Chapter III: Part 3

A savage stooped and began gathering eggs, pushing away the birds or knocking them on the head with a stick, when, with their sharp beaks, they protested against the robbery. He was a horribly filthy fellow, and his ugly body was partly covered with skins of birds and sealskin. He noticed a female sitting close, calling to our penguin for help, and the bird seemed to be very fine and large, with a good skin. He made a pass with his club and smote her on the head. She struggled desperately to get away, but could not. The blow partly stunned her. The little ones scurried off as she rose, and the savage saw there were no eggs to be had from her. But he would have her skin anyway, so, with a furious stroke of his weapon, he knocked her lifeless at his feet. Then he picked her up and went on.

Later in the afternoon the male came back from fishing. He climbed the cliffs and looked about him. His mate and young were missing, and he sent forth his deep, sonorous cry. But it was not answered. Other birds took it up, but there was no answering call from the mate, and the little dark speck that rose and fell upon the heave of the swell away in toward the shore of Tierra del Fuego gave no token of her fate.

All night he wandered over the rocks, his wild note of calling sounding far out to sea. In the morning he stood once more upon the spot where, a few days before, the mate of his bosom sat proudly upon the white eggs. The empty shells were all that were left. He stood gazing out to sea, and then his instinct told him he would see his family no more. He gave one long-drawn cry, plunged into the sea, and was gone. The great west wind came roaring over the sea before the sun set, and before it he held his way. He would go far away from the scene of his summer’s life. The vast ocean would be his home, and the memories of the ledge be a thing of the past.

For many days the penguin roamed over the huge rolling hills of water. The vastness of the ocean and its grandeur soothed him, though he still called out at intervals when the sadness of his life was strong upon him. Then came a day when sea and sky seemed to blend in one wild whirl, and a hurricane from the high, ragged hills of Patagonia swept the Antarctic Drift. Away he went before it, and the wildness of it was joy, the deepening roar of the wind and crash of Cape combers making music for his spirit. He headed for the middle of the current between the land where the Pacific flows through and meets the western ocean, the stretch of sea that reaches away past the South Shetlands to the south pole.

How wild and lonely was the storm-swept sea! Great hills of rolling water, fifty feet in height, with stately and majestic rush, passed to the eastward, their tops crowned with huge white combing crests and their sides streaked and flecked with long stripes of white foam. Above, the dull banks of hurtling vapor flew wildly away to somewhere in the distance, far beyond the reach of vision. It was more comfortable beneath the surface than above it, and our penguin drove headlong before the sea two fathoms below the foam, only coming up once in a while to breathe. On and on he drove for hours, until hunger warned him to keep a lookout for fish, as he occasionally came up for air, and to see if there were signs of the oily surface denizens showing in the sweep of that great, lonely sea. Suddenly an object attracted his attention. It was a mere speck on the storm-torn horizon, but he knew it must be of considerable size. It was different from anything he had ever before seen, for above it three long, tapering sticks stood upward, and upon the middle one a strip of white, like the wing of an albatross, caught the weight of the wild west wind. He was interested, and drove along toward it until the object loomed high above him, and the deep snore of the gale sounded like a heavy roaring comber tearing through the many lines of the rigging and under the strip of white canvas. The great thing would rise upon the crest of a giant wave and fling its long, pointed end high into the gale, the rushing sea striking it and smashing over in a white smother like the surge on the rocks. Then down it would swing slowly until it would reach the hollow between the moving hills, and the penguin could see upon its body, its tall sticks rolling to windward and the roar of the gale deepening into a thunderous, rushing sound, until the advancing sea would lift it again and roll it toward the lee. The sight of the huge monster wallowing about, hardly making the slightest way through the water, interested the penguin. It seemed like a floating rock without life, and he felt a curiosity to know if it were alive. He rose partly from the sea and uttered a long-drawn, hoarse call that floated down the gale and swept over the great hulk. Nothing happened, and he repeated the call,--a far-reaching, wild, deep, resonant cry.

But the great ship swung along slowly, as before, and he dived under her to see what was below.

