A TUSSLE WITH THE MONARCH OF THE SEA
In spite of his interest in the pearl work, Colin began to feel the
strain of the steady and persistent grind required from him by Dr.
Edelstein, who himself seemed absolutely untiring. At the beginning of
July, moreover, the weather turned wet, and the rain poured down
steadily, not heavily, but soaking the ground thoroughly. For a week or
so no notice was taken of the rain, other than the discomfort it caused,
but one day Colin overheard one of the head workers saying to the
superintendent:
"It looks as though we might have trouble unless there's a let-up to the
rain soon!"
"I'm afraid of it," was the reply, and the grave tone of the answer
surprised Colin; "and I hear that it's raining in torrents in Montana."
"We're safe enough, I suppose," was the comment.
"Yes," the superintendent answered, "but hundreds of other people are
not. Floods always catch some of them."
This was an idea that had not occurred to Colin. The word "flood" called
up a host of graphic ideas, and a flood on the Mississippi, the largest
river in the world flowing through a populated country, seemed a serious
matter. He spoke of it to his friend of the paddlefish investigation.
"Yes," the other answered, "there have been many scores of lives lost
and many millions of dollars swept away on the 'Father of Waters,' and I
doubt if the time will ever come when the flood danger will be at an
end. Remember that the Mississippi River Valley is the only water outlet
for two-thirds of the entire United States."
"It's protected by levees, too, isn't it?" Colin queried. "At least,
during the flood on the Mississippi, you always hear of the levees
breaking or just going to break."
"They give way very seldom now," his chief replied, "and that means
wonderful engineering, for there are sixteen hundred miles of levee, the
river banks being built up clear from Illinois to the Gulf."
"Then where are the floods one hears of so often?"
"There are bad floods on the Ohio," was the reply, "and there is always
danger when a flood tide comes down the Mississippi. You see, if part of
a levee does give way, or as they say, if a 'crevasse' comes, thousands
of square miles are inundated, hundreds of people made homeless, and the
property loss is incalculable. All the land around the lower part of the
Mississippi is just a flood plain which used to be covered with water
every year. That land has been rescued from the river just as Holland
has been rescued from the sea."
"Then there is danger every year?"
"There is always danger," was the reply, "and the levees are carefully
patrolled. But during the high water of early summer there is more
danger, and a week's rain means trouble. We're going to have a bad flood
this year unless the rain stops soon."
"But the river isn't rising?"
"Not yet. Why should it? It isn't the water that flows directly into the
Mississippi, but that which floods the tributaries that causes disaster.
From the Rocky Mountains on the one side to the Alleghanies on the
other, and from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada--nearly every drop of rain
that isn't evaporated or used by plants has to be carried to the sea by
the Mississippi."
"It seems like a big job for one river bed," Colin agreed. "But how can
it be made safer?"
"The way is easy," was the answer, "but costly. If big reservoirs are
built on all the headwater streams so that--no matter what the rainfall
may be--only a constant amount is allowed to flow out of these
reservoirs, then floods will be avoided, there will be plenty of water
for irrigation, and a steady depth of water in the channel will extend
navigation that is now stopped during low-water periods. Besides which,
it will make the Mississippi fish question a great deal easier."
"I don't quite see what it has to do with the fish!" the boy said.
"Supposing five thousand square miles of land are flooded. When the
water goes down, at least half that amount of land is still flooded,
though no longer connected with the river, but forming shallow lakes and
pools. These are all full of fish. As the pools dry up, everything that
is in them dies, and millions of food fish are lost."
"But how can we stop that?"
"The Bureau of Fisheries does a great deal to stop it," was the answer,
"and if this rain holds--though we are all praying that it
won't--you'll probably have a chance to see. The Bureau seines as many
as it can of those bayous and pools and lakes to save the fish and
return them to the river. If a couple of men can save several thousand
fish a day, isn't that worth while? Think of a farmer who could get a
thousand bushels of wheat in a day! And that's about the proportion of
food value."
"Well," said Colin, as he was leaving the laboratory to take up another
piece of work he had been told to do, "I don't want a flood to come, of
course, but if there is one, I'd like to have a chance to see how the
Bureau handles that sort of fish rescue work."
The reports the next morning were no more encouraging,--the Weather
Bureau reporting heavy rain in Montana and the Milk River in flood.
Fortunately the weather was fine in the eastern States, but a flood on
the Milk River usually means a Missouri River flood, and that takes in
nearly two-fifths of the Mississippi basin. Around the Iowa station the
rain still poured heavily. By the end of the week more hopeful reports
came from the west. As the southwest had escaped entirely no serious
trouble was expected, but in the region near the laboratory the rain
was coming down in torrents and the Wapsipinicon and Cedar Rivers were
overflowing their banks.
[Illustration: CLIMBING UP THE WHEEL.
Device used on the lower Mississippi to haul in big nets for the
Spoonbills.
_By permission of Dr. Louis Hussakoff._]
[Illustration: BIGGEST FRESH-WATER FISH IN AMERICA.
Pulling out the source of domestic caviare, the Spoonbill.
_By permission of Dr. Louis Hussakoff._]
The neighboring stations at Bellevue, Iowa, and North MacGregor, Iowa,
were reported to be preparing for collecting black bass, crappies,
sun-fishes, yellow perch, pike, buffalo-fish, and catfish as soon as the
water should recede and leave the fish stranded in lakes and pools. One
Sunday, Colin took the power-boat up the river and had a chat with the
men at Bellevue regarding the nature of the work. He found that the
flood dangers were small above the junction of the Missouri and
Mississippi Rivers, and when an opportunity arrived to do some fish
collection in the overflows, the boy thanked the superintendent of the
station, and said he would rather keep to the mussel work. This, a day
or two later, came to the notice of Dr. Edelstein.
