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Read Ebook: Rameaun veljenpoika: Filosofinen vuorokeskustelu by Diderot Denis Hagfors Edvin Translator
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Ebook has 558 lines and 39465 words, and 12 pages
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BROOK TROUT 8
MALMA TROUT 8
LAKE TROUT 8
OQUASSA TROUT 10
BROWN TROUT 10
YELLOWSTONE TROUT 10
SAIBLING TROUT 10
RAINBOW TROUT 12
LAKE TAHOE TROUT 12
STEEL-HEAD TROUT 12
AN UNUSUAL WAY OF TAKING THE FLY 46
THE TROUT BROOK 66
The Determined Angler
THE HOLY ANGLERS
"The greater number of them were found together, fishing, by Jesus, after His Resurrection."--IZAAK WALTON.
"... certain poor fishermen coming in very weary after a night of toil found their Master standing on the bank of the lake waiting for them. But it seems that He must have been busy in their behalf while he was waiting; for there was a bright fire of coals on the shore, and a goodly fish broiling thereon, and bread to eat with it. And when the Master had asked them about their fishing he said: 'Come, now, and get your breakfast.' So they sat down around the fire, and with His own hands he served them with the bread and the fish."--HENRY VAN DYKE.
"The first men that our Saviour dear Did choose to wait upon Him here. Blest fishers were...." W. BASSE.
"I would ... fish in the sky whose bottom is pebbly with stars."--THOREAU.
The principal fishes of the Sea of Galilee to-day are the same as they were two thousand years ago--bream and chub. These were taken in olden times by both net and hook and line.
The fishermen whom Christ chose as His disciples--Peter. Andrew, James, and John--were professional net fishermen, but hook and line fishing was a favorite pastime of the well-to-do Egyptians as well as the poor people who could not afford a net.
Weirs not unlike the modern article were used in the Holy Land in Bible time, excepting on Lake Gennesaret, where the law of the land forbade them.
Our Saviour "fed the people on fish when they were hungry." The species is not alluded to in the Biblical paragraph, but no doubt the fish feasts of the Lord were mostly of chub and bream. Jesus loved fishermen and was in their society most of His time. No other class of men were so well favored by Him. He inspired St. Peter, St. John, St. Andrew, and St. James, poor fishermen, who drew their nets for the people, and these four fishermen, declares Father Izaak, "He never reproved for their employment or calling, as he did scribes and money changers."
The Lord's favorite places of labor and repose--the places He most frequented--were near the fishes and fisherman. "He began to teach by the seaside. His pulpit was a fishing boat or the shore of a lake. He was in the stern of the boat, asleep. He was always near the water to cheer and comfort those who followed it." And Walton tells us that "when God intended to reveal high notions to His prophets He carried them to the shore, that He might settle their mind in a quiet repose."
Bream and chub are not monster fishes--they do not average the great weights of the tarpon and the tuna; they are of the small and medium-size species; so, if the apostles were pleased with "ye gods and little fishes," we mortals of to-day should be satisfied with our catch, be it ever so small.
APPELLATIONS OF THE TROUTS
HISTORIES OF THE TROUTS--HOW THE ANGLER TAKES THEM
THE ANGLER AND THE FISHERMAN
One profound proof of the soundness in the philosophy that teaches against wantonly wasteful slaughter in the chase is the disinclination on the part of certain so-called sportsmen--a vulgar gentry that resort to the woods and waters solely because it is fashionable to do so--and their guides to honorably dispose of their game after the killing. These greedy snobs are viciously adverse to losing a single bird or fish in the pursuit, but they think little of letting the game rot in the sun after the play. With this fact easily provable any day in the year, it may be said that outside of market fishing and camp fishing for the pot the one real object in fishing and angling is the pursuit itself and not the quarry.
In baseball, it's the game, not the bases; in archery, it's the straightest shooting, not the target. True, we play cards for prizes, but surely as much for the game itself, not altogether for the prizes, because it is possible to buy the prizes or their equivalent outright or take the prizes by force.
My bayman develops fits bordering closely upon incurable hysteria if I lose a single bluefish in the play, but he worries not when he goes ashore with a sloopful of hand-liners and half a hundred fish he cannot make good use of.
"Pull it in! you'll lose it!" "We could catch a hundred if you wouldn't fool!" "The other boats'll beat us badly!" "There's a million right 'round the boat!"
These are a few of his excitable expressions. But, when I say to him, "What's the difference, Captain, in losing one or two fish here and wasting half a hundred on shore?" he calms down for a minute or two. Only for a minute or two, however, for he's in the game solely for fish, not the fishing. It's all numbers and size with him, and he's encouraged in this greed by nine out of every ten men he takes aboard his boat.
"We caught fifty," says Tom.
"We caught a hundred and ten," says Dick.
"We caught two hundred and sixty," says Harry.
And so the bayman brags, too, because it's purely business with him.
I have always found the greatest pleasure in fishing is the fishing and not the blood and bones associated with the pursuit. I would rather take five fair fish on fine tackle correctly manipulated than fill the hold with a hundred horrid monsters mastered by mere strength, as in hand-line trolling for bluefish in the ocean and for muskellonge, etc., in fresh water.
"But," says Captain Getemanyway, "I can catch more fish with a hand-line than you can with your fine rod and reel."
"Of course you can," I reply, "and you could catch more if you used a net, a stick of dynamite, or a shotgun."
If it's the fish alone that is the object of the Angler's eye, why resort to any sort of tackle when there's a fish stall in every bailiwick?
There is great need of enlightenment in the common ethics of angling. Many persons are under the impression that quantity rather than quality makes the Angler's day.
According to their view of the pursuit, fishing is judged by figures, as in finance--glory to the man with the biggest balance. This is not so, because with this view accepted, Rockefeller would shine above Christ, Shakespeare, and Lincoln.
The mere catch--the number of fish taken--is only one little detail; it is not all of angling. If it were, the superior fisherman would be the man who got his fish in any manner.
Some of our greatest Anglers purposely never excel in the matter of numbers. The Angler's true qualities are based on the application of correct tackle, correct methods in fishing, and a correct appreciation of the pursuit, the game, the day, and the craft.
'Tis the day and the play, not the heads and hides that count.
An ancient writer says of the royal hounds: "The hunter loves to see the hounds pursue the hare, and he is glad if the hare escapes." So it is in angling; we do not wish to catch all the fish we can take in any fashion. We want to take some of them in a proper manner with appropriate implements.
"I can catch more trout with the angleworm and more bass with the trolling spoon than you can with the artificial fly," says Robert.
"Of course you can, Robert," say I, "and you could catch still more if you spread a screen across the tiny stream or set a trap, or if you used a set line with a hundred hooks, just as the target shooter might more readily puncture the circle with a charge of shot than with the single bullet, or just as the greedyman with a blunderbuss might excel in number the wing shot by potting quail bunched on the ground instead of chivalrously bagging single birds on the wing with a pertinent arm."
The neophyte always confounds the angler with the indiscriminate fisherman and so implicates the angler in the cruelty and wastefulness associated with mere chance fishing, when in fact the Angler is the real propagator and protector of the fishes, and is in no sense cruel or wasteful.
The laws that prohibit greedy catches, and protect the mother fish in breeding time, are made by, enforced by, and supported financially by the Angler.
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