The Chronicle-star combined with the Moss Point advertiser., 1946-08-23

one ounce leader with a Swiss
movement reel and a royal coach
man lure of humming bird feath-
ers. Bass fishing in the grand
manner is sport too but In all
of these things, a lot depends on
the man who is fishing. We once
knew 9 fellow who got quite FAM
Gus as a bass fishermen, who
made a good chunk of money writ
ing about it; he studied the his
tory of the thing, and tied his
own flies, and went ON at q great
rate about the fine and headv ex.
perience of being a real sports
man. There was always a chal
lenge in his manner, as though
you were something of a seoun-
drel, q real peasant, for believing
that there vas any other way 'to
take a fish, or any other pur-
pose for doing so, than to pit q
stout and honorable sportslnan's
heart, and a fly made of goofus
feathers and tied at midnight OF
All Souls day, o. some such,
agaiastaa wild and free denizen OF
nature like the black bass.
Amongst fine fly fishermen. there
is many and many a real sports
man, and we are not arguing to
the contrary. But this acquaint-
ance of ours was not one of them.
Fishing with him was simply a
compensation, a way of showing
off, and Disgusting from himself
and from others the fact that he
had an unpleasant nature. He was
cold and grasping in his relations
with other human beings, and
if he had you cornered, financial
lly or professionally, he would
gut you in short order, without
ever a show of the fine mercy and
the sporting chance he would in
sist should be shown to a fish.
From our way of looking at it,
a man could fish and hunt by
the sporting code from the era
die to the grave vet never be q
sport if the process only served
to make him less sporting and a
little more arrogant and self-sat-
isfied in the other pursuits of
life. Nothing is more boring than
the sport who employs his social
led craftsmanship as a conscious
and artificial mark to insist that
he is made of stuff a little rarer
and finer than the common run
of men.
Last week we got a chance to
do a little maekerel fishing. Two
newspapermen we used to work
with had blown in on their vaca-
ton, raring to wet a hook. So
about five of us, all of the ink
stained tribe got a charter boat
and set out in the general diree-
ton o! the islands. There was q
stiff south wind and the sky was
overcast, and huge dark green
waves were running in Horn Is
land pass, in no mood to be tri-
fled with. We trolled in the Ice
of Petit Bots, and drew up to
the light house and caught a few
founders. Then we went to the
pier behind Petit Bots and landed
on the island. Several of us
found an old path across the is
land through the rushes and shall
low ponds. The water in the
ponds was brown with leaf mould,
and still warm from the mid
day sun. It was curious to see
little minnows floating in these
land locked pools, while the huge
sea itself. flowing to all the oceans
of the world, beat upon the satd
dil dOOQl tHCfilf SCdACc = iiditUkN
yards away. They were afloat in
their limited little sphere of life,
just as we are afloat upon our
little sphere. with no real idea
of the measureless vastness Of
the sea of space and time in which
our globe is spinning.
A big surf was piling up on the
beach when at last we came over
the dunes. The open Gulf stretch
ed far away. and vivid whitecaps
were breaking beneath the grey.
windy sky. We swan in the surf,
and rode in on the big slopiHg
waves. sometimes forty or fifty
yards or more. If you get on 3
big one and begin to swim al just
the right moment you viii merge
with the motion of the wave it
self and ride in like a surf board
We returned = the beat nd