RUN DOWN DURING A SQUALL
On the way back to New Bedford, Colin begged for the 'sword' of the
swordfish as a trophy, and, permission being given, one of the boatmen
volunteered to prepare it for him, offering to clean and polish it so
that the weapon would show to best advantage. Dr. Jimson had been
excessively courteous to Colin throughout the trip, and his
fellow-feeling was greatly increased when he learned that the boy also
was a holder of the blue tuna button, for he himself was an enthusiastic
angler.
"I'm a trout-fisher by preference," said Dr. Jimson, settling himself
down for a chat as the schooner sailed quietly on its way to New
Bedford, with a dropping wind, "and I believe that the steelhead trout,
in the streams that flow through the redwood forests, are the finest
fish alive."
"I thought the rainbow trout was supposed to have the call," said Colin;
"at least, Father always declares so, and he goes up to the Klamath
region nearly every year."
"The rainbow is a very gamy trout," agreed the angler, "and it runs
large, up to twenty pounds sometimes, but pound for pound, there's more
fight in a steelhead."
"What's the Dolly Varden?" Colin queried. "I never can get the various
kinds of trout clear in my mind."
"If you can keep them clear when you have them hooked," said the other,
with a jolly laugh, "that's much more important. But a Dolly Varden
isn't a trout at all, it's really a char. It's a beautiful fish, too,
and you find it in cold, clear streams, such as the upper waters of the
Sacramento and Alaskan rivers. In Alaska it swarms in millions. But the
most beautiful trout in the country, indeed the most beautiful fish in
the world, perhaps, are found in three little streams on the very top of
the Sierra Nevada. Did they tell you the story, in Washington, about the
three forms of golden trout?"
"No, Dr. Jimson," the boy replied; "Dr. Crafts mentioned it, but
something came up to turn the conversation."
"I went up on that expedition a few years ago," the trout-lover said,
"because I've done a good deal of work for the Bureau on the whole
salmon family. Trout and salmon are very near relatives, and the trout
will go up streams and leap small falls just as the salmon do. But, as
you can easily see, in the headwaters of streams rising high in the
Sierras, there are sure to be falls that trout cannot leap."
"Yes, sir, of course."
"Now, my boy," the other said impressively, "a few years ago, it was
found out that there were trout in these streams above falls which would
be absolutely impassable to any fish. How could they get there? It was a
riddle. The only possible answer was that the fish must be older than
the falls, that the stream had worn away its bed, bit by bit, until an
impassable barrier from below had been created, but that the trout had
gone on in the upper creeks, developing in their own way, for hundreds
of centuries.
"The rocks over which these streams flow are a granite formation, very
brightly colored, principally gray and red. The swiftly-flowing stream
removes the débris, so that the clear water flows limpidly over this
gorgeous coloring. In such a stream, where the natural enemies of the
trout are the fish-hawk and the eagle, it is essential as a matter of
protection that the fish should resemble the hue of the bottom, and
accordingly, the most superb coloring in the world is theirs. But each
of the three small streams that are cut off from the rivers below are
also separate from each other, and in the ages during which this has
been so, each of these streams has seen a different coloration develop
in the trout. All are bright golden, all have orange fins and an orange
stripe along the side, all are spotted with black, but they vary in many
small particulars. Nowhere else in the world but in these three
creeks--Volcano Creek, Soda Creek, and Aqua Bonita or Gracious Water
Creek--can these fish be found; nowhere else would they retain their
gorgeous coloring.
"Accordingly, the United States Government sent a party up to the very
summit of the Sierra Nevada to study these fish, and of this party I was
one. It was there that I saw the most marvelous storm that has perhaps
ever been recorded. An electrical disturbance of great magnitude was
passing over the country at the time, and it reached its vivid climax on
the Sierras. Our camp was struck, several animals killed, and a couple
of the teamsters severely injured, but for nearly two hours the whole
world seemed set in a coronal of lightning flashes.
"We stayed up there with the trout for several weeks, and when we
reached Washington, there was not a man in the party but was determined
to fight, heart and soul, to save these rare fish from extinction. One
or two summers during which 'fish-hogs' were permitted on the upper
reaches of the Kern River, would have destroyed the trout forever, and,
indeed, in one month a party of those reckless near-sportsmen destroyed
almost one thousand of them. But the President's interest was enlisted,
the Bureau of Fisheries made a firm stand, and to-day the region
containing these most exquisite and most wonderful of all fresh-water
fish is a part of the Mount Whitney National Park, and the golden trout
are saved from extinction."
"Bully for the Bureau!" cried Colin. "Every time I learn more of its
work, it seems to be doing something finer."
