“Now,” he said, as he began setting up his rod, “I will show you my favorite rig for catching big-mouthed bass. Look at that trolling spoon, it is something of my own invention, although the tackle shops are getting them lately.”
He had a special arrangement of feathers and tin, not be described on paper, but long experience has made me skeptical about new all-killing inventions, and possibly my countenance betrayed my thoughts, for he went on, as he saw me getting out a cast of bass flies.
“I know” he observed, throwing his lure overboard, “that other rigs will take some, but you see now, I shall have one within a minute.”
I had no choice, as I was seated in the bow of the boat, and could not have used a trolling spoon if I had wished, as our lines would have fouled. I had to put on flies and fish by casting.
“That is all very well,” I replied, “at certain times, and in a stream like this, but if we had a large, deep river, I would rather use a number of flies on a long leader.”
“There,” said Mr. Green at that moment as he struck a fish, “what did I tell you. If you want to take black-bass, particularly this kind—”
He never finished his observation, for at that moment a four-pound fish seized my fly, and it took our joint skill and attention to keep from fouling. He managed, however, to get his fish in quickly, as it was a small one, and give me an opportunity to play mine with the light tackle that I was using. We saved them both, but they were only the forerunners of an unlimited number. The spoon did undoubtedly kill the most, but there were all that we both wanted, ten times over, and we had to stop fishing, to avoid destroying more than we could use. I had the satisfaction of catching the largest, however, with the fly.
We had brought a gun, as well as our fishing tackle. Suddenly from out the bushes there rose with much noise and flurry a large bird. I had hardly time to grab my gun, before he was out of range, and although I fired, it was ineffectually.
“Oh, I am sorry you missed him,” said Mr. Green sadly, for he always takes a dejected view of other people’s failures, “that was a Limpkin, and I should like to have got him.”
“I thought it was a water turkey,” I replied, referring to the queer creature that we had seen on ever stick and stump in the St. John’s. “But whatever it was, it was out of range when I fired.”