"I haf observed," his chief said, "that you haf been taking much more
interest lately in your work. Why is it?"
"I have been trying to do a little investigating on my own account,"
Colin said confusedly, "and there's a lot of fun in working things out
all by yourself."
"Haf you any objegtions to telling me what you haf been gonsidering?"
"Not at all, sir," Colin answered. "I'd be glad to show you, if you'd
care to see. I've been trying to find out the cause of the difference in
the secretions of the mussels that have very bright pearly shells and
those that are dull. But I haven't got very far along yet."
"Fery good subject," was the reply; "let me see your notebooks."
Colin brought him a number of small notebooks filled with records of
experiments that he had been doing in the evenings, and over some of
them the gem expert smiled.
"You haf done a great deal of unnecessary work," he said, "work that I
gould haf told you had no bearing on the results, but it isn't time
wasted at all, for you will haf learned more that way than if I had told
you. And you haf two series of eggsperiments that are very useful. If
you only had time to make the series gomplete, the information would be
of value to the Bureau."
"Would you include them in your report, sir, if I completed the series?"
His chief leaned back in his chair.
"Seriously," he said, "I think your eggsperiments on the garacter of
the secretions are very interesting. You don't know as much organic
gemistry as you should, but if you will take a few suggestions from me,
I think your work would be worth publigation."
"You mean in your article?" asked Colin.
"No," was the answer, "in your own."
"My article! You mean that I should write it up?"
"Why not?"
"But I don't know enough!"
"If we all waited until we thought we knew enough about a subject," the
scientist answered, "there never yet would haf been a line written.
Don't gif any opinions, Golin, for they will not be worth much, nor any
gonglusions, because you hafn't reached any. But make a simple statement
of what was the problem you had, how you went about it, and the results
of your eggsperiments so far. Remember, too," he added, "that a negative
result is often of just as much value as a positive, for it solves the
problem to the eggstent of eliminating that partigular fagtor."
"And you really think I should write it up, Dr. Edelstein?"
"Of gourse."
"But would the Bureau take it?"
"That is for the Gommissioner to say, and he would decide on its merits.
If it is not too long--just two or three pages, perhaps, I feel sure he
would aggsept it. If you like I will go over the manuscript and advise
you about it."
"Would you really do that for me?" asked Colin.
"Very gladly," was the reply; "but you will need a series almost twice
as large as you haf now in order to make it of any value."
"Indeed I'll complete the series, Dr. Edelstein," Colin said. "I'll work
at it every minute of spare time I can get."
From that moment time seemed to Colin all too short--the days appeared
to fly. He was up long before breakfast getting out specimens both for
himself and his chief and till late in the evening he would sit over his
microscope working out the details of his experiments. The expert, who
had realized earlier in the summer that Colin was restless, now saw that
the reason was that none of the work he had been given to do possessed
an individual note, and perceiving--as did every one--the enthusiastic
nature of the lad, he helped him in every way possible. Thus it came
about that before the day set for the reopening of college, Colin had
finished the series of experiments which had been thought necessary, and
had sent the manuscript of his article to Washington. And in the very
first batch of letters that he received on his arrival at college was
one from the Commissioner accepting his report and promising publication
in the Bulletin.
Colin ever afterward declared that this was a great stimulus during his
college work. He had done well the first year, but his late training
under Dr. Edelstein and the spur of research had taught him how to
concentrate upon his studies. He did not neglect the out-of-doors life,
however, and he still had the swimming championship to defend, but every
minute that he was not actively at play he was hard at work. Idle
minutes were scarce. Nor did he fail of his reward. Just before the
spring examination he received a letter from the Bureau of Fisheries
telling him that his application for the next summer had been accepted
and assigning him to duty at Woods Hole, the station where he had long
desired to be.
Immediately after the close of the college year, and a few weeks spent
at home, Colin betook himself to Washington, where he received the
necessary credentials. As still a week intervened before the time of
the opening of the laboratory, he spent several days in New York,
visiting the American Museum daily and assisting his friend, Mr.
Collier, with whom he had gone to Bermuda. The sea-garden exhibits were
all completed and were among the museum's most popular cases, and the
curator was engaged in preparing some exquisite models of the
Radiolaria, those magical creatures of the sea, which are so small that
they can be seen only with a powerful microscope, but which look like
living snow-crystals, although a thousand times more beautiful. Some
were already installed in the museum, but a large series was planned.
On his arrival at Woods Hole, Colin found work in the hatchery division
of the station almost at an end. Hundreds of millions of cod, pollock,
haddock, and flatfish fry had been hatched from eggs and planted in
favorable places for their further development, and tens of millions of
lobster fry as well. A few of the hatching troughs were in use, but most
of them had been emptied and prepared for the work of the biological
department of the Bureau, to which the station was given over during the
summer months.
Colin found that he was not unknown to the director, who, being
especially interested in mollusks, had read the lad's paper on the
mussel-shells. Accordingly he was quite heartily welcomed and set right
at work.
"You will take charge of the fish-trap crew, Dare," he was informed, the
director's quick, snappy eye taking in the lad. "I suppose you know
enough about fish to tell the various species apart?"
