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PREFACE
“Puget Sound swarms with fish. Wonderful stories are told of them. So plentiful are the salmon that during the season when they are running up the streams it is said they will rush up a brook so thickly as to wedge together and form a bridge that one can walk across. In jumping the falls of small creeks they often lacerate themselves terribly on sharp rocks. Salmon is the favorite fish of that country. Even the ladies like them. One old fisherman down on the wharf told how a lady up town had a pet salmon. It stayed in a certain little cove. During the rainy season the lady would come each day to feed it with bread. When she would start back it would swim up the watery streets and follow her home, then swim down again to its little cove.
Very queer fish are caught in these waters. One kind is called candle fish. It is dried and packed in boxes like candles. We are told the fishermen use them to light their homes, and that at one time all the boats on the sound used them instead of sperm-oil lamps. By putting the heads of the fish downward in a candlestick and lighting the tail, which, in conjunction with the backbone, acts as a wick, it burns like a candle. They eat this fish, and when cooking it is so fat it fries itself.” — St. Paul Daily Globe. August 19, 1893.
This little book is full of stories such as these. It is a “truthful,” little collection of tales like those the old fisherman or “sea salt” used to spin at the behest of the ever curious. So get comfortable, relax and get ready to share in a beautiful exercise of human imagination.
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