gs
over the rail. The way he came up coughing and spitting and then his
dive for the companionway--everybody had to roar.

"Did y'see the cook hop?--did y'see him hop?" called Andie, who was
afraid somebody had missed it.

We passed the Marauder, Soudan McLeod, soon after. His mainmast had
broken off eight or ten feet below the head. They were clearing away
the wreckage. "I s'pose I oughter had more sense," he called out as we
went by.

"Oh, I don't know--maybe the spar was rotten," said Maurice, and that
was a nice way to put it, too.

That night it came a flat calm, and with barely steerage way for us.
There was a big four-masted coaster bound south, too, and light, and
for the best part of the night we had a drifting match with her.
Coasters as a rule are not great all-round sailers, but some of them,
with their flat bottoms and shoal draft, in a fair wind and going
light, can run like ghosts, and this was one of that kind. We had our
work cut out to hold this one while the wind was light and astern, but
in the morning, when it hauled and came fresher, we went flying over
the shoals. So far as the looks of it went the big coaster might as
well have been anchored then.

All that day we held on. And it was a lesson in sailing to see the way
some of those seiners were handled. Our skipper spent most of that day
finding out how she sailed best and putting marks on her sheets for
quick trimming by and by.

Trying each other out, measuring one vessel against another, the fleet
went down the coast. We passed a few and were passed by none, and that
was something. Ahead of us somewhere were a half-dozen flyers. If we
could have beaten some of them we should have had something to brag
about; but no telling, we might get our chance yet.

IX

MACKEREL

Throughout all that night the lights of the fleet were all about us,
ahead and behind. At breakfast next morning--four o'clock--we were off
Delaware Breakwater, and that afternoon at two we began the mast-head
watch for fish. And on that fine April day it was a handsome
sight--forty sail of seiners in sight, spread out and cruising
lazily.

The skipper was the first to get into his oilskins and heavy sweater,
for with a vessel hopping along at even no more than six or seven
knots by the wind it is pretty chilly aloft, nice and comfortable
though it may be on deck in the sun.

There was a game of seven-up going on in the cabin, and the sun
striking down the