass of either species are not necessarily the hardest fighters; on the contrary, a bass of two or two and a half pounds’ weight will usually make a more gallant fight than one of twice the size, and this fact, I think, will account in a great measure for the popular idea that the smallmouth bass is the “gamest” species for this reason:

Where the two species co-exist in the same stream or lake, the large-mouth bass always grows to a larger size than the other species, and an angler having just landed a two-pound smallmouth bass after a long struggle, next hooks a large-mouth bass weighing four or five pounds, and is surprised, probably, that it “fights” no harder or perhaps not so hard as the smaller fish—in fact, seems “logy”; he, therefore, reiterates the cry that the smallmouth bass is the gamest fish.

But, now, if he next succeeds in hooking a large-mouth bass of the same size as the first one caught, he is certain that he is playing a smallmouth bass until it is landed, when to his astonishment it proves to be a large-mouth bass; he merely says, “he fought well for one of his kind,” still basing his opinion of the fighting qualities of the two species upon the first two caught.

Perhaps his next catch may be a smallmouth bass of four pounds, and which, though twice the weight of the large-mouth bass just landed, does not offer any greater resistance, and he sets it down in his mind as a large-mouth bass. Imagine the angler’s surprise, then, upon taking it into the landing net, to find it a smallmouth bass, and one which, from its large size and the angler’s preconceived opinion of the species should have fought like a Trojan.

Now, one would think that the angler would be somewhat staggered in his former belief; but no, he is equal to the occasion, and in compliance with the popular idea, he merely suggests that “it was out of condition, somehow,” or “was hooked so as to drown it in the struggle”; and so, as his largest fish will necessarily be big-mouth bass, and because they do not fight in proportion to their size, they are set down as lacking in game qualities—of course, leaving the largest smallmouth bass out of the calculation.

Gentle reader, this is not a case of special pleading, nor is the angler a creation of the imagination lugged in as an apologist for the large-mouth bass; he is a veritable creature of fish and blood, of earth earthy, and with the self-conceit, weaknesses and shortcomings characteristic of the genus homo. I have met him and heard his arguments and sage expressions scores of times, and if the reader will reflect a moment I am sure he will recognize him.

Many years ago I was at Gogebic Lake, Wisconsin, where, among a number of prominent anglers, were Dr. F., and Dr. T., both of New York City. Dr. F. had a very extensive angling experience in all parts of the country, and Dr. T. was well known as a participant in the fly- and bait-catching contests in the tournaments of the National Rod and Reel Association of that day.

Dr. T. was a firm believer in the superior game qualities of the smallmouth bass, and declared that he could invariably tell what species of black bass he had hooked, from its manner of “fighting.” Dr. F. was confident he could not do so. The matter was finally put to a practical test, when Dr. T. was forced to ac-knowledge himself vanquished, and that he nor any other angler could make the distinction, for one fish was as “gamy” as the other. I might add that this result will be obtained wherever the two species exist in the same waters.

Mr. S. C. Clarke, a veteran angler of sixty years’ experience, and whose opinion is titled to great weight, says:

“I will say that, from an acquaintance with both species for more than forty years, from Minnesota to Florida, I have found little or no difference between them. I have taken them with fly, spoon, and bait, as many as fifty in a day (in early times), and up to six and a half pounds’ weight.”

“A bad name, given to the big-mouth bass when black bass first began to attract the attention of anglers, has stuck. It may interest a younger generation of anglers to know that forty years ago these gamy fishes were hardly known to anglers, and as soon as they began to attract attention some per sons, to show their exquisite discrimination, began to praise one to the detriment of the other. Dr. Henshall and I have had the courage to fight this, and to say that in game qualities there is little difference, and that what there is depends on the weight of the fish, two pounds being its fighting weight. Further than to say that the big-mouth is not so capricious about taking the fly as his brother—i.e., will usually take it more freely—I have not room to go into this subject here. I have written all this before and intend to keep at it until justice is done to a noble game-fish.”

Mr. Henry Talbott, an angler of wide experience, and who has written so entertainingly and instructively on black bass angling in the Potomac, says:

“There are some anglers who consider there is but one black bass, the smallmouth, and that the other is useless for food, lacking in gamy qualities and only fished for by the misguided. In this they are mistaken, and it is a theory they will abandon and resent when their experience is wider.