In the forecastle the dim light of the summer day made a dismal and cheerless scene. The watch below had turned in, all standing, their wet clothes wrapped about them in their “pews,” or bunks, making a vapor in the cold air through which the light of the swinging lamp shone dimly. The gray light from outside filtered in at the side ports and spoke of the cold, hard day on deck. Once in a while some shivering wretch would turn in his poultice of soaking flannel and get a fresh piece of icy-cold cloth against his skin that would call forth maledictions on the Horn, the weather, and the hove-to ship. In a corner of the forecastle a pile of soaking clothes moved, and a moan sounded above the noise without.

“Stow it, Sammy; you’ll be all right soon, my boy,” said a voice in a bunk above him.

“Oh, but it’s so cold, Tom,” whispered the pile of clothes. “I can’t last much longer, and they might let me die warm, at least.”

“What’s the little man sayin’?” asked a deep voice opposite. “Wants to die warm, does he? Say, Sammy, me son, you’ll be warm mighty soon after you’re dead; why in thunder don’t you put up with a bit o’ cold till then, boy?”

“You’re a blamed brute, bos’n,” said the first speaker, “an’ if I wa’n’t mighty well used up I’d soak you a good whanging for that. Yer know the poor boy’s sick wid scurvy, an’ aint likely to pull through.”

“I’ll ware ye out when th’ watch is called, yer preacher,” said the bos’n confidently. “Talk away, for you’ll only get it all the worse when I shucks my dunnage.” Then, as if the matter were settled, he snugged up in his soaking bunk and hove down to warm a piece of his steaming covering until it should cease to send a chill through his big frame and he could wander into dreamland.

The shivering form of the boy in the corner moved again, and he groaned in agony. It was useless for him to try to sleep with his limbs swollen and his flesh almost bursting with the loathsome disease. The pile of wet clothes upon him could not keep him warm, and each shiver sent agony through him. He would die unless he could get relief soon, and there the ship was off the Horn in June, the beginning of winter, without one chance in fifty of making port in less than two months.

In his half-delirious state he lived many of his early schooldays again, and then followed thoughts of those who were nearest to him. He must die. His grave must be in that great, dark void beneath. Oh, the loneliness of that great ocean! What would it be like far below in the blackness of the vast deep, beyond the heave of the great sea, in the very bosom of the great world of silence? The horror of it caused him to groan. Would anyone punish the cruel ship-owners and captain who had so foully murdered him with the cheap and filthy food? What would anyone care after he had gone? What would he care, away down in that everlasting blackness, where no one would ever see him again? He lay upon his back and stared with red and swollen eyes at the bunk above him where Tom, the quartermaster, snored loud enough to be heard above the dull, thunderous roar overhead. In another hour the watch must turn out, but they would let him lie by; him, a dying ship’s-boy. But would he die outright? Would his soul live down there in that awful blackness, where they must soon heave his body? He had heard of sailors’ spirits haunting ships. Could his do so? Was there a hideous devil below waiting for him? He had heard there was. Far down in the bottomless abyss some monster might await him. He gazed with staring eyes at the dim lamp, and longed for a little light and sunshine to relieve the terrible gloom of the Antarctic winter day.

Then there broke upon his ears a wild, sonorous, deep-drawn cry sounding over the storm-swept sea. It was not human. What was it? Was it for him? The thought made him sick with terror. He groaned aloud, and Tom turned over in his wet clothes until the sudden chill of moving from the one steaming place made him grumble audibly.

“What was it, Tom?” he whispered.

“What?” growled the sailor surlily.

“There----” and the cry was repeated.

Tom growled a little and then rolled snug again. Suddenly he started up. “A man might as well freeze to death on deck as in this unholy frozen hole,” he said. Then he climbed stiffly down from his bunk, clapped his sou’wester on his head, and, tying the flaps snug under his chin, he slid back the forecastle door with a bang, and landed on the main deck.

There he stood a minute watching the great fabric straining under her lower maintopsail, hove to in that sea that the Cape Horner knows so well and dreads so much. In the waist, the foam on deck told of a flood of icy water that poured again and again over the topgallant rail and crashed like a Niagara upon the deck planks, rushing to leeward through the ports in the bulwarks and carrying everything movable along with it.

He watched his chance, and dodged around the corner of the deck house, where the port watch huddled to keep clear of the wind and the sea.

