dded his head and took up his position about three feet away
from the Chinaman. Soon the net appeared above water, and the men,
bending over the gunwale, grasped it with their hands, and, tugging all
together, pulled it slowly but surely upwards.

'Where are the fish?' Charlie asked, surprised at seeing none in the
part of the net at which they had been tugging.

'For'ard,' Ping Wang answered, and as he spoke the donkey-engine started
panting and puffing, and the part of the net to which the Chinaman had
pointed was now raised high above the gunwale. It resembled a huge
cooking-net which had been lifted out of a gigantic pan. It was crowded
with fish, and as it was pulled in and suspended over the pound made on
the deck, the very small fish, mostly dead, fell through. Others, with
wide-opened mouths, were caught in the meshes. A fisherman now stepped
under the dripping net, untied it at the bottom, and sprang quickly
aside as the catch of fish fell with a thud into the pound.

'What a mixture!' Charlie exclaimed as he gazed at the fish jumping,
wriggling, and sliding about in the pound. 'What are they?'

'Cod, plaice, haddock, and turbot,' Ping Wang replied, but he only named
a few of them. The catch included also ling, sole, whiting, dab, gurnet,
oysters, crabs, whelks, cat-fish, star-fish, and a large amount of ocean
scrapings.

Charlie stood watching the struggling mass, deeply interested, but Ping
Wang whispered to him, 'Come away, or you'll have the skipper at you. We
are going to shoot now.'

Charlie bestirred himself at once, and assisted in shooting the gear.
When that had been done without a hitch, the work of sorting, cleaning,
and packing the fish was begun. Three men stepped into the pound,
trampling on the fish until they had made a clear space for their feet.

'Give a hand there, cook!' the skipper shouted, and Charlie stepped into
the pound. He had not the heart to tread on the still living fish as the
others were doing, and in his anxiety to avoid hurting them, he slipped
and fell against the gunwale, his sou'-wester falling overboard. The
other men stopped work at once, and looked at him in a by no means
friendly way. The skipper abused him loudly and fiercely.

'It was my own sou'-wester,' Charlie declared, unable to understand why
the skipper should be so excited over the loss.

'Then why don't you jump overboard and save it? We will fish you up next
time we haul.'

The men laughed heartily