"I'm not sure, sir," said the boy, "but I think I know most of the
common kinds. That is, theoretically, Mr. Prelatt, through studying
them. I have never done any fishing of consequence off the New England
coast."
"You can haul the trap at slack water this afternoon," the director
said. "I will ask Mr. Wadreds to go with you. He knows every kind of
fish that swims and more about each one than three or four of the rest
of us put together."
"What will be my duties, sir?" asked Colin. "I don't want to trouble
you, but if I am to take charge of the crew I ought to know what I have
to do."
"The trap is to be hauled daily," was the reply, "except when the water
is very rough. You will be given a list of the needs of the laboratory
for experimental purposes, and as far as possible, you will fill those
needs. Sometimes you may have to assist in the collecting trip besides,
as for green sea-urchins and the like; or perhaps you may have to draw a
seine for silversides and small fish. Sometimes you may be needed to
haul some of the lobster pots, because we shall have two men at least
doing research work on lobsters. Again, you may have to get mussels for
some work that is being done on shellfish for food. There will be two
other students working with you in maintaining the supply of specimen
material, under the direction of the head collector."
"Very well, Mr. Prelatt," the boy replied, "I'll see that things are
kept up as far as possible. Am I to come to you for information as to
where to go for special fish and so forth?"
"Mr. Wadreds knows more about that than I do," the director said; "he
can usually tell you just where to find anything you're after. You'll
soon find it easy, because collecting narrows down to a few species. The
M. B. L. boat does collecting, too, and sometimes each party is able to
help the other."
"What is the M. B. L., sir?" asked Colin.
"The Marine Biological Laboratory," was the reply, "which owns all the
land on the other side of the street, just as we do on this. It is a
summer college supported by a number of leading universities, to which
graduate students come for courses in biology and marine life. There is
some research work done also, and at the present moment Professor
Jacques Loeb is doing some wonderful work over there on fish
hybridization. We are entirely distinct organizations, one being a
summer school and the other being a government marine hatchery with a
biological laboratory attached. They have their own boats and we have
ours, but we grant them the privilege of using our wharves, and there is
a great deal of friendly cooperation between the two."
"You spoke of sea-mussels, sir," suggested Colin.
"Well?"
"I was wondering, Mr. Prelatt, whether I would have any time aside from
the fish-traps and the collecting, and if so, if I might work with the
man who is going to take that up."
The director shook his head.
"No," he answered, "there are two men working on that subject together.
Besides which, you will have but very little time, at least for a couple
of weeks. Then, if you feel that you would like some research work, I'll
tell you what I want done."
Colin soon found that the demands upon him by the chief of the
collecting staff not only were very heavy, but that they required
considerable ingenuity. Frequently he would be asked for starfish and it
would be necessary to go to a well-known shoal at some little distance,
perhaps in the _Phalarope_ or other of the government boats. There they
would dredge with 'tangles,' a tangle being an iron frame with yards and
yards of cotton waste dragging behind in which the spines of sea-urchins
and the rough convolutions of starfish easily become entangled.
Occasionally more distant trips, such as those to the Gulf Stream, would
be made on the _Fish Hawk_, the largest of the Bureau's boats, named
like all the others, after sea birds.
The hauling of the fish-trap, usually done in boats from the _Blue
Wing_, never palled in interest. Every day the visit to the trap had the
expectant thrill the miner finds when prospecting in a new stream. There
was always the excitement of possibly finding new species, true gold
to the scientist.
[Illustration: THE _BLUE WING_ AT THE GOVERNMENT FISH TRAP, WOODS HOLE.
_Photograph by C. R. W._]
"I've found at least three new species," said Mr. Wadreds to him one
day, "right out of the same trap you're haulin'. And sometimes, when
there has been a long-continued storm and the wind's settin' in from the
southeast, the traps have jest had numbers o' tropical fish."
"Why should the wind bring the fish?" asked Colin.
"They come up with the weed, lad," was the old collector's reply. "When
a storm rises the big masses o' gulf weed are broken up an' drift on the
surface before the wind. A great many semi-tropical fish live on the
weed an' the little creatures that make their homes in it, an' so they
come followin' it away up here. Then we find them in the traps and by
seinin'. We've caught butterfly fish an' parrot fish in the seines up
here several times."
"We get menhaden in the trap principally now," the boy said; "why aren't
they used for food? They look all right. Are they poisonous, or
something?"
"Oily," was the reply; "an Eskimo might like 'em, but no one else. But
the menhaden fishery is valuable just the same, for there's more oil
and better oil got every year from menhaden than there is whale oil.
Nearly all fish manure is menhaden, too. But they're not a food fish."
"Nor are dogfish," said Colin, "but I see that the M. B. L. mess table
has them once in a while. We get lots of mackerel and other varieties
that are good eating. I wonder why they eat dogfish?"
"Partly to try it out," the collector said. "A dogfish is a shark, as
you know, and mos' people don't like the idea of eatin' any kind o'
shark. But it is a waste to have a good article o' food entirely
neglected by the public an' so the Bureau and the M. B. L. have tried
usin' dogfish on the table as an experiment to get an idea of its value
as food."
"It tastes all right, too," said the boy. "I had some yesterday."
"O' course it does, but the name is against it. Both dogfish and catfish
are good eatin', but there is a prejudice against 'em, because people
don't eat cats an' dogs. But they have been canned an' sold under
various names, such as 'ocean whitefish,' 'Japanese halibut,' an' 'sea
bass.'"