Following out the lad's interest in the whole trout question, Dr. Jimson
taught him nearly all there was to know about the various members of the
salmon and trout family, one of the most important food-fish groups of
the world. Both being ardent fishermen, they were startled, however, by
the sudden announcement:
"Big halibut off starboard quarter!"
"Yes," said Dr. Jimson, "there it is! Don't you see it," he continued,
pointing with his finger, "flapping its tail on the water?"
"I see," said Colin; "but what is it doing that for?"
"Probably attacking a fish," was the reply. "Are you going after it,
Captain?"
"No," the fisherman answered; "I've heard that people sometimes catch
them without a net, but I never did."
"One of the biggest halibut that was ever brought ashore was caught in
just such a way," the trout expert said, turning to Colin. "It was out
near Sable Island, and the halibut was attacking a big cod by repeated
blows with its tail. A boat was sent out with a couple of men carrying
gaff-hooks, and the fight between the two fish was so fierce that
neither of them paid any attention to the boat. The fishermen gaffed the
halibut and pulled him into the dory, though it nearly swamped them, for
the fish weighed over three hundred and fifty pounds. It's rather a
queer story, I think, but it is reported as official."
Colin whistled.
"My word!" he said. "It must have been a big one, because a halibut is
flat, like a flounder, isn't it?"
"Yes, it's the largest of the flatfish. There's a record of one halibut
having been caught weighing a trifle over five hundred pounds. Usually a
fish one-fifth of that size is considered large."
"Flatfish are funny creatures," said Colin. "I've often wondered how the
eyes in various species wander around in their heads."
"Other people have wondered, too," said his companion.
"Well, but we know something about it, don't we?" protested the lad.
"Aren't the eyes all right in the young fish?"
"Certainly," was the reply, "and, what's more, the young fish swims
upright."
"How does the eye move round, then? Does the eye on one side go blind
and another one grow on?"
"No," answered his friend; "your first idea was the right one, the eye
moves round. But, as a matter of fact, it goes through the body. The
young flatfish is thin and almost transparent, and when it begins to be
time for the eye to change from one side of the body to the other it
sinks in. A thin, transparent skin grows over the socket and the eye
sinks in and in, the bones moving away from before it, until it has come
near the proper place on the other side. Then a new socket opens for the
eye, and it finally arrives at the end of its journey through the head,
thus coming on the same side as the other eye. At the same time, too,
the flatfish gets the habit of swimming on its side, and its color
scheme changes, one side--which has become the bottom--being white,
while the upper side is dark and spotted to look like the stones on the
bottom of the sea."
"What do flatfish eat?"
"Everything," was the reply, "from a clam to a codfish. But the favorite
food of the halibut, for instance, is sting-ray, and consequently it is
a good friend of the oysterman; where there is plenty of halibut, there
will be few sting-rays, and these last are destructive to a good
oyster-bed."
"It seems to me," said Colin, "that the whole story of the seas is that
fish eat fish, while the few that escape from their own kind are gobbled
up by seagulls and terns and other birds."
"Yet," said the other, smiling, "the birds don't have it all their own
way. Sometimes the fish gobble them!"
"Can they eat birds?"
"It's a little rare," was the reply, "but there's one authentic case on
record in which a fish's stomach was found to contain no less than seven
wild ducks."
"Why, I always thought that fish had a small mouth in proportion to
their size. It must have been a monstrous big one!"
"It was not much more than four feet long," was the reply; "but it is
one of the few fishes having a huge mouth. They sometimes call it a
goosefish, because it attacks wild geese, but the right name is
fishing-frog or angler. It glides along the bottom until directly
beneath where ducks are feeding, and when one dives for worms in the
mud--you know the way ducks go down--the angler catches it by the neck
and drags it down and then swallows it at leisure. You see the bird
hasn't a chance, because all the angler-fish has to do is to hold it
until it strangles."
This led to a discussion of the food of fishes, and under the spur of
the boy's questions, the scientist outlined for him the dietary of
almost every fish that swims, together with all the various ways in
which water is aerated, such as the growth of water-plants and the
currents of streams.
"It still seems to me," said Colin, "that nearly every fish lives by
fighting some other fish. It's a wonder," he added, with a laugh, "that
there aren't some professional fighters among them."
"There are," his friend replied; "that is to say, in the sense you mean.
There's a fish which is called the fighting-fish, that is regularly
trained by the fishermen, and the combats are so famous that when one is
scheduled to come off a big crowd gathers."
"Where?" asked Colin incredulously. "That sounds a little as if you
thought I was one of the marines, Dr. Jimson."
"It is absolutely the case," was the reply. "And, what is more, they
advertise these fights widely and get big gate receipts, just like a
baseball game here. The sum of money taken in for admissions, too, has
become so large that the Crown refuses to allow the fights to be held
unless a certain percentage is paid over to the king."
"Where can that be?"
"In Siam," was the reply. "The fighting-fish is distantly related to
the perch, but it has been used for public combats for so long that it
has become highly specialized. It is really a sort of gamecock among
fish, and the money expended in licenses in Siam brings in a comfortable
revenue to the Crown. The owner of a champion fighting-fish never needs
to work for a living, he can easily be supported by the winnings of his
possession. Often a fish or a team of fishes is owned by a village and
the rivalry between communities is intense. The Siamese are inveterate
gamblers, also, and in more than one instance the Siamese Government has
had to send supplies to a village which was threatened with famine
because all the villagers had lost their crops through betting upon the
success of their team of fighting-fish."
"You say it's a kind of perch?"
"Only distantly," was the reply; "it belongs to a very curious group of
fishes which cannot live long in the water unless they can breathe air
once in a while, nor can they live very long in air, unless they breathe
water occasionally. The fish that climbs tall trees is a member of the
same sub-order."
"You mean the skippy?"
"No," the scientist answered; "it's a much better climber than the
skippy. It will run up the trunk of a palm tree."
"Now come, Dr. Jimson," expostulated Colin. "Do you expect me to believe
that?"
"Certainly, when it is true," came the reply. "The statement often has
been made and then disbelieved, but there is plenty of scientific
evidence now to arm its truth."
"Does it climb up to the top and crack cocoa-nuts?" queried the boy,
still incredulously.
"Not quite that," his friend said, smiling. "I believe seven feet is as
high a climb as is known, that being recorded officially by one of the
staff of the Madras Government Central Museum. The creature usually only
climbs during a heavy tropical rainstorm, and it is believed that the
fish, accustomed to ascending tiny streams, is stimulated to climb the
tree by the rush of water flowing down the bark. The gill cover is
movable, and the spines of the ventral fins very sharp. It doesn't go up
head first, you know, but sideways."
"How does the fish climb down, then?" queried Colin.
"Tumbles," was the laconic reply.
"And starts up again?"
"No, it usually hops sideways over land to a mud-bank again, not to
have another climbing fit until the next big tropical shower comes after
a period of drought. But if you wanted to find out all the strange
habits of fishes," continued his friend, as the schooner ran into New
Bedford harbor, "it would take more time than one swordfish trip would
give you."
[Illustration: CLAMMER RAKING FOR QUAHAUGS IN NEW BEDFORD HARBOR.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
[Illustration: OYSTERMAN TONGING FOR OYSTERS IN BUZZARD'S BAY.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
On the way back to Woods Hole, going down the harbor, Colin questioned
the captain of the M. B. L. boat, the _Cayadetta_,--which happened to
have been at New Bedford that afternoon, and on which he had been given
the courtesy of a passage--why there seemed to be two different kinds of
boats scattered over the harbor oystering.
"That feller's not oysterin'," the captain answered; "he's rakin'
quahogs."
"Quahogs?"
"That's clams," was the explanation; "the right name for what the people
down in New York call a 'little-neck clam.' The 'neck' is a foot, and
it's little because the quahog doesn't burrow deep. The long or soft
clam does."
"And he just pulls them up with a rake?"
"Yep," was the reply; "big rake with curved tines to it. You see he
jerks his rake along until he feels it full, then pulls it up. Now, this
feller, over on the other side here, he's not goin' after clams at all.
He's oysterin'. Ef you'll notice, he has two poles an' he works 'em
apart an' together again like a pair o' shears, an' then when he feels
he has a load, he hauls it up the same way, picks out the oysters that
are big enough, an' throws the small ones back together with the stones
an' other rubbish that he has brought up. They call that 'tonging'
oysters, an' the thing he uses is called the 'tongs.'"
"I've been wondering," said Colin, as they passed over the bay and he
noted again all the lobster-pot buoys which had interested him so
greatly on the way to New Bedford, "I've been wondering whether there
was any crabbing done up this way?"
"Not much," the captain answered; "there's one caught now an' again, but
all the good eatin' crabs belong further south. New Jersey's the place
f'r crabs, an' I reckon most o' the soft-shell crabs o' the country come
from there, but the business o' cannin' crabs is done way down in
Chesapeake Bay, where there's crabs no end."
"A soft-shell crab is just the same species as the regular blue crab,
isn't it," asked the boy; "only it has cast its shell?"
"Jus' the same," was the reply, "but for the market, an' there it's
worth four or five times as much."
"When you come to think of it," said Colin, "there isn't much in the sea
that isn't fit for food. Even the swordfish is good eating."
"There's some poisonous fish down in the tropics," was the reply, "but I
reckon that but for a few of those, a hungry man could eat nigh anythin'
that came out o' the water, fish or shellfish or anythin'. An' you
know," he added, "some folks, like the Japanese an' South Sea Islanders,
prefer 'em raw."
"Doesn't sound good to me at all," the boy said with a laugh, as the
little steamer turned into the 'hole.' "I'm satisfied to eat oysters and
clams raw, but not much else."
The rest of the month passed all too rapidly for Colin, who was becoming
greatly attached to Woods Hole. The sense of accomplishment was strong
throughout the place, every one was conscious that time was well spent,
and the atmosphere of the little village was one of entire content. The
boy made any number of friends, but above all, he took his greatest
delight in knowing that he had really found the work that he wanted to
do, and in trying as hard as he could to fit himself for it. Every day
he spent in the Bureau he saw more clearly the value of the work it had
done and the opportunities for other great advances. The exportation of
live fish to foreign streams had a great attraction for him.
"You know, Colin," the director said to him one day, when he was
speaking of the Bureau work, "all over the world there are fish which we
ought to be able to acclimatize in American waters, and there are
American fish which would thrive abroad. It has always been an idea of
mine that we could probably prevent famines in large parts of Asia by
looking after the fish supply. You hardly ever find a bad crop and a bad
fish year come together, the one always makes up for the other. Just
think what a gain it would have been in some of these Chinese and Indian
famines if they could have had all the fish they wanted. Millions of
lives could have been saved. The Bureau of Fisheries of this and other
countries won't have finished its work until every river and stream of
fresh water, every lake, and every square mile of the ocean is stocked
with the very finest of the food fishes, and the undesirables are weeded
out."
"Weeded out, like a garden?"
"Just exactly! Every hogfish and lamprey in American waters--that's a
near-fish that sucks the blood of other fish, you know--should be
exterminated just in the same way that the farmers of the country are
making away with the Canada thistle. Against the sharks--the tigers of
the sea, the killers--the wolves of the sea, and all the other predatory
forms, relentless war should be waged until the wild fishes of the sea
are destroyed, as the wild beasts of the forest have fled before the
face of man."
"Could that ever be done?"
"It will be done," the director answered, "but not in my time nor in
yours. It is a piece of work in which every step counts, and just one
summer's work may bring results that will help millions of people in the
years yet to come."
"And I shall have a share!" cried Colin, his enthusiasm kindling.
"Every one has a share; in the Fisheries, no work is wasted, no energy
is lost. Whether it be such research as that which you have seen me
doing upon the oyster drill, or the spectacular administration of the
seal herds on the Pribilof Islands, or the dry statistical work of
estimating the value of a fishery--on which work Dr. Crafts writes me
he is going to send you--each part has its place and a big place. The
aims of the Bureau are on so vast a scale that nothing is petty. We
think in terms of millions and tens of millions, and Nature responds.
There are more showy ways of helping the world, but for the
accomplishment of great results I know of none superior."
"You said, sir," said Colin, who had been startled by the reference to
himself, "that Dr. Crafts had some other work for me?"
"Yes," was the reply. "You know that the Laboratory here only keeps open
until the first of September, don't you?"
"Yes, Mr. Prelatt."
"What had you thought of doing between then and college?"
"I hadn't made any plans."
"I have a letter from the Deputy Commissioner, here," the director
continued, "in which he asks me if there is any one of the young fellows
whom I have had for the summer who would like to go with one of the
statistical field agents, and he suggests your name, should you wish to
go. It will be a short stay, not more than ten days or so, and won't
interfere with your getting back to college."
"I should like to go, ever so much," said Colin, "and I think it's
awfully good of Dr. Crafts to think of me."
"Very well, then," answered the director; "I'll write to him about it. I
thought you would accept, unless you had made other plans."
"I don't think I know much about the statistical side of the Bureau,"
said Colin; "just what does that take up?"
"Statistics mainly, but I can explain its value best by what I know it
has done," the director said thoughtfully. "One of the very best things
it accomplished, I think, was an investigation into the cause of the
heavy loss of life among the crews of New England fishing-vessels."
"What was the cause, sir?"
"The statistical division of the Bureau ascribed a great many of the
fatalities to badly-built vessels, so that a number of them foundered at
sea in bad weather."
"How could the Bureau help that?"
"It did help it wonderfully," the director answered. "A thorough
investigation was set on foot and all kinds of vessels examined. The
experts of the country were consulted and hundreds of models made to
find out just which was the most seaworthy. The fishing-fleets of all
the world were visited, and as a result a schooner was built and called
the _Grampus_, which became a model for all that was most to be desired
in fishing-vessels. The boat-builders of the country since then have
followed that type, and the loss of life from vessels of the _Grampus_
type in the last ten years has been less than one-fourth of that from
the older vessels in the ten years preceding. From the port of
Gloucester alone, this has meant in the ten years a saving of over six
hundred lives."
"That's getting results!" said Colin admiringly.
"And the commercial results, while they don't compare in importance with
the saving of life, of course, are even bigger. The winter cod-fishery
of New England was absolutely revolutionized by the introduction of
gill-nets with glass-ball floats, the catch becoming three times as
large, while at least one hundred thousand dollars was saved annually in
the single item of bait. Scores of new fishing-grounds have been
located, and apparatus has been devised which enables the fishermen to
exploit grounds which they previously had been unable to reach.
[Illustration: TESTING THE OCEAN'S CROP.
Experimental haul on the Bureau's vessel, the _Fish Hawk_, to determine
the character of the population of shore waters.
_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]
"There are so many different things being accomplished that it's hard to
name them all, but you can see for yourself that some one has got to
collect the figures on fisheries in order to determine how the industry
is progressing. If a town reports a bad season, when all the other ports
have been fortunate, the Bureau finds out why. If the catch of a certain
fish is decreasing all over the country, then this species must be
turned over to the fish culturists for artificial hatching and increase
of supply, and so on in a thousand directions. The statistical end has
to get the figures. We base all our work on those."
"I wonder what I shall have to do?" said Colin, with a note of query.
"That I don't know anything about," the director answered. "As director
of the Biological Laboratory, I'm on the scientific division, and really
can't tell you much about the cultural and statistical ends. I
understand, however, that the Deputy Commissioner plans to send you to
the mackerel fishery."
"From Gloucester, Mr. Prelatt?"
"No, from Boston. At least that is where you are to meet Mr. Roote.
Rather a full review of the mackerel fishery has been made, so I
suppose this is some special inquiry. The regular statistics of Boston
and Gloucester fish-markets are so important that local agents are
appointed to make monthly reports. You have not been called on much for
extra collecting recently, have you?"
"No, sir," answered Colin; "almost all the research workers have enough
specimens for the work they're doing, because it's too near the end of
the time to start any new details. So I haven't much to do except to
look after the trap."
"We'll get a few days together on the oyster drill, then," said the
director, "before you go away."
When the time came for Colin to leave Woods Hole he found himself most
reluctant to go, and he rather regretted that he had accepted the
mackerel fishery investigation, because he saw that he could have got
permission to work on with Mr. Prelatt for a week or two. But the matter
had been arranged, and when the boy arrived in Boston, he was alert with
the interest of a new experience.
The statistician was a silent man. He greeted Colin with few words and
eyed him critically.
"Hm! You can handle a boat?"
"Yes, sir," said Colin in surprise.
"Get aboard the _Shiner_ at seven-thirty to-morrow, at the dock next to
Gray's," and he nodded his head and walked off, leaving Colin to stare
after him.
"Well," the boy said aloud, "that's short enough and clear enough, only
I don't happen to know where Gray's is!"
A little questioning around the waterfront, however, enabled him to find
the vessel, and as the lad had been in Boston a couple of times before,
the search was not long. The _Shiner_ hailed from Gloucester and was
"the real thing," as Colin said under his breath. One hundred and twelve
feet long she was, with an air, as she sat on the water, of knowing
every little wickedness of the ocean and understanding the way to
conquer it too; her mainmast cleared eighty-five feet, and was stepped
well forward, with a boom that Colin did not overestimate greatly when
he put it at eighty feet. Although the boy was not a keen judge, he
thought the bowsprit immensely long, and noticed what a narrow nose the
seiner possessed.
Early the next morning she put out. The weather was ugly, but the
captain of the _Shiner_ was a Gloucester fisherman, and he went slap
down Boston Harbor with every inch of canvas set alow and aloft. The
seiner lay well over on her side, and Colin, while he had often sailed
in small boats with the lee rail under, found it a new sensation to go
tearing along at such speed. He knew nothing of his new chief, and stole
a glance at him, finding the statistician smoking a pipe with entire
unconcern.
Colin smiled to himself. For a moment he had forgotten, the statistician
was a Bureau man, too. The _Shiner_ sped out to sea, cleaving the water
at thirteen knots an hour easily, although her thirty-six-foot
seine-boat was towing after her.
"She certainly can sail, Mr. Roote!" exclaimed the boy, but he only got
a grunt in reply.
The evening of the third day had come before Colin gained any idea as to
the purpose of this trip. He saw that it would be no use asking
questions, and waited until he should be told what he was to do. In the
meantime, he was enjoying the sail immensely, for the craft seemed
instinct with life, and Colin learned from the other fishermen aboard
that she was one of the fastest vessels out of Gloucester. Colin had
settled himself under the blankets for the night and just dropped off
to sleep when there came a hail from the masthead.
