Another river in this region which affords good salmon fishing is the Esquemain. It empties itself into the St. Lawrence about twenty miles east of the Saguenay. It is a cold, clear, and rapid stream, abounding in rapids and deep pools. At its mouth is situated a saw-mill, but its water-works are so managed as not to interfere with the salmon. The fish of this stream ascend to a great distance, and, though rather small, are exceedingly abundant.
The best fishing in the river is at the foot of a waterfall, which forms a sheet of foam, about one mile above the mouth. My Quebec friend accompanied me to this place, and, though we only threw the fly about six hours (three in the evening and three in the morning), yet we killed thirteen salmon, without losing a single line, and with the loss of only three flies.
Owing to the bushy shores of the stream, we were compelled to fish standing upon boulders situated in its centre; and whenever we hooked a fish, there was no alternative but to plunge into the current and trust to fortune. For some unaccountable reason (of course it could not have been our fault), we lost more than half of those we hooked; but it was worth a moderate fortune to see the magnificent leaps which the fish performed, not only when they took the fly, but when they attempted to escape. There was not one individual that did not give us a race of at least half a mile. The largest taken during this expedition was killed by my companion, and caused more trouble than all his other prizes. Not only did this fellow attempt to clear himself by stemming the foam of a rapid, and rubbing his nose against a rock to break the hook, but he also swept himself completely round a large boulder, poked his head into a net, and ran with the speed of lightning to the extreme end of his line. It took my friend forty minutes to land this salmon; and I can assure you that he was particularly pleased when he found that his fish weighed one pound more than the largest I had taken. The fact was, our rods were almost precisely alike in length and strength; and, as two countries were represented in our persons, the strife between us was desperate. I will acknowledge that the Canada gentleman took the largest salmon; but the States’ angler took them in the greatest number.