A second tub trailed after the first, its trawl being attached to the
end of the other. The four remaining tubs followed in order. At the
junction of the second and third a buoy was fastened, and another
between the fourth and fifth. To the end of the trawl from the sixth and
last tub was tied another anchor, and as soon as it had reached bottom
the last buoy was cast over. They had set almost three and a half miles
of trawl, bearing more than thirty-one hundred short, baited lines.

"And there's a good job done!" exclaimed Jim, as the last buoy floated
astern. "Here's to a ten-pound hake on every hook!"

"Do you often catch as many as that?" inquired Percy, innocently.

Jim laughed.

"Hardly! We'll be more than lucky if we get a tenth of that number."

Day was now breaking. The night wind had died out and, save for the
long, oily swells, the sea was absolutely calm. Jim started the engine
and swung the _Barracouta_ round, and they ran leisurely back to the
other end of the trawl, meanwhile eating the lunch Filippo had put up
for them. Soon they were close to the first red buoy.

"Now for business!" said Jim.

He stepped into the dory.

"Guess you know enough about automobiles, Whittington, to handle this
engine. Keep the sloop close by and watch me haul. You can take your
turn when I get tired."

Gaffing the buoy aboard, he pulled up the anchor, and soon was hauling
in the trawl over the wooden roller on the starboard bow. Percy watched
with all his eyes. This was real fishing.

As the line came in Jim coiled it smoothly down into an empty tub on a
stand in the bow. The first three hooks were skinned clean.

"Something down there, at any rate," he commented.

The trawl sagged heavily.

"First fish, and a good-sized one! Pretty logy, though! Feels like a
hake!"

Percy stared down into the blackish-green water. Out of its gloomy
depths rose an indistinct shadow, gradually assuming definite shape. A
blunt, lumpy head with big, staring eyes broke the surface; two long
streamers hung from beneath the lower jaw.

Jim reached for his gaff.

"Hake! And a good one, too!"

Striking the sharp iron hook through the fish's gills, he lifted the
slimy gray body over the gunwale, unhooked it, and slung it,
floundering, over the kid-board into the empty space amidships.

"Fifteen-pounder! Wish we could get a hundred more like him! Hullo!
Who's next?"

The newcomer had a huge reddish-brown head with bulging che