The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-03-02
JIeeERlNo FOR FROST FISH.
4 Very Foolish Fish Whose Curiosity Gets
1t Into Trouhle in the NXintar


1t Into Trouble in the Winter.
The Connecticut river fisherman cuts
a bundle of sprigs in the woods OIL
pulls up huckleberry bush in his pas
ture, and. bush in hand and a hook
with no other bait, goes fishing What
silly fish is it, pray? What absurd fin.
| ny denizen OF the more or less deep
bites at huckleberry bush? Why, the
delicate little frost fish, of course, who
knows almost absolutely nothing. and
| is so brittle that he almost breaks him
self in two with a snap in turning a
very sharp corner.
a frost fish is good. though, to eat
He is just about as big and shapely as
a baby pond trout but has no more
style than sense. He is almost as light
| of color and crisp as an icicle. With
the severe frosts of midwinter, when
| the ice is strong enough on the rivers
| for skating, and feathery crystals float
in the air ct dawn, the frost fish quit
the ocean, and in a great crowd scurry
! up tide water rivers on mysterious
+ errand, nobody knows exactly what
! one. They rush into shallow water
/
frost fisherman comes along and capt
ures them as easily as he lifts eggs out
/ OF one basket into another. He cuts a
| broad hole in the thin ice at the shore.
and on hands and knees, bending over
the rivers brink, thrusts in his buckle
berry bush and agi tates it in the liveli-
! est style.
! Like most beasts that are not over
| charged with intellectual freight the
frost fish are loaded to the very gun
wales with trivial curiosity. As soon
| as the water begins to bubble and sizzle
with the buckle berry bush hustle shoot
ing off glistening beads of foam the
| frost fish conceiyes an equally lively
| curiosity to find out what makes the
water go, and what the crooked-up
creature on its hands and knees on the
! banks is up to Accordingly in little
school he makes break right into the
| middle of the submarine brush snare,
just as the piscatorial juggler wants
| him to- and all that cool cheat, with a
stick and hook set in the end of il,
had to do is to set the hook into the
foolish frost fsh's gills and yank him
out on the bank, Then, while the frost
fish is Topping about on the ground, his
equally foolish and unsuspicious COM
panions keep on poking their shouts
into all parts of the waving water
bough, examining every stem Of it with
solemn attention, wondering still what
makes the thing go-then the angler
steadily makes his barbed stick go back
and forth from bough to bank until he
has lifted every one of his inquisitive
callers into his creel. And the frost
fish never find out exactly what made
the sprig go. and, what is of more i'm
portance, what made themselves go
hence. The whole jiggering and Jug
Cling business is to them sort OF
marine version of the equally curious
curiosity enigma about the lady and
the tiger" with the difference, however,
that the frost fish is goose and a goner
both.
Thus the Connecticut riverside fisher
men entrap the benighted and delicious
frost fish, and very successful pro-
cess it is. It is not an expensive method
at all, for huckleberry bushes are
plentiful in the nutmeg state, and like
frost fish are to be had for the taking
of them. At Quaker Hill, on the
Thames river, a few miles north Of
New London, the fishermen have been
angling for frost fish for week or
more and any one may get a peck
basketful of Jack Frost's piscatorial
pets in couple of hours any day and
at almost any hour of it 1t is rather
comical spectacle on the river bank
these frosty days. that of nearly score
OF men in heavy overcoats, on their
hands and knees, and often stretched
at full length on the snowy ground,
bending eagerly over the rivers edge;
in their left hand a hooked stick, a
huckleberry bush in the right. which
they agitate in the water in the most
solemn and earnest way, that is to say,
'jigger" it
Lingering for frost fish" is what the
sport is universally called; and in any
riverside rural grocery in eastern Con-
necticut, where a stalwart country
fellow, who speaks about once in
every twenty minutes, but chews navy
plug most socially. finally breaks
silence with sudden great bubbling
over of jocund JOY in his countenance,
and jerks out: Say, let's go down and
jigger fur a spell!"-well, a stranger in
the land might not catch the idea,
might think, perhaps, the invita-
ton was a vague proposal for
an assassination; but every fellow
in cowhide boots and his trousers
in them and whip lash over his right
shoulder catches on promptly and re-
spends: Lets! by goshl I'm with
yer. Tell yer what I'll do; I'll jigger
yer fur the crowd Cigars fur all
hands Durn me eff I don't" That
settles It And straightway two
dozen able-bodied countrymen wallow
through the snow down TO the river
bank and breathlessly watch the two
champions, prone on their faces, while
they jiCger two hours for the cigars,
two for nickel, for the crowd.
As pan fish frost fish are crisp and
toothsome. They should be fried, not
broiled, in butter and served piping
hot They are OF far better flavor than
are the tommy cod, = which come into /
Thames river in their season in equally /
great numbers Mantle river, three or
four miles west Of this town, which is q
salt estuary, like the Thames, in the
town Of Lyme, emptying into the beau |
tiful Mantle bay, also abounos in frost /
fish at this time The Lyme fishermen /
have a rather curious way, though, Of