"They have a vicious look, though!"
"They are vicious," was the reply, "but you mustn't believe all you
hear. Why, at the last International Fishery Congress a speaker told of
a plague o' dogfish which not only attacked lobsters, but swallowed pots
an' all."
Colin looked incredulously at his friend.
"That's the story," the other said; "you don't have to believe it. I
don't."
"But after all, a dogfish is a shark, and aren't sharks the most vicious
creatures o' the sea?"
"I shouldn't say so," the old collector answered. "I reckon the moray is
really more vicious. He's always huntin' trouble. A shark is always
hungry, that's all. Fishes have different kinds o' tempers, you know,
an' often it's the smallest creature that's the meanest."
"Common fishes?"
"There isn't anythin' that swims that's meaner than a 'mad-Tom,' an'
they're frequent in all the rivers o' the middle west an' south. A
'mad-Tom,'" he continued in answer to the boy's questioning look, "is a
small catfish with spines. Most boys in riverside villages have their
hands all cut up by 'mad-Toms.' O' course there are scorpion-fish an'
toad-fishes in tropical waters, an' their poison will cripple a man for
a while, but there's no fish that's fatal."
"I thought there were lots of poisonous things in the water," Colin
said, "jellyfish and other things like that."
"Well," replied the collector, "a jellyfish can be tolerable poisonous.
The Portuguese man-o'-war, pretty enough to look at when it floats on
the water, with long streamers o' purple threads flowin' out behind, is
the only thing that I ever heard of that killed a man."
"A jellyfish? How?"
"It was all his own fault," was the reply. "It was down in the Bahamas,
off Nassau, as I remember. The sea was just alive with jellyfish, an'
this young fellow that I'm tellin' about, he swam around a good deal an'
once or twice had run into a jellyfish without gettin' stung. There's
only some o' them that sting."
"I thought all of them did a little?"
"No, only a few. Well, this chap knew enough, I reckon, to keep away
from a Portuguese man-o'-war usually, but either he had got reckless or
didn't think of it. Some of his friends shouted out to him to take care,
but he laughed back, tellin' them they were foolish to believe old
stories, and to show that he didn't care, in a spirit o' 'dare' he dived
plumb under the jellyfish. But he misjudged his distance an' came up
clean in the middle of it an' the stingin' hairs just closed all over on
him."
"There are hundreds of them, too, aren't there?"
"Thousands of stingin' filaments in some o' them. He gave one wild
scream an' went down. When he came up and his friends were able to grasp
him he was paralyzed as though he had suffered an electric shock, an'
before they could get him to shore his body had broken out in a violent
rash. The doctors couldn't do anythin' for him an' he died three days
later."
"Have you ever been stung?"
"I know enough to keep away from a jellyfish," was the blunt rejoinder;
"but I had a nasty time with a torpedo once."
"The electric ray?" queried Colin. "That fish that looks like a small
sea vampire only it hasn't a whip-like tail?"
"That's it," said the older man. "It was when I was just a youngster, I
was haulin' in a net, when my feet slipped from under an' I went
headlong into the middle o' the net, and a torpedo landed on the back
o' my neck. I reckon he must have shocked the spinal cord or something
because I was fair paralyzed for an hour or two. You're sure to get one
yourself," he continued, "because they use torpedoes for research work a
good deal, but a shock in the hand or on the arm passes away in a few
minutes, so that you don't need to worry about that. The electric
eels--which are not eels at all, though they look like it--are the worst
of all, but since they live only in South American rivers, I suppose
they won't bother you much."
"As long as I don't find any in the fish-trap," said Colin, laughing, as
Mr. Wadreds nodded and went on his way, "I won't mind, and I'd just as
soon not have to handle any dogfish that swallow lobster-pots as a
habit, but if I do I'll come to you for help."
All in all, Colin thought Woods Hole the most interesting place in which
he had ever been. Unlike other summer resorts, a spirit of earnest vigor
pervaded the little settlement. The houses nestled in the wooded low
hills behind the town, and though so near the sea, flowers could be made
to grow luxuriantly, as a famous and beautiful rose garden bore witness.
To the southeast, over a spit of land that was little wider than a
causeway, the road ran to the Marine Biological Laboratory and the
Bureau of Fisheries station, holding their commanding positions
overlooking the harbor. The great government pier smacked of the stormy
sea, for it was used also by the Lighthouse Service and huge red buoys
lay in dozens on it awaiting their hour to warn the tempest-driven
mariner of the perils that lay below them.
Nearer in, where the pier was severed from the shore, the opening being
crossed by a short swing bridge, was a small inclosed inner harbor where
lay the launches and boats of the two laboratories. Upon the shore
itself was a stone-walled tank, set between the Residence building and
the Laboratory proper, and therein large fish which had been caught in
traps or elsewhere, and which were too big for the indoor tanks, flitted
as dark shadows within the pool. Smaller fish were in the Aquarium in
the first floor of the laboratory opposite the wide space where stood
the serried rows of hatching troughs.
