Page:A La California.djvu/101

ing in, and prepared to fish for salmon-trout, as they are called; really they are yearling and two-year-old salmon. They will bite at a worm, spoon, or fly, but best at worms. I had hardly put in my hook before a noble fellow made the line fairly hiss through the water for a few minutes. Then we drew him, panting and exhausted with his struggles, alongside the rocks, and with a landing net got him into the boat. He was twenty inches in length, and the handsomest fish I ever caught. Eight-and ten-pounders are common, and they are the most delicious fish for frying or broiling which ever swam the sea. Great crabs came in also with the tide, and we dipped several of them out with our net. In two hours we corralled fourteen salmon-trout, losing several more by hooks breaking, and then, the slack-water coming- on and the fish ceasing to bite with avidity, hoisted sail and went swiftly gliding back up the stream to the hotel. It was, all in all, the best morning's sport I have ever enjoyed in my life, and I have shot and fished from the Red River of the North to the Rio Grande, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific.