"After breakfast we pulled out and around the island toward Osborn Bank. The fog began to break up early, and by 9:00 or so it was clear, with a brisk westerly coming up fast. Still there were no signs of fish, although we did see a good many more birds than we had the day before. It was just about noon when George came down off the cabin.

"'Tuna ahead!' he announced, quietly. 'Miles of em!'

"I climbed to the rail to look and pretty near fell overboard! He hadn't exaggerated any! I don't believe I ever saw so many fish before! The ocean was alive with them! Wherever you looked there were splashes, with birds working over them! As we drew closer we could see them driving the bait out in clouds!

"George got his big kite up, with a lot of line on it, while I rigged a bait. By the time everything was ready we were right into them.

"The first time the bait hit the water it was just as though a bomb had exploded! The surface parted and two or three fish made a grab for it. One nailed it. I let him go, then, when he'd stopped, set up the drag and went to work. I don't try to take yards of line at a time. Just about one turn of the reel with each drop—but keep it up steady. There wasn't much said. When the fish had struck, George had run over to where the kite line entered the water. He grabbed it, gave it a jerk, and broke it off, tying it to the boat. While I was fighting the fish, he rigged up another bait. We didn't have to say much. Each of us knew what to do and did it. George didn't move the boat all around. You don't have to on a tuna. Usually once, when he's circling, he comes up a little too far forward. You just kick ahead a few feet, and there you are.

"I got that fish in about ten minutes. The next strike was a great deal like the first. Three or four fish after the bait—and one getting it. This one didn't run quite so far as the other, so I got him a little quicker. I looked at George—and he was grinning. I knew by that that he was tickled with the way things were going.

"The next one we lost. There were so many after it that they got in each other's way and only succeeded in smashing the bait into pulp. I reeled in quickly and we rigged another.

"It hardly hit the water before a big tuna had it! He looked plenty big! When he stopped his run, and I went to work on him, from the feel of him I thought I must have snagged a rock! I gave him everything I had—but couldn't budge him, at least for a while. Pretty soon, though, the steady pressure told, and he started to come my way. Once I had him coming, I never let up, and it wasn't long before he was at gaff. When we got him aboard he looked big—perhaps two hundred pounds. I said so—but George only shook his head. He turned out to be right.

"Three fish!

"The next one acted differently from most any tuna I've taken. In the first place, from all I could see, he was the only one that went after the bait, and hardly made any fuss at all when he took it. His run was just average—not far nor fast. When he stopped, and I went to work on him, he came along nice and easy, and I was patting myself on the back, when something happened. That fish just sat down and sulked! I lifted until my rod almost bent to the cockpit combing, but I couldn't move him. All the time he seemed to be jerking his head up and down—just as though he were nodding. Each time he did that I thought he would jerk my arms out! It was a big temptation to ease up the drag and strain a little—but I knew better than to do that. No—we just had to have it out right there. It reminded me of breaking a colt. You've got to teach him who's boss. After about five minutes or so he gave in, and started to come again. I thought I had him licked this time—but found out different. When he was close to the boat, about fifteen feet down, and George was getting ready to make the gaff, he made a quick turn and lit out for the other side, under the boat! I had to do some tall lighting out myself to pass the rod around the stern and keep the line from fouling the propeller! I'd no more than got to the other side, when back he shot! Believe it or not, for five minutes that fish kept me in a regular foot race back and forth across the stern! I took a deep breath when George finally grabbed the leader and drove the gaff home.

"Fish were still everywhere and we lost no time getting going again. It was pretty rough by now, but we didn't mind that. I think we both realized that this was our big day; that before we were through with it we would have made some kind of record for ourselves; that we would probably never have another one like it.

"The fifth fish made the prettiest strike I think I've ever seen. He leaped clear of the water and smashed squarely down on top of the bait. White water flew every which way. When he was in the air there must have been five feet between him and the water. He sure tore off when I struck him—and I wondered if he was ever going to stop. But he did—they generally do—and we dragged him in pretty fast.

"Five fish! George asked me if I was getting tired. The funny part of it was that I wasn't a bit. You see I'd been fighting these fish according to my method. If I'd done it as most anglers do—I'd probably have been dead!

"The next one was just an ordinary tuna strike and an easy fish. I must have brought him in in about five minutes. It had grown very rough and the wind was getting stronger and stronger. Every sea was breaking and there was a nasty cross chop running. The kite danced a jig. We were a long way from Avalon—close to forty miles. George looked up to windward, off to leeward where Catalina was or ought to have been, and said,

"'We've time for just one more—then we've got to get out of here!'

"That kind of set me back for a minute. Somehow or another the idea had grown on me that I could stay there and catch fish as long as they stuck around. It seemed a shame to leave them. Probably we would never have another day like it as long as we lived. But George was right. It was no kind of a sea to be in if anything went wrong with the engine—and they do go wrong once in a while. Then, too, it was a part of the sea where few boats came—and nobody at Avalon knew where we were. They didn't have the Coast Guard patrols then that they do now.

"I don't remember much about that last fish except that a shark tried to take a bite out of him as we were gaffing him. George hit the shark over the head with a gaff hook and drove it away.

"Well, that was that! Seven tuna! Every blessed one of them over a hundred pounds! Three hours and thirty minutes of elapsed time! Fifty-nine minutes of actual fighting time! I could never express how I felt when old George came aft and said,

"'Do you know your actual fighting time on those fish? Just fifty-nine minutes!'—and he grinned.

"When we brought that load of tuna into Avalon about 9:30 that night, the place was fit to be tied! Seven tuna, weighing 104, 104 1/4, 109 1/4, 109 1/4, 112 3/4, 114 1/2 and 156 3/4—the last one a season's record! When I figured up the total weight of those fish, 810 3/4 pounds, and thought that I was giving them to the fish market with tuna bringing $200.00 a ton, after I'd paid that same market $1.50 for the bait with which I caught them, I had to laugh. There was another phase of it, though, that didn't make me laugh. Out of the entire crowd of anglers over at Avalon, there wasn't a one who took the trouble to go down to the Pleasure Pier and see those fish weighed in! Figure that out!