Here were many most interesting fish--among them that constant delight
of the landsman, the puffer, which, when disturbed, rapidly inflates
itself, rising to the surface of the water until it becomes apparently
so large a mouthful that its would-be devourer is fooled into believing
the morsel too big to swallow. Then, the danger removed, the puffer
releases the gulped-down water and swims away. Here also were strange
fish, like the eighteen-spined sculpin and the sea-robin, walking over
the bottom on three free rays of each of the pectoral fins. Upon the top
story of the same building were preserved in a rough museum various
other strange forms, not all from Woods Hole waters; the remora, or
sucking fish, that fastens on sharks and becomes a constant passenger
enjoying a free ride, specimens of which were often in the Aquarium; the
deal-fish, which alone among its tribe has a long slim fin projecting
upwards from the tail almost at right angles to it; the blenny, whose
facial expression has caused it to be known as the sarcastic blenny; the
graceful sea-horse, who swings on seaweed with a prehensile tail like
that of a monkey--and the male of which hatches the eggs instead of the
mother, and not the least extraordinary, the three-cornered trunk-fish
whose front view is the most unfishlike apparition possible. These and
hundreds of others Colin learned to know from the collections.
It was with great delight that Colin heard of the presence of his
friend Mr. Collier, who was working on the plans for a model of Bryozoa,
and who had with him his staff of glass-workers and modelers. The boy
found it hard to tear himself away from this laboratory and struck up
quite a friendship with a Japanese colorist on the staff. Also, he was
fortunate in meeting and knowing Mr. Cavalier, the artist of animal
life, and from him the boy learned a great deal of the picturesque and
æsthetic elements of the life which he painted and modeled with such
surpassing skill. Scores of other workers, writers, and scientists of
all kinds had rooms in the wonderfully interesting workshops of Woods
Hole.
[Illustration: HATCHERY AND LABORATORY BUILDING, WOODS HOLE.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
[Illustration: RESIDENCE AND FISHERIES BUREAU HEADQUARTERS, WOODS HOLE.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
Beyond the laboratory building was the wharf to which the two steam
yachts attached respectively to the station and the M. B. L. were tied
up. Beyond that again was a second pier, that of the Revenue Cutter
service, where lay, with banked fires, one of the guardians of American
seas, a man ever on duty at the wireless receiver. Beyond the pier the
land curved to the point opposite the Elizabeth Islands, while in the
narrow strait or 'hole' between, the tide for all Buzzards Bay surged
out or in as the ebb and flow compelled.
As captain of the fish-trap crew and active in collection, Colin had the
run of both laboratories and the day always seemed too short for him.
Every investigator's work was a matter of personal interest to him and
he talked 'research' all the day long, though too tired to dream of it
at night. Nor did he forget his swimming, and at the beach in Buzzards
Bay he swam a mile or so each day, the admiration and the envy of all
the M. B. L. students. But Colin speedily won their friendship, for he
never hesitated to help other swimmers in every way he could, even
teaching little tricks of style that were all his own and which had gone
far to win him his championship.
As Director Prelatt had promised, Colin was given an opportunity to keep
some research work in hand, although he found--as had been
foretold--that he had but little time for it. The director was engaged
upon a most interesting and important investigation, which, like all
those that were in progress at the laboratory, had a strong economic
value. This was the study of the life history of the whelk.
"At first sight," the director said to him, when explaining the problem,
"it does not seem as though the biology of a sea-snail were a matter of
much importance to the country, but as a matter of fact, to a great
extent the oyster industry--which reaches millions of dollars annually
and gives employment as well as food to thousands of people--depends
upon that very thing."
"Just how, Mr. Prelatt?" inquired Colin.
"All creatures have their own special enemies," the director answered;
"and everything is so equally balanced that there are enough oysters
born to keep up the supply in spite of the attacks of the whelk, or
oyster-drill as it is termed. When man comes on the scene, however, and
commences to dredge the oysters, the combination of the market and the
drill together is too much for the oyster-beds and they soon become
depleted."
"That's the way it is with fish, too!"
"With everything," was the assenting answer. "Now there are two ways to
overcome this condition. One is the way in which we handle the same
question with fish--by artificially hatching millions more eggs every
year than would have been hatched during a state of nature. The other is
by attacking the enemy of the oyster and thus enlarging the chances of
those that hatch naturally. The latter we can't do with fish."
"Why not, sir?"
"Because the enemies of fish are numerous and free-swimming," was the
answer, "and also because fish produce an enormous amount of eggs.
Oysters do also, but fertilization is so largely a matter of chance that
but a few of the tens of thousands of eggs ever really have a chance to
become young oysters. You can help that in two ways, one by preparing
the ground so that everything is made easy for the young oysters to have
a chance, the other by thinning them out or transplanting the young
oysters or 'spat' as they are called, improving and enlarging the beds."
"That ought to help settle it, I should think."
"It is not enough. Enemies also must be kept at bay."
"I should think the oyster, in its tough shell, would be practically
free from enemies," remarked Colin.
"On the contrary, it has a large number. A great many kinds of fish,
such as skates, for example, will eat oysters, and many owners of
oyster-beds have surrounded their holdings with an actual stockade of
stakes."
"Like the pioneers had against the Indians?"
"Just the same," assented the director. "Drum-fish are hostile on the
Atlantic coast, and on the Pacific a very substantial stockade is
required against the invasion of sting-rays. More destructive still are
the starfish."
Colin stared at the director in surprise.
"Starfish!" he said, "those little starfish? Why, they're soft and they
haven't any teeth or anything to crush an oyster shell with."
"They're small and they're soft and they haven't any teeth at all," said
the director, "but starfish cost the oyster industry at least five
million dollars a year."
"But how?" queried Colin; "I don't see how they can work it."
"What is a starfish?"
The boy thought for a moment.
"It's an echinoderm," he said, "generally with five arms, that lives
only in the sea, has a simple stomach, and feeds on the minute organisms
in the water."