“It is possible that in the Florida lakes they may be tame sport, and there seems to be a general agreement that in some of the swamps of Ohio the big-mouth is an inferior fish, but there is yet to be found his superior where he has a fair chance.

“Taking the two fish at their best, there is no man living can tell the difference in their taking the fly, in their fight to the boat, or on the platter, by any other sign than that one has a more capacious smile than the other; and by the same token he is just a little the better jumper and will leave the water oftener after being hooked, and is as long in coming to the net as his cousin.”

Owing to my admiration for the black bass as a game-fish, and my championship of its cause for many years, and my efforts to place it in the front rank of game-fishes, and my desire to have it placed in new waters, I am sometimes, thoughtlessly and unjustly, accused of being opposed to the brook trout, and of advising the stocking of trout streams with my “favorite” fish. Nothing can be further from the truth.

I am utterly opposed to the introduction of black bass into waters in which there is the remotest chance for the brook trout or rainbow trout to thrive. I yield to no one in love and admiration of the brook trout. I was perfectly familiar with it before I ever saw a black bass; but I am not so blinded by prejudice but that I can share that love with the black bass, which for several reasons is destined to become the favorite game-fish of America. “My offending hath this extent, no more.”

Let us look this thing squarely in the face. I do not wish to disturb anyone’s preference, but I do want to disabuse the minds of anglers of all prejudice in the matter. The brook trout must go. It has already gone from many streams, and is fast disappearing from others. It is sad to contemplate the extinction of the “angler’s pride” in public waters, but the stern fact remains that in this utilitarian age its days are numbered and its fate irrevocably sealed. As the red man disappears before the tread of the white man, the “living arrow” of the mountain streams goes with him.

The trout is essentially a creature of the pine forests. Its natural home is in waters shaded by pine, balsam, spruce, and hemlock, where the cold mountain brooks retain their low temperature, and the air is redo-lent of balsamic fragrance; where the natural flood of the trout is produced in the greatest abundance, and where its breeding grounds are undisturbed.

But the iron has entered its soul. As the buffalo disappears before the iron horse, the brook trout vanishes before the axe of the lumberman. As the giants of the forest are laid low, and the rank and file decimated and the wooden walls of the streams battered down, the hot, fiery sun leaps through the breaches, disclosing the most secret recesses of forest and stream to the bright glare of midday. The moisture of the earth is dissipated, the mosses and ferns become shriveled and dry, the wintergreen and partridge-berry, the ground pine and trailing arbutus struggle feebly for existence; the waters decrease in size and increase in temperature, the conditions of the flood supply and of the breeding grounds of the brook trout are changed; it deteriorates in size and numbers and vitality, until finally, in accordance with the immutable laws of nature and the great principle of the “survival of the fittest” (not the fittest from the angler’s point of view, but the fittest to survive the changes and mutations consequent on the march of civilization), it disappears altogether.

Much has been said about the “trout hog” in connection with the decrease of the trout. But while he deserves all the odium and contempt heaped upon him by the honest angler, the result would be the same were the trout allowed undisturbed and peaceable possession of the streams, so far as the fish-hook is concerned, while the axe of the lumberman continues to ring its death knell.

Let us, then, cherish and foster and protect the crimson-spotted favorite of our youthful days as long as possible in public waters, and introduce the rainbow trout, the Dolly Varden, the steelhead, the red-throat trout, or the English brown trout, when he has disappeared; and when all these succumb, then, and not till then, intro duce the black bass. But let us give these cousins of the brook trout a fair trial first, and without prejudice. There are plenty of lakes, ponds, and large streams in the eastern states into which the black bass can be introduced without interfering with trout waters.

For many years to come brook trout will be artificially cultivated, and the supply thus kept up in preserved waters by wealthy angling clubs; but by the alteration of the natural conditions of their existence they will gradually decrease in size and quality, until finally they will either cease to be or degenerate to such a degree as to forfeit even this praiseworthy protection.