"Fish! Lyin' nor'-nor'-east."
Every man stirred in his bunk, but none made a move. Colin, who had
wakened instantly with muscles tense and ready to spring out, followed
the example of the others round him, and waited. Indeed he dropped off
to sleep again, when the voice of the captain came from the wheel:
"Pass the word to oil up."
There was no need to say "Pass the word," for every man below heard the
order, and tumbled up at once, sliding into sea-boots, oilskins, and
sou'westers. Most of the men lighted a pipe, and one or two took a
'mug-up' from the coffee-kettle. Evidently the mackerel were not far
away, for in less than five minutes the captain called again:
"All on deck!"
Up the ladder went the fishermen with a rush. There was not a star
visible, and the night was as black as though the ship were plunging
into a cave. Even the phosphorescence or 'fire' at the ship's bow was
not especially brilliant, and Colin tumbled over half a dozen different
things in as many yards on deck, while only the fact that he had
sea-boots on saved him from barking his shins on the fore-hatch.
"Drop over the dory, haul up the boat!"
The commands came ringing out sharply. Colin had been aboard a
man-of-war, but there was no such discipline as this. The words were
scarcely spoken, when four of the men had the dory over the starboard
rail, while eight of the men tailed on to the painter of the seine-boat
and brought it to the port fore-rigging.
"Tops'l halyards. Lively now!"
With a rattle and whir the two great sails went soaring up in the
darkness, and the _Shiner_ leaped forward, her lee rail almost flush to
the sea.
"She's a great boat," said Colin to one of the men near him; "I
shouldn't have thought she could have stood the tops'ls."
The fisherman looked at him.
"Jerry Fitzgerald is the skipper o' this craft," he said, "an' he's got
the reputation o' carryin' all canvas in a full gale. See the lights
around us?"
"I saw one or two," Colin answered. "Other seiners?"
"O' course, an' do you think Jerry's goin' to lose a chance o' the
school because o' canvas? Wait a bit an' you'll see!"
Not a minute had passed by before another order came.
"Give her the stays'l. Run up the balloon, too!"
Colin gasped, but he lent a hand. As the _Shiner_ felt the added sail
she poked her nose in and took the water green. But the narrow build
forward threw off the load, and she rose like a duck. The seiner was
carrying a fearful press of sail, but she stood up stiffly under it, all
the red and green lights of the other seiners falling astern; it was
evident that the skipper meant to keep them there. Before long,
occasional flashes of light, being the phosphorescence churned up by the
tails of a pod of mackerel, could be seen from the deck.
"Into the boat!" cried the skipper.
For just a second Colin hesitated, but he saw Mr. Roote go into the
seine-boat and he followed immediately. The seine-master, who had been
aloft, came down with a rush. Colin could hear the rustle of the
oilskins as he partly touched the stays, but he landed on the deck with
a 'thump' as great as though he had leaped down the last ten feet. The
seine-boat was dropping astern as fast as one of the crew, who remained
on deck, could pay out the painter, but the seine-master gave no heed to
the rapid departure of the boat. He took half a dozen quick steps to the
stern and leaped over the quarter, judging the distance so accurately
that he landed fair on the foremost thwart of the seine-boat as she
dropped astern, a couple of the men catching him as he jumped.
"Easy on the painter!" he cried. Then, next moment:
"Stand by the dory," as the smaller of the boats, with two men aboard,
came sliding by and was almost thrown on top of the seine-boat by a
cross-sea.
There came a fire of orders from the captain, which Colin could hardly
follow, and he wondered how the helmsman and one man on deck could keep
up with them.
"Ease off the main-sheet! Dave,"--that was the man at the wheel,--"swing
her away a bit. Steady there! Slack the foretops'l and stays'l halyards.
Lively now! Jibe her over, Dave! Down with the balloon, there! Quick as
the Lord'll let you! Over she comes! Stand by in the boat and dory! Keep
her down, Dave! Down, man, down! It's a good school."
There was a moment's pause.
"You in the boat and dory?"
"All ready, sir," answered the seine-master.
"Ready, dory?"
"All ready."
"Hard up, Dave! Steady a little. A little! Don't you know what a little
is? Ready in the boat, there! Steady with that wheel! Now you've got
her. You in the boat, there. Got that new-fangled net ready?"
"Ready," cried the statistician shortly. Then Colin understood. The trip
was for the purpose of testing out a new net devised by the Bureau and
the Fisheries man was a net expert. No wonder he knew a boat!