"There you're wrong," said the director. "It lives only in the sea,
that's right enough, but you haven't proper regard for a starfish's
powers of digestion. It feeds on mussels, oysters and other shellfish.
Can it swim?"
"I don't think so, sir," said Colin, after a moment's thought, "it
crawls."
"How?"
"I don't know, Mr. Prelatt."
"By thousands of sucker-like feet on the under side of it," he was told.
"So you see it can crawl to and over an oyster-bed."
"But even so, wouldn't an oyster shut tight at the approach of danger?"
suggested Colin.
"That doesn't make any difference to the starfish," was the reply,
"he'll open the oyster."
"How, sir?"
"What keeps an oyster closed?"
"The muscle, sir, because when it is dead it flies open."
"Very good. Do muscles grow tired?"
"Mine do," said Colin, smiling, "and I suppose the muscles of oysters
are the same way."
"Exactly. Now what happens is this. The starfish crawls along until he
finds an oyster which he thinks will suit his taste. As he crawls near
or on it, the oyster closes up tight. The starfish--taking plenty of
time--fastens himself to the shell, having two of his 'arms' on one
shell and the suckers of the other three 'arms' attached to the other
shell. Then the starfish starts to pull."
"But isn't the oyster stronger?"
"Much stronger," agreed the director, "but the starfish doesn't know
enough to quit. The pull he exerts is not so powerful but it is
relentless and unceasing and no oyster muscle can resist it for more
than a few hours. Presently the shell gapes open. The starfish lumbers
over and commences to feed, other starfish often coming to enjoy the
feast."
"And are there starfish enough to injure the beds?"
"Myriads of them. A starfish is not easy to kill, moreover, because if
any of the arms are cut off he will grow a new one."
"How do the oystermen fight them?"
"By catching them in tangles. The snarled cotton waste does no harm to
the oyster, but, as it is pulled over the bed, picks up hundreds of
starfish and sea-urchins. Up-to-date vessels engaged in that work have a
vat of boiling water on deck, into which the tangle is plunged when it
is pulled up from the bottom. This kills the starfish and is a great
gain over the old system of picking them out of the tangle by hand.
"But the worst of all the oyster's enemies," the director continued,
"and the one on which I am working, is the oyster-drill. At least eighty
per cent of the possible oyster crop is destroyed by this sea-snail.
This creature, usually about half an inch long, crawls on an
oyster--usually a young one--and with a rasp-like tongue files a hole in
the shell, through which it sucks the juices out of the oyster. The only
thing that keeps the oyster-drill in check at all is that as soon as it
is big enough for a younger drill to climb on its shell, it is apt to
suffer the same fate. It is a case of reversed cannibalism, the stronger
falling to the weaker."
"What can be done to stop it?"
"Nothing so far," said the director; "that is my chosen problem. Because
the drill prefers the thin-shelled mussel to the thicker-shelled oyster
it has been suggested that mussels should be planted outside
oyster-beds, so that the drills would stay there. But the cure would be
worse than the disease, for the mussels would spread over the oyster-bed
and the drills with them, since they would have so excellent a breeding
ground. No, the problem is still unsolved, and the people of the United
States are looking to the Bureau of Fisheries to solve it. The Bureau
has given it to me. That's the fascination of this work, that on your
own toil and your own skill and ingenuity a factor of world-wide
importance may depend."
"Perhaps----"
"What is it, Colin?"
"It just occurred to me, sir," the boy answered, "that perhaps some
parasite which would prey on the drill might be found."
"It might--but I have as yet found none."
"Or perhaps," Colin again suggested, "some chemical which would unite
with lime might be put into the water so that the oyster shell might be
poisonous to the drill, but not for food, because we eat the oyster and
not the shell."
The director laughed.
"That suggestion is new, at least," he said, "but I don't think it would
work because this is a marine question and the water changes
continuously. There must be some solution, there's always a way of doing
everything, and some one will find it out. I'm going to stick at it till
I do, that is, when I'm not engaged on other Bureau work. But I'm always
glad of suggestions, and when you can help me in any way I'll let you
know."
"Thank you ever so much, Mr. Prelatt," Colin answered; "I'll be glad to
do anything I can."
The boy had a fertile brain, and, before a week had passed by, a line of
experiment suggested itself to him in connection with the oyster-drill
problem and he explained it to the director.
"To work that out properly would take several years!" the latter said
tentatively.
"I thought it would," said Colin, "but perhaps some one else could carry
it on, and the work ought to be done, anyway."
"You have the right idea," the director replied; "it's the problem, not
the man who solves it. Now," he continued, "I have a surprise for you.
Dr. Jimson, who has been working on swordfish for some time, is anxious
to try and capture a large specimen and is going out with a swordfish
sloop next week. I can probably arrange for the trap to be looked after,
if you are off for a day or two. Do you want to go?"
"Indeed I do," said Colin. "Mr. Wadreds was telling me some stories just
the other day about swordfish-catching."
"I suppose he told you the famous story of the swordfish which charged a
vessel and drove its sword through 'copper sheathing, an inch board
under-sheathing, a three-inch plank of hard wood, the solid white oak
timber twelve inches thick, then through another two and a half-inch
hard-oak ceiling, and lastly penetrated the head of an oil cask, where
it stuck, not a drop of the oil having escaped?'"
[Illustration: WHAT SHALL WE GET THIS TIME?
