The young fry feed on minute crustaceans and the larval forms of insects. When a month old they are about an inch long, and continue to grow, if food is plentiful, so that they reach a length of from three to six inches in the fall. Thereafter they increase a pound a year under the most favorable conditions, until the maximum weight is attained, which is about five pounds. In some instances, however, they have reached a weight of seven or even ten pounds, where the environment has been unusually favorable; notably in Glen Lake, near Glens Falls, New York, where a half-dozen or more have been taken weighing from eight to ten pounds. One of ten pounds was twenty-five and one-half inches long and nineteen inches in girth. As a game-fish the black-bass has come into his inheritance. As the French say, he has arrived. With the special tools and tackle now furnished for his capture, he has proved my aphorism. "Inch for inch, and pound for pound, he is the gamest fish that swims." When I ventured this opinion twenty-five years ago, there were no special articles made for his capture except the Kentucky reel and the McGinnis rod, twelve feet long and fifteen ounces in weight. In awarding the palm as a game-fish to the black-bass, I do so advisedly, in the light of ample experience with all other game-fishes, and without prejudice, for I have an innate love and admiration for all, from the lovely trout of the mountain brook to the giant tarpon of the sea. In the application of so broad and sweeping an assertion each and every attribute of a game-fish must be well considered: his habitat; his aptitude to rise to the fly; his struggle for freedom; his manner of resistance; his weight as compared with other game-fishes; and his excellence as a food-fish, must be separately and collectively considered and duly and impartially weighed. His haunts are amid most charming and varied scenes. Not in the silent and solemn solitudes of the primeval forests, where animated Nature is evidenced mainly in swarms of gnats, black-flies, and mosquitoes; nor under the shadows of grand and lofty mountains, guarded by serried ranks of pines and firs, but whose sombre depths are void of feathered songsters. However grand, sublime, and impressive such scenes truly are, they do not appeal profoundly to the angler. He must have life, motion, sound. He courts Nature in her more communicative moods, and in the haunts of the black-bass his desires are realized. Wading down the rippling stream, casting his flies hither and yon, alert for the responsive tug, the sunlight is filtered through overhanging trees, while the thrush, blackbird, and cardinal render the air vocal with sweet sounds, and his rival, the kingfisher, greets him with vibrant voice. The summer breeze, laden with the scent of woodland blossoms, whispers among the leaves, the wild bee flits by on droning wing, the squirrel barks defiantly, and the tinkle of the cow-bell is mellowed in the distance. I know of such