"Stand by the boat. Ready, the dory! When I give the word! Hold on a bit
with the painter! Now let her go! You in the dory there, show your
lantern! All your own way now!"
Colin tugged at his oar. Never, in all his experience in rowing, had he
tackled anything like an oar of that size, but he pulled for all he was
worth, and a glow ran through him to feel that he was holding up his
end. The light dory with two men aboard, came racing after them. It was
nearly a half-mile pull before the seine-master cried:
"Over with the buoy!"
And the buoy was tossed overboard for the dory to pick up and hold to
windward.
Then the silent Fisheries officer got busy. Without a word, he reached
for the net. It was made of a lighter twine than customary, and not
thickly tarred, having also different corks to the usual type, and
sinkers all over the net. It looked like a fearfully complicated thing
to handle and Roote was a small man, but that net went flying out as
though tossed by a giant.
"You're a jim-dandy with the twine, all right," said the seine-master
admiringly. He turned to the rowers, "Put your backs into it, boys," he
said; "drive her for all you know how. We've got to give this new
contraption a fair chance."
"How much net out now, sir?" he asked the statistician in a few minutes.
"Quarter of a mile," was the reply.
"Shall we close in then, eh?"
"You'd better."
The seine-master, feeling that the school of mackerel had been inclosed,
turned the seine-boat towards the dory and, under the powerful arms of
the fishermen, the circle was soon completed. It was a perfect set.
The wind had been rising rapidly, and just as the seine-boat reached the
dory a sharp rain squall struck. But the cry was, "Purse up!" for until
a seine is partly pursed up, there is no telling whether the fish are
really in or not. For a moment, however, it was almost impossible to
purse up, the wind and rain were beating so savagely.
"Pull!" said Roote, suiting the action to the word, and all hands joined
him. The net was light, far lighter than the old fishermen's nets, and
there was more than one audible comment to the effect that the net would
break, and that it was too bad they hadn't one of the old-style nets
around the school, but the pursing in continued, and the net showed no
signs of breakage. Presently first one, then another, fish flashed above
the water, and a minute later the shine of the mackerel showed, and then
the whole school, including thousands of fish, rose in a body to the
surface, beating the water with their forked tails, and threshing in mad
confusion from side to side.
The seine-master turned to the Fisheries official with a good deal of
concern.
"That's a big haul," he said; "will your net stand it?"
There was no hesitation in the reply.
"Yes," he said.
"Then I'm willin' to admit," said the seine-master, "that you win. I'd
never ha' believed that you could get as big a net as light as that an'
able to hold the fish. That'll save us fishermen a pile o' labor."
But the official was not to be tempted into talk, even on the question
of his own invention. He simply nodded, and went on pursing in.
Presently the _Shiner_ came pelting down the breeze, still carrying
quite a bit of canvas, there being not enough hands on board to reef.
The weather was getting dirtier every minute.
"Hello there the boat!" hailed the captain.
"All right," the seine-master called back. "A couple o' hundred
barrels."
"Net holding?"
"Looks like it."
"Better get on board soon's you can," the captain advised; "we may have
a bit of a blow."
Colin thought to himself that there was a great deal more than a "bit of
a blow" at the time, but he said nothing. The worst of it was the way
the rain came pelting down, for it was as thick as a fog, and
dispiriting. It was a cold rain, too, and although it was September, the
northeast gale was chill. Colin shivered in his oilskins. The pursing in
done, the seine-master waved a torch, but it could not be seen in the
rain.
"It's a good thing we've got a cap'n like Jerry on board, boys," said
the seine-master. "He'll have to smell us out, because he can't see
anythin'."
But it was a longer wait than any one expected, for the schooner had
faded into the rain and could not be seen. Suddenly a hail was heard,
and the _Shiner_ passed to leeward of the boats, dimly visible. Every
one shouted, and an answering cry came back.
"He'll beat up to wind'ard a bit an' then pick us up," said the
seine-master cheerfully.
Colin wondered how any man could run a schooner about in a gale of wind
and come back to a certain spot, but he need not have been incredulous,
for in about five minutes' time the _Shiner_ came sliding down as though
to run over the boats, being thrown up into the wind in the nick of
time. As the schooner settled beside the boat, all the men but two
streamed aboard her, one remaining at the bow, to shackle the seine-boat
to the iron that hung from the hook at the fore-rigging on the port
side, while the other, grabbing hold of the long steering-oar, did his
best to fend off the stern. The seine, thus being between the boat and
the schooner, was held by Roote and the seine-master. Colin climbed
aboard with the rest of the men, and within two minutes' time, the big
dip-net--which would hold a barrel at a time--was scooped in among the
fish.