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
[Illustration: HERE'S A NEW ONE, BOYS!
The veteran collector of the Woods Hole Station is seen in the
foreground of both pictures.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
"Yes, Mr. Prelatt," Colin answered, "and if he hadn't told me that the
record was authentic and that the sword and section of timber had been
in the National Museum, I might have doubted it."
"They're enormously powerful, one of the best boatmen I ever knew was
killed by a swordfish," said the director.
"How was that, sir?"
"He had harpooned the swordfish and had gone out in the small boat to
lance it, when the huge fish dived under the craft and shot up from the
bottom like a rocket, his sword going through the timbers as though they
were paper and striking the boatman with such force that he was killed
almost instantly. Boats used often to be sunk by the rushes of a
swordfish, but nowadays the greater part of the work is done directly
from the deck of a schooner. No amount of changes, however, can take all
the excitement out of a swordfish capture."
"Will they attack a boat unprovoked?"
"There are lots of cases in which they are supposed to have done so,"
the director replied, "but I think any such instances were probably
swordfish who had been wounded--but not fatally. You knew that the
swordfish was the Monarch of all the Fish?"
"No," Colin answered, "I didn't."
"He was so elected at one of the meetings of the International Congress
of Fisheries," said the director, smiling. "We were waiting for the
chairman or the speaker or somebody and in casual conversation the query
arose as to who was the real master of the seas, in the same way that
the lion is regarded as the King of Beasts."
"And the swordfish got the award?"
"After quite a little debate. Plenty of people had their own favorites,
the white shark and the killer whale among others, but when it came to a
sort of informal vote, the swordfish was chosen almost unanimously."
"I shall be glad to pay my respects to His Majesty," answered Colin with
a laugh, as the director wheeled his chair to his desk, "and I'm ever so
much obliged for the opportunity."
The next morning, after having hauled the trap, Colin jumped aboard the
_Phalarope_, which was going to New Bedford for supplies for the
station, and which was to take him there to join Dr. Jimson on a
swordfish schooner. A large portion of the surface of Buzzards Bay was
dotted with billets of wood, about six inches thick and painted in all
manner of colors. Some were red, some white, some black, some yellow and
blue, some striped in all manner of gaudy hues.
"I've been wondering," said Colin, as he stood in the pilot house
chatting to the captain of the little steamer, "what all those sticks in
the water are?"
The captain took his pipe out of his mouth to stare at him in surprise,
as he turned the wheel a spoke or two.
"Don't you know that?" he said. "Those are lobster-pot buoys."
"You mean there's a lobster-pot attached to every one of those?"
"Yes, of course."
"But there are thousands of them! Why, right now, I can probably see
forty or fifty, and they're not so awfully easy to catch sight of with a
little sea running. And why are they painted all different colors?"
"Different owners," was the reply, "every man has his own color. Every
day, or every other day at least, he sails out to the grounds--some of
'em now have motor-boats--and makes a round of his pots. A chap whose
buoy is yellow has perhaps a hundred or two yellow buoys scattered about
the harbor."
"That sounds like work," said Colin.
"It's hard work," was the reply. "A lobster-pot is weighted with bricks
and it's a heavy load to pull up in a boat. It's an awkward thing to
handle, too. Then a lobsterman has to rebait his traps, and as he does
that with rotten fish, it's not a sweet job. And he can only bring in
lobsters over a certain size; anything less than nine and a half inches
in length he has to throw back. Sometimes it'll happen that the traps
are full of lobsters that are too short or too small, 'shorts' they call
'em, and his day's work won't bring him in much. There's a living in it,
but that's about all."
Finding that the captain of the _Phalarope_ knew the lobster business
well, as do most men who are natives of the region, Colin kept him busy
answering questions until they ran into New Bedford. As the old center
of the whaling industry, the harbor had a great interest for Colin, but
there was but one of the whaling ships in at the time, and the ancient
fisher-town atmosphere was greatly marred by extensive cotton mills that
had been built along the river, just below where the whaling piers used
to be. The swordfish schooners were at the pier, however, large as life,
and Colin felt quite a thrill of excitement as he stepped aboard the
little vessel on which he was to live for the next couple of days, and
saw the narrow dark bunks in the entirely airless cabin in which four
men were to sleep. Dr. Jimson and Colin practically were going as
members of the crew, the two men, whose places they were taking, staying
home from the trip.
Long before sunrise the following morning they were up, and by daybreak
the schooner was standing out of the harbor for Block Island, one of the
famous haunts of the swordfish. Colin, who had good eyesight, and who
was always eager to be up and doing, volunteered to go to the
crow's-nest and keep a lookout for the dorsal fin of a swordfish, which,
he was told, could be seen a couple of miles away. There was no
advantage in going aloft, however, until toward noon, when, the water
being still, the swordfish come up to sun themselves.
Once Colin was quite sure that he saw a swordfish, but just as he was
about to shout, there flashed across his mind a sentence that he had
read somewhere of the likelihood of confusing a shark's fin with that of
a swordfish, and soon he was able to make out that it was a shark. As it
grew toward noon and the sun's rays beat directly on him, Colin began to
realize that sitting on a scantling two inches by four at the top of a
schooner's mast in a bobbing sea, under a broiling sun, was a long way
from being a soft snap, but he would have scorned to make a complaint.
He was more than glad, though, when the cook hailed all hands to dinner,
and one of the sailors went to the crow's-nest.
At dinner Colin turned the conversation to swordfish and their ways.