Imust dissent from the statement sometimes made that the black bass is the bluefish of fresh waters. The black bass is voracious—so are all game-fishes—but not more so than the brook trout. The character of a fish’s teeth determines the nature of its flood and the manner of its feeding. The bluefish has the most formidable array of teeth of any fish of its size—compressed, lancet-shaped, covered with enamel, and exceedingly strong and sharp, in fact, miniature shark teeth—while the black bass has soft, small, brush-like teeth, incapable of wounding, and intended only for holding its prey, which is swallowed whole. The brook trout has longer, stronger and sharper teeth than the bass, and a large, long mouth, capable of swallowing a bigger fish than a black bass of equal weight. The mouth of the bass is very wide, for the purpose of taking in crawfish with their long and aggressive claws, and not, as supposed by some, for the swallowing of large fishes. The black bass gets the best of other game-fishes, not by devouring the fishes themselves, but by devouring their flood. For this reason, more than any other, they should not be introduced into the same waters with brook trout. The pike or pickerel is the blue-fish of fresh waters, and in dental capacity and destructive possibilities is not far behind it.

The brook trout, I think, is the most beautiful of all fishes, as a fresh-run salmon is the handsomest and most perfect in form. The salmon is a king, the brook trout a courtier, but the black bass, in his virescent cuirass and spiny crest, is a doughty warrior whose prowess none can gainsay.

I have fished for brook trout in the wilds of Canada, where a dozen would rise at every cast of the fly, and it would be a scramble as to which should get it—great lusty trout, from a half-pound to two pounds in weight—but the black fly made life a burden by day, and the mosquito by night. The glory and beauty of the madly rushing stream breaking wildly over the great black rocks, and the quiet, glassy pools below reflecting the green spires of spruce and fir, availed nothing to swollen eyelids and smarting brow.

I have cast from early morn till dewy eve, on a good salmon stream in New Brunswick, for three days in succession without a single rise. I have cast standing in a birch-bark canoe until both arms and legs were weary with the strain, and then rested by casting while sitting—but all in vain. The swift-fowing, crystal stream reflected back the fierce glare of the northern sun and flowed on in silence toward the sea. The fir-clad hills rose boldly on either side, and stood in silent, solemn grandeur—for neither note of bird or hum of bee disturbed the painful silence of the Canadian woods.

At such times would flash on memory’s mirror many a fair scene of limpid lake or rushing river, shadowed by cool, umbrageous trees, and vocal with myriads of voices—where the black bass rose responsive to the swish of the rod and dropping of the fly. Or, should the bass be coy and shy, or loth to leave his lair beneath some root or shelving rock—the melody of the birds, the tinkle of a cow-bell, the chirp of a cricket, the scudding of a squirrel, filled up the void and made full compensation.

The true angler can find real pleasure in catching little sunfish, or silversides, if the stream and birds, and bees and butterflies do their part by him; while the killing of large or many fish, even salmon or trout, in silence and solitude, may fail to fully satisfy him.

I can find something beautiful or interesting in every fish that swims. I have an abiding affection for every one, from the lowly, naked bull-head, the humble scavenger of the waters, to the silver-spangled king who will not deign to soil his dainty lips with flood during his sojourn in crystal streams, and I love the brook trout best of all. But, as an angler, I can find more true enjoyment, more blessed peace, in wading some rushing, rocky stream, flecked by the shadows of overhanging elm and sycamore, while tossing the silken gage to the knight in Lincoln-green, my ears conscious of the rippling laughter of the merry stream, the joyous matin of the woodland thrush, the purring undertone of the quivering leaves—my eyes catching glimpses of hill and meadow, wren and robin, bee and bittern, fern and flower, and my breath inhaling the sweet fragrance of upland clover and elder-blossom—I say I can find more true enjoyment in this—than paying court to the lordly salmon in his drear and silent demesne, or in wooing the lovely trout with anointed face, gloved hands, and head swathed in gauze. If this be treason, my brother, make the most of it. I am con tent. It is my honest conviction. After killing every species of game-fish east of the Rocky Mountains, from Canada to Florida, and some in foreign lands, I find the knightly bass and his tourney-field all sufficient.

THE CAPTURE OF THE BASS

My brother of the angle, go with me
This perfect morning in the leafy June,
To yonder pool below the rapid’s foot.
Approach with caution; let your tread be soft;
Beware the bending bushes on the brink.
Disturb no branch, nor twig, nor leaf, my friend,
The finny tribe is wary.

Rest we here.

