The captain told me of a certain deep hole where he said an old pioneer made his headquarters, who had taken off two hooks and leaders for him on two different days during the summer. When I reached the hole I recognized it in a moment by the captain's description. It was in a short bend or angle of the creek. On the opposite side from where I stood, and on the lower angle of the square, the channel had cut a deep hole under an overhanging bank, which was covered with willows. These drooped over the water and shaded it nicely. There was a slight eddy there and the surface of the water was flecked with bits of white foam which came from the rapids just above. What a paradise for a wary old trout!
I stopped about forty feet above the hole and put on one of the largest hoppers in my box; then I reeled out ten or fifteen feet of line and cast into the foot of the rapid. As the current straightened out my line I reeled off more of it and still more until it floated gently and gracefully down into the dark eddy, and when within two feet of the edge of the bank there was a whirl, a surge, a break in the water, as if a full-grown beaver had been suddenly frightened from his sun bath on the surface and had started for the bottom. I saw a long, broad gleam of silvery white, my line cut through the water, and the old-timer started for his bed under the bank.
I struck at the proper instant, and, bending my little split bamboo almost double, brought him up with a short turn. He darted up the stream a few feet, and again turning square about started for his den. I snubbed him again. This time he shot down the creek, and, turning, made another dive for his hiding place. Again I gave him the butt, but this time he was determined to free himself, and with a frantic plunge he tore the hook from his mouth and disappeared in his dark retreat.
My heart sank within me, when I realized that he was gone. He was truly a monster, fully two feet long, and I think would have weighed four pounds or over. I reeled up and made two or three more casts in the same hole. His mate, a comely-looking fellow, but not nearly so large, came out once and smelt of the bait but declined to take it. He had evidently seen enough to convince him that it was not the kind of a dinner he was looking for. I fished down the creek for an hour and then returned and tried the old fellow again, but he had not yet forgotten his recent set-to with me, and refused to come out. I presume he is still there, and will probably reign for some years to come, the terror of tackle owners, unless someone gets a hook firmly fastened in his jaw, and has tackle sufficiently derrick-like to land him; and whoever that lucky individual may be, I congratulate him in advance. My tackle would have held him if I had been fortunate enough to get the proper _cinch_ on him, and the only thing I have to regret in thinking of the trip, is that I was not so fortunate.