y to the
water with his weight; but as the boat rose again, the impetus of the
thrust he gave her in leaping aboard carried her out a couple of
lengths.

There was no thought now of any wrong-doing, as Bob and I seized an oar
apiece and began to paddle as the boat rose and fell and glided over the
swelling tide.

"Pull away, Sep!" cried Bob. "Here, old Big, you're sitting all on one
side and making the boat lop. Get in the middle or I'll splash you!"

Bigley moved good-humouredly, and the boat danced beneath his weight.

"Heave ho! Steady!" shouted Bob. "Don't sink us, lad. I say, what a
weight you are! Let's put him ashore, Sep. He's too big a Big for a
boat like this."

"Make good ballast," said Bigley, laughing good-humouredly. "Boats are
always safer when they are well ballasted."

"I daresay they are, but I like 'em best without Big lumps in 'em. I
say, how far out shall we go?"

"Oh, about a quarter of a mile, straight out, over the Ringlet rocks.
You pull, I'll watch the bearings, and drop out the grapnel. Pull
hard!"

We rowed away steadily, while, to save time, Bigley took out his
pocket-knife and, taking a board from the bait-basket, laid it upon the
seat, and began to open the mussels and scrape out the contents of the
shells ready for placing them upon the hooks when we reached the fishing
ground.

For I may tell you that knowing the bottom well has a great deal to do
with success in sea-fishing. A stranger to our parts might think that
all he had to do was to row out in a little boat a few hundred yards,
and begin to fish.

If he did that, the chances are that he would not catch anything, while
a boat three or four lengths away might be hauling in fish quite fast.

The reason is simple. Sea fish frequent certain places after the
fashion of fresh-water fish, which are found, according to their sorts,
on muddy bottoms; half-way down in clear deeps; among piles; in gravelly
swims; at the tails of weeds; or under the boughs of trees close in to
the side of river or lake.

So with the sea fish. If we wanted to catch bass, we threw out in
places where the tide ran fast; if we were trying for pollack, it was
along close by the stones of the rocky shore; if for conger, in deep
dark holes; and if for flat-fish, right out in deep water, where the
bottom was all soft oozy sand.

Upon this occasion we had decided for the latter, and with Bigley giving
a word now and then to direct us, as