“Merry Fourth o’ July to ye,” bawled a man of the watch, as he came among them.

“What’s the matter? Can’t ye find enough work to do whin yer turn comes?” asked another.

“Where’s the whale-iron?” asked Tom, of Chips, who had come out of his room to get a look around.

The carpenter looked at him queerly. “What d’ye want wid it?” he asked.

“Listen!” said Tom.

Then the cry of the sea fowl sounded again.

“Penguin?” said Chips.

“Turkey,” said Tom, with a smile. “If we can get the steward to give us a bit o’ salt pork fat we can git him, or I’m a soger.”

He was an old whaleman, and the carpenter hesitated no longer. He led the way into his room in the forward house where he kept his tools, and the iron was brought forth. A word to the mate on watch, and the sailor was fast in the lee forerigging, standing upon the shear-pole, with the iron ready to heave. The fat was tossed over the side, and he waited.

In the dark, cold hole of the forecastle the drawn lips of the sick boy were parted, showing his blue and swollen gums. He was grinning horribly. “Take him away. Oh, take him away!” he was moaning. “Hear him a-callin’ me? Don’t let him get me, Tom; take him away, take him away! It’s the devil callin’ me!”

All the fear and anguish that can burn through a disordered brain was upon the little fellow, and the dismal cry lent a reality to his delirious thoughts. Suddenly he half rose in his bunk, and then the latent spark of manhood, which was developing even in spite of his sufferings, came to his aid. He thought of the Great Power which ruled his fate, and shook himself into full consciousness, glancing up at the aperture through which the dim light filtered as if he half expected to see a vision that would give him strength. Then he felt that he would face the end calmly, and meet whatever was in store as a man should. Perhaps the captain and owners could not help matters, after all. He could hear the song of the gale more distinctly, and once the tramp of the men as they tailed onto the maintopsail brace. They were jamming the yard hard on the backstay, and there was no show of a slant yet. He must lie quiet and wait, listening to the weird cry that caused him to shiver and see fantastic figures upon the carlines above his head.

Out on the great, high-rolling sea, the penguin had scented a peculiar substance. He drew nearer the great fabric that rolled and swung so loggily on the sea. He sent forth a wild cry, and drove headlong after a piece of white matter that floated in the foam of the side wash. He seized it and swallowed it. Then he came closer.

A form stood in the rigging above him, motionless, as if made of wood, and a long, pointed thing was balanced in the air. A piece of fat showed right beneath, and he went for it, in spite of the feeling of dread that came upon him. He was hungry, and would snatch it and then get away. He reached it, and at that instant something struck him in the back, carrying him beneath the surface. Then his life went out.

“A fine turkey, an’ that’s a fact,” said Chips, a moment later. “Get something to put him in, quick; the lad will have a stew, fer sure. ’Twill well-nigh cure him, and, anyways, it’ll keep him a-goin’ until we speak a wessel fer fresh grub.”

The second mate came forward.

“Eight bells, ye starbowlines,” he bawled into the forecastle; “turn out, or I’ll be right in there wid ye! One o’ ye bring Sammy’s mess things. He’s got turkey fer dinner. Come, wake up, sonny! There aint no devil or nothin’ a-chasin’ ye. Ye’ll be all right in a week o’ Sundays. Bring that beef juice right in here, Chips. Hold his head, Tom,--there,--make him drink it while it’s hot.”

In a little while the hot broth made from the bird’s flesh warmed the boy’s body, and his mind was clear again. The forecastle was empty, and the wild cry he had heard no longer sounded above the gale. He felt stronger, and his terror had vanished. A feeling of ease grew within his poisoned body. A gleam of faint sunlight came through the open door, and as he looked he knew that the God he felt had given him strength had been kind. He knew no prayer, or word of thanks, but his spirit was warm with gratitude. He smiled his thanks at his shipmates, and closed his eyes. Then he slept.

A crowd of swearing and jostling men awakened him as they came tumbling below some hours afterwards.

“Grub ahoy!” bawled one. Then the mess-kid came in steaming from the galley, and upon it was a large fowl.

“Hi, yi, turkey, ahoy! Turkey, ’e was a good old man!” cried a Swede.

“An’ divil a bit will anyone but th’ bye git,” said the big bos’n. “It’s sorry I am, Thomas, me dear, that I have tew whang ye afther yer noble raid on ther poulthry.”

He was probably named by sailors because of his fancied resemblance to a certain piece of ship’s gear, but the Conchs of the Bahama Bank believed he deserved his name in its true meaning, for he was certainly the most stupid fellow on the reef. Those who knew him and watched him crawl up the glistening white coral sand that glared in the heat of the torrid sunshine never took the trouble to harm him, although the law of the reef is very much like it is elsewhere. The strongest or quickest-witted only might endure.

But the conch who first turned him, or rather attempted to turn him, found that his dead weight of six hundred pounds of shell and leather-like beef was not worth the trouble. Turtles of more manageable size were plentiful, and there was no use of straining one’s self trying to upset such a monster. He drew his knife to kill, but the stupid one had sense enough to withdraw his head within the wall of bony shell, and the black man called maledictions upon him for turning the edge of his weapon. Then he smote him over the back with his turning stave and called him a worthless one because he refused to contribute himself to the Conch’s larder, and passed on.

The loggerhead paid small heed to the man’s behavior. The bright sunshine was warming the white sands, and the blue water of the Gulf Stream was rippling past the cay, while above him the beautiful little lumpy clouds, bunches of pure white vapor, were floating away to the southward. It was enough to live without bothering with those who fished upon the waters of the reef or the great swarm of creatures who inhabited the clear depths. Everywhere the sea denizens seemed to be in continual tumult, some trying to build homes among the sponges and growths of the coral banks, and others hurrying to and fro through the clear blue liquid with no especial purpose he could fathom. Then there were the destroyers who came and went with a rush, chasing the smaller to shelter and splashing a great deal of water in their efforts to capture those weaker than themselves.

The loggerhead poked forth his nose and gazed about him, wondering at the beauty of the world, and gave the struggling swarms but a passing glance. Then he laboriously hauled himself up the warming sands until he reached high-water mark.

The Conch had walked far away down the cay where his boat was hauled up. His companion sat in the stern-sheets and lazily bailed the water from her. When he had finished, the two men shoved her off and hoisted a small sail. Then swinging her bow around before the breeze, they headed away toward the distant line of white which showed to the eastward where a larger cay of the Bank rose from the sea. After they had gone the loggerhead watched the rippling water along the shore. Soon the head of a huge turtle appeared, and in a few minutes the great form of another like himself hauled slowly and lazily up the beach.

Before dark several followers had hauled up to high-water mark. On the cay was soft fine sand of a nature not unlike that of more northern beaches, and this had banked above the coral to a depth of three or more feet.

With flippers of horny hardness and gigantic power the females began to cut their way down. They scooped and scooped until they had holes at least two feet deep nicely rounded and firmly packed on the sides as though they were cemented. Then they dropped slowly egg after egg into the little pits until a hundred or more had packed themselves into the receptacles. The shells of the eggs were soft like leather, and each egg had a small dent which showed it was fresh. Then as the night wore on they softly covered the pits with sand and carefully smoothed them over until not the slightest trace of any disturbance of the surface showed. It was nice work, for the sand was soft, and the signs of digging were easily made, but hard to conceal, and it was nearly dawn before the females were satisfied with their efforts. Then they slipped slowly down the sand into the sea and disappeared to return no more. Their task was done.

The huge loggerhead who had led the way up the beach watched the departing turtles as they went to sea. The sound of the murmuring ocean was in the morning air, the song of the south sea awakening the day as the soft wind sighed over heaving swell and rippled the beautiful wavelets until they rolled into little combers and flashed white in the sunshine. All about him was the light of the tropic dawn. The sweet breath of the trade wind fanned his iron-hard head and he opened his eyes lazily to watch the sunrise. It was well. The beauty of the world attracted him.

Far away on the horizon the spurts of foam showed the beginning of the strenuous life of the destroyers. He watched them lazily and wondered at their fierceness, their uselessness of purpose. Then he saw a form coming down the beach and looked eastward where the boat of the Conchs had made the shore again.

The black man went slowly along the beach prodding the sand at high-water mark wherever he saw the tracks of turtles. He had a long, thin piece of iron with a sharp end which he drove into the sand and withdrew again, looking at the end to see if there was any sign of egg-yolk adhering to it. Once he struck a place where a turtle had scooped out a nest, and the dripping iron caused him to give a cry to his companion in the boat. Then he threw down a sack and dug until he had unearthed the eggs, which he transferred quickly to the bag, and picking up his iron staff he went along, bending down to watch the tracks more closely.

The loggerhead watched him out of the corner of his eye and thought of the turtle who had lost her eggs, but the whole thing interested him but little and he made his way slowly down the sand to avoid being hit over the head with the iron rod because the Conch did not like him.

The Conch saw him as he gained the surf, but he knew him, and shaking his staff at him he went along searching for more prizes.

The great loggerhead swam easily just below the surface where the sunlight filtered down and made the liquid a bright blue. He had no object, and held his course across the Gulf Stream, letting himself drift with the current. It was well to live and the uselessness of effort was more apparent to him since he had seen the Conch’s work on the cay of the Bahama Bank.

The warm stream was rushing silently northward and the gentle wind caused but little roll to the sea. The loggerhead could lie upon the surface and poke his head out, getting a glimpse of the eternal rim of the circle which had no break. But he cared nothing for land, and the sea was sparkling and blue. The sun overhead sent down hot rays which he felt through his thick armor of shell, but when it grew too warm he cooled himself by sinking a few feet below the surface for several minutes.

Several big barnacles which had attached themselves to his underbody made navigation tiresome, for he had to drag them through the water along with him, but it was too much trouble to scrape them off. He had seen some of his fellows do this on the rocks of the Florida Reef, but it was laborious work and he preferred to take things easy.

He was not an old turtle. Some of his fellows had lived for several centuries and were old before he was born. But he had grown very large since the day he first saw the sun shining over the reef at Roncador. He was but a tiny little fellow then, and his shell was so soft that he felt the sun burn through it. His leather-like skin on his neck was tender and even his bony beak could hardly cut the soft Gulf weed. His flippers were dark and soft and very unlike the huge scaly paddles he now used to scull himself along. He was quite rapid in his movements then, but life upon the tropical sea had gradually had the effect of making him sluggish and philosophical. The sunshine was all he cared for.

He had no trouble getting enough to eat without fighting for it. It seemed a great waste of energy to be eternally chasing other and weaker creatures, and now he had drifted instinctively back to the habits of his forefathers. He took things very coolly. When a savage shark or albicore made a strike at him he did not retaliate by snapping at them with his huge beak which would now slice out a couple of pounds of wood from a floating log and shear through anything living. He simply hauled in his paddles and stump of a tail to the sheltering safety of his armor and the vigorous fish might chop all day at him for all he cared. Their teeth might scratch his shell a little, but the powerful arch of his back made it impossible to crush him and a few scratches upon his plates would not injure him in any way whatever. His head he might draw in until his ugly beak and steady eyes looked out of a sort of cavern. It was trifling with sudden death to come within the radius of a foot of that nose, and the vigorous fish after tormenting him a few minutes generally gave him a shove and left him in disgust.

After they had gone away he would slowly and lazily shove out his paddles again and proceed to scull himself leisurely on his way, his small, dull mind undisturbed at the affront. Such creatures were a nuisance to him, but they were in existence and it was not for him to worry because they were. He would go along in the sunshine and soft air in his easy way, and when these no longer attracted him he would draw in his head, upset himself, then, thrusting it forward again, go sculling for the cool depths where he would spend many hours among the beautiful marine growths fathoms below the surface upon the coral reef, and where the faint light of the sun filtering down made objects dim and uncertain. All was quiet here, and it was the ideal place for repose.

It had taken many years of wandering to get the loggerhead as far north as the Bahama Bank. He had let himself drift along, and here he was at last in the core of the great Florida Stream, going to the northward at a rate which would have astonished him very much had he known its velocity. It is doubtful even if he had known it that he would have made any effort to either stem it or get clear, for he now had the reposeful habit strong in his nature, and he took things as they came. Nothing had as yet caused him the slightest harm, and there was no reason to get excited at anything. Life was pleasant. Effort was useless.