Behold the lovely scene! The rippling stream,
Now dancing, sparkling, in the morning sun;
The blue-eyed violet nodding at your feet;
The red-bird, all ablaze, with swelling throat,
The dreamy, droning hum of insect wings
Is mingled ever with the rustling leaves.
Sleek, well-fed cattle there contented stand,
On gravelly shoal beneath the spreading beech.
Across the narrow stream a sycamore,
A weather-beaten giant, old and gray,
With scarr’d arms stretching o’er the silent pool,
With gnarl’d and twisted roots bathed in the flood
For, lo, these hundred years.

Beneath those roots
With watchful eye—proud monarch of the pool—
A cunning bass doth lie, on balanced fin,
In waiting for his prey.

And now with rod,
With faithful reel, and taper’d line of silk,
With mist-like leader and two fairly flies—
Dark, bush hackles, both—I make a cast.
With lengthen’d line I quickly cast again,
And just beneath the tree the twin-like lures
As gently drop as falling autumn leaves;
And half-submerged, like things of life they seem,
Responsive to the rod and line.

But look!
Saw you that gleam beneath the flood? A flash—
A shadow—then a swirl upon the pool?
My hand, responsive to the sudden thrill,
Strikes in the steel—the wary bass is hooked!
And now with lightning speed he darts away
To reach his lair—his refuge ‘neath the roots.
The singing reel proclaims him almost there—
I “give the butt”—the ever-faithful rod
In horse-shoe curve checks his headlong fight.
Right lustily he tugs and pulls, Egad!
But still the barb is fast.

The hissing line—
The rod now bending like a slender reed
Resists the tight’ning strain. He turns his course—
In curving reaches, back and forth, he darts,
Describing arcs and segments in the pool.
Ha! nobly done! as with a mighty rush
He cleaves the crystal stream, and at one bound,
Full half a fathom in the realm above
He nimbly takes an atmospheric fight—
His fins extended, stiff with bristling points—
His armor brightly flashing in the sun—
His wide-extended jaws he shakes in rage
To rid him of the hook.

And now I lower
The pliant rod in court’sy to the brave.
The line relieved, somewhat, of steady strain,
Outwits the wily bass—the hook holds fast!
Now back again he falls with angry splash
To seek the aid of snag, or root of tree;
For thus, my friend, he oft escapes, I trow,
By fouling line or hook—

He never sulks!
Not he; while life remains, or strength holds good,
His efforts never cease. Now up the stream—
Now down again—I have him well in hand.
Now reeling in, or erstwhile giving line;
He swims now fast or slow—now high or low.
The steady strain is still maintained, you see!
The good rod swaying like a wind-blown rush—
He surges thro’ the flood.

Another leap!
Ye Gods! How like an angry beast he shakes
His brisling mane, and dives below again!
And did you mark, my friend, his shrewd intent,
As when he fell upon the slacken’d line?
If then he’d found it stretched and taut, I ween,
He would have made his safe and sure escape.
But haply then the tip was slightly lowered—
And so, with yielding line, the hook held fast.
Now truly, friend, he makes a gallant fight!
In air or water—all the same to him—
His spiny crest erect; he struggles still.
No sulking here! but like a mettl’d steed
Skills, Tactics, and Techniques
He champs the bit, and ever speeds the best
With firm-held, tighten’d rein.

He’s off again!
Now down the stream he flashes like a shaft
From long-bow swiftly sped—his last bold
spurt—
The effort cost him dear—his worsted strength
Is ebbing fast. And now in lessening curves
He feebly swims, and labors with the tide.
And as I reel the line he slowly yields,
And now turns up his breast-plate, snowy white—
A vanquished, conquered knight.

And now my friend
The landing-net. With firm and cautious hand
Beneath the surface hold it. Take him in.
Now lift him out and gently lay him down.
How bright his tunic, bronze and glossy green!
A fitting rival to the velvet sward.

And see the ragged rent the hook hath made!
You marvel how it held him safe and fast!
‘Twas by the equal and continual strain
Of supple rod and ever-faithful reel.
‘Twas work well done.

Oh valiant, noble bass!
Fit dweller of the merry, brawling stream.
Thy once-loved pool beneath thy giant tree,
Thy fancied stronghold ‘neath its tangled roots,
Shall know thee never more. Thy race is run!

Now in thy creel,
My doubting friend, we’ll gently lay him down
Upon a bed of cool and graceful ferns,
Yet sparkling with the early morning dew—
A warrior in repose!

A. The Black Bass as a Gamefish

JAMES A. HENSHALL