"There's one thing I don't quite understand, Dr. Jimson," he asked, "is
a spear-fish the same as a swordfish, only that the weapon is shorter?"
"Not at all," was the reply, "the spear-fish is a variety of the great
sailfish, which you see in West Indian waters six or seven feet long,
with a huge dorsal fin, blue with black spots, looming above the water
like the sail of a strange craft. But the real difference is in the
spear or sword. In the case of the spear-fish it is bony, being a
prolongation of the skull; in the case of the swordfish it is horny, and
horns, as you probably know, are formations of skin rather than bone.
Now the narwhal's tusk," he continued, "is again an entirely different
thing."
"That's a tooth, isn't it?"
"Yes," was the reply, "it seems to be the mark of the male narwhal.
Sometimes a narwhal has two tusks, but generally only one--on the left
side. The females have none at all. You know the unicorn is always
represented with a narwhal's tusk? One of the early travelers, Sir John
de Mandeville or Marco Polo, I forget which, brought back a narwhal's
tusk which, he had been told, had been taken from a kind of horse. I
really suppose that the native who sold it believed it was from some
species of antelope. But to this day the arms of Great Britain show a
horse having a fish's tooth sticking out from his forehead like an
impossible horn."
"Way-o!" suddenly came the cry from the masthead.
"Where away?" called the captain, jumping up and looking around.
"Three points on the starboard bow, sir," answered the sailor, pointing
his finger.
"That's right enough. You're in luck, Dr. Jimson," he added, turning to
his passengers, "you won't have had long to wait if we catch this one
for you."
The captain walked aft, saw that everything was clear on deck, then
stepped forward and walked out on the bowsprit to the 'pulpit,' the
characteristic feature of a swordfish schooner. This was a small
circular platform about three feet across, built at the end of the
bowsprit, with a rail waist high around it and a small swinging seat.
Triced up to the jib stay was the long harpoon with its head, known as
the 'lily-iron.'
The schooner, having the wind abeam, danced smartly over the waves
toward the long lithe fin, gliding swiftly through the water. The
captain, standing like a statue, waited until the craft was within ten
feet of the unconscious swordfish, then thrust downward with all his
might. It was a thrust--not a throw--and the muscular strength behind
the blow caused the steel to pierce the thick skin of the swordfish. At
the same instant the keg around which the line had been wound was thrown
overboard, and the water flew up like a fine jet from the rapid
revolutions of the barrel as the swordfish sped away with the line.
"How in the world are you going to haul him in now?" asked Colin, when
he saw the keg thrown overboard.
"Did you think we pulled him in, same as you would a cod?" asked the
captain.
"Why not?"
"Too much chance of sinking the schooner!" was the reply. "That isn't
the way to get a swordfish."
As soon as the line on the barrel became unwound, it tightened with a
jerk and the barrel disappeared under the surface. But the resistance
that the barrel full of air at the end of the long line gave was great
and even the powerful swordfish could not tow it for long. In a few
minutes he slackened his speed and the barrel bobbed to the surface. But
the swordfish was still traveling like a railroad train, in short
rushes, however, here and there.
"See him charge it!" cried Colin.
There was a swirl of water and with a speed which seemed incredible the
huge body launched itself at the barrel. But there was no resistance,
the keg revolved as the sword struck it, and the swordfish shot into the
air. Again and again he charged, and Colin realized what danger lay
behind that ton and a half of muscle backed by a power that could drive
such a weight at sixty miles an hour through the water.
Again the Monarch of the Sea shot away, towing the barrel, but it was a
disheartening drag, even upon the magnificent strength of the great
swordfish. Little by little the rushes became shorter, the spurts less
frequent, as exhaustion and loss of blood began to tell. The captain
ordered out the boat and, at his earnest appeal, Colin was allowed to
go.
"You're light," the captain of the schooner said, as he picked up a
lance not unlike a whale lance, "and we don't want much weight in the
boat because it might pull the barb out of the fish if he starts to
run."
"This reminds me," said the boy, "of the time I was spearing whales in
the Behring Sea," and he recounted the adventure briefly as they pulled
toward the swordfish. The Monarch of the Sea, who had never had a
chance to show his powers, being handicapped by the barrel dragging back
his every movement, caught sight of the boat. He did not wait to be
attacked, but rushed with renewed fury at this new foe. The captain,
apparently unmoved, waited until the fish rose at the boat and then he
thrust in the lance with all his strength. The force acting against both
fish and boat drove the latter sideways a foot or more, so that the
giant rose in the air not two feet from the gunwale of the boat, the
spray stinging like fine rain as the wind of his leap whistled by.
[Illustration: CATCHING SWORDFISH WITH ROD AND REEL.
Dangerous method of capturing the monarch of the sea, used only by
expert anglers.
_By permission of Mr. Chas. Fredk. Holder._]
"He'll charge again in a minute," the captain said quietly, "look out
always for the second rush."
The words were scarcely out of his lips when the fin appeared. Once
again, as before, that great mass of dynamic energy hurled itself at the
boat, but twenty yards away there came a sudden check and the swordfish
dived. A second passed--so long that it seemed like a minute, while
Colin waited shiveringly to hear the crashing of the timbers and to see
that fearful weapon flash up between them, but as silently as a shadow
the lithe gray fighting machine shot up from the deep a yard or two
astern of the boat and, falling limply, turned on his side, dead.
The captain smiled.
"If he had lived about a half a second longer," he said, "I reckon this
boat would be on its way to the bottom now."