Ten or eleven times the dip-net had descended and come up full of fish,
and the work was proceeding rapidly in spite of the pitching and heaving
of the vessel, when suddenly every one was stopped by the long wail of a
foghorn near by. Not a sound of one had been heard before, and all hands
were so busy that the direction from which the sound came had not been
noted. Exactly half a minute elapsed.
Then mournfully and very close, the long "Who-o-o-o" sounded almost upon
them, and the captain sprang to the wheel. As he set a hand upon the
spokes and spun them round, a tall gray ship towered above them from the
side on which was the seine-boat, and seemed to hang poised a moment on
the crest of a sea before the final crash. Colin, who was leaning over
the rail watching the dipping of the net, was able to see everything.
The fisherman at the bow of the seine-boat jumped for the boom and
clasped it safely. Then, as the sailing vessel lurched upon them, the
boy noted that the seine-master and the fisherman at the stern of the
seine-boat leaped for the martingale shrouds and held them.
But that instant's delay, as the bark had seemed to be poised upon the
wave, had been enough for the _Shiner_. Having her canvas up, the
fraction of time gave her the chance to answer to her helm, and she spun
round like a teetotum, seeming almost to wriggle from under the bow of
the ship like a live creature. Roote, the only one left in the
seine-boat, had been the last to see the oncoming ship. He gave one
quick look upward, and plunged from the seine-boat into the sea. Even
so, the chances were in his favor, but as he touched the water the ship
crashed into the seine-boat, and a piece of the wreckage hit him on the
head.
It all happened in a flash, but at the instant that he was struck,
Colin, still in his oilskins and sea-boots, dived into the water.
Fortunately, he cleared the vortex. In a few seconds Roote came up, and
Colin grabbed him by the hair. The statistician was insensible, which
made matters easier for the boy. But the oilskins and sea-boots were an
impossible load, and it was only by great exertion that he managed at
last to get them off and still keep Roote afloat. Soon after this
relief, too, the statistician showed signs of life, and after
successfully fending off a struggle, Colin succeeded in getting the
injured man to rest his weight on him in the least tiring manner.
"I don't swim much," said the net expert. "How about you? How long can
you keep afloat?"
"Long enough twice over for them to find us," said Colin cheerfully.
"I'm a regular fish in the water."
But the boy soon found out that it was a far different thing swimming
under normal conditions and really having to battle for his life in a
fair seaway. Roote, too, soon relapsed once more into unconsciousness,
and the boy had to support his weight. He was a swimmer, a champion
swimmer, and it was rather a shock to him to find how difficult it was
even to keep afloat. He realized how valueless a casual knowledge of
swimming would be for use in the open sea.
He had not been more than half an hour in the water when his strength
began to fail. He swam around expecting to find some piece of wreckage
which would aid him, but not a thing could he see. His arms grew heavy
and his feet hung down as though leaded weights were fastened to them.
Black spots began to dance before his eyes, and Roote's weight became a
torture. But he still hung on and kept afloat.
An hour passed of buffeting with the sea, and the boy began to grow
light-headed. He had swallowed quite a little salt water, and presently
he began singing, although he had a feeling as though a double self told
him not to sing. A choking took his throat and startled him into full
consciousness. He had nearly been down that time! But the training of
years stood him in good stead now that he needed it, and he still swam
on.
Then he began to dream. Once or twice he came to himself and smiled
sadly to think that this was the end of all his hopes in the Bureau of
Fisheries, but this consciousness did not last for more than a minute
before he fell dreaming again, still, however, swimming heavily and
keeping afloat. And it seemed to him that the last and the most real of
his dreams was that a boat came by. But this, he thought, must be
drowning and it was not hard to drown, to dream of being rescued and to
go down, down, down, to the cold, strange tideless depths of sea from
which no one ever comes up alive. Still, there was the boat in his
dream, but it had come too late, and it seemed to Colin, that with his
last effort he pushed Roote toward the outstretched arms of the men in
the boat, waved a feeble farewell and sank. The water gurgled in his
ears, there was a horrible strangulation, he tried to cry out, his lungs
filled with water, and he knew no more.
Hours passed. Then, with a sense of suddenly arriving from a far-off
place, Colin opened his eyes. He was in the cabin of a ship, and despite
his exhaustion, he tried to rouse himself at the sound of voices. Roote,
and another man, the captain of the bark, were standing beside his bunk.
"He's a plucky youngster, as well as a great swimmer," he heard the
captain say. "Who is he?"
And Colin heard the other reply, with a note of pride in his voice:
"That's Colin Dare. He's one of our men. We think a lot of him in the
Bureau of Fisheries!"
And the boy, wanly, but happily smiling, fell into a deep but healthy
sleep.
THE END