He would float along upon the bright blue surface of the warm stream and poke his head up into the clear sweet air and sunshine. It was enough. The life of albicore or dolphin was not for him. Theirs was all effort, savage strife, and a sudden death. He might lie and ponder at their lot with his head slightly raised and his paddles at rest, but while he might notice them in their desperate play he had a supreme contempt for them all. He had already lived as long as three generations of them, and they had done nothing save fight and slay.

As he floated away he soon found many of his old acquaintances were disappearing. The savage amber-jack and fat sunfish would pass him now and then, but they were always heading south. Only his companions, the flying fish, seemed to care as little as he for their whereabouts. The flying fish were not afraid of him, and they were his friends. He held them in high disdain for their cowardice, for they were always timorous and ready for flight at the first sign of an approaching fish, and it was more contempt than pity he had for those who were caught. The more fortunate he would watch with languid interest.

The lives of all were so full of strife they were eminently unsuccessful from his point of view, and it was only because the little flyers were so pretty when they whirled upward from the blue water and with whirring wings sailed away, that he liked them better than the rest. They always knew where the best Gulf weed was to be had and never disputed his claim to the largest share of any that he found. It was manifest to him that he was a superior being, quite above the rest of his fellows, and with the instinctive feeling common to all animals, he felt that this superiority was a special gift from the great power which he felt ruled his destiny. His dull brain worked slowly. There was no quickening of his sluggish circulation to brighten his wits.

It was quite a fortnight after leaving the Bahama Bank that he began to notice that the water about him was not quite so blue as before and that there was a chill in it which he did not like. It stirred him to action and he began paddling westward after the setting sun. The next day a low shore appeared on the horizon with a bright sand beach shining like a white band between the dark line of hammock and the sparkling sea. He headed for it, thinking to haul out a little while and sun himself upon the hot beach, for the air was much cooler than what he had been accustomed to and the Gulf weed was scarce.

In spite of his unwieldy size the loggerhead was not slow when he once started to use his great paddles. He kept up a steady stroke with all four, his large front ones sculling him along like two oar-blades, bending at each return, and his smaller hind ones shoving him ahead with quick, jerky strokes. His head was thrust forward, and he went along a few feet below the surface like a great oval shadowy shape.

In a little while he drew near the beach. It was a long sand-spit stretching out to sea, upon which the long roll of the Atlantic swell fell with a deep, sullen roar. Beyond the spit was a quiet lagoon, and there was an opening through the line of breakers.

He paddled slowly in, keeping clear of the surf, poking his head up now and then to get his bearings correctly. Upon the inner end of the bar he saw three strange forms. They were absurd-looking creatures with long legs and bills, their heads having light gray penciled feathers giving them the appearance of being bald, as their wings and breasts were dark. Their large eyes were watching the incoming tide as it swirled through the inlet, and when they saw him they set up a vast noise of protest, scolding loudly and threatening him. He felt instinctively that these birds were timid creatures in spite of their fierce threats, and a sudden movement toward them sent them shrieking away in terror. This amused him, and he went in through the smooth water unmolested.

Inside the lagoon was a long stretch of shoal water. Sculling along close to the bottom so that but a few inches were between him and the hard sand, he went swiftly up the sound. A great sand shark lay in front of him, his long body barely moving, the sunlight playing upon his flanks and his dorsal fin just awash. The loggerhead gave him a brush with his paddle as he went past and the great fish shot ahead a full fathom with the touch. He was not used to being brushed against, and it startled him. Then he turned and chopped at the turtle, but his teeth met the armor of shell and several broke with the impact. The loggerhead went steadily on. The water was now getting warmer again and the sunshine made it very bright, for it was shoal and the white sand reflected the rays from the bottom, hurting his eyes with the glare.

He found a sloping beach and hauled lazily out into the heat of a cloudless day.

The quiet of the lagoon was attractive to the turtle. He spent many days drifting about its shallow depths feeding upon the drift-weed and small shell-fish the tide drove into the inlet. He was well content to lie upon the surface and watch the shear-waters go sailing past, their beaks skimming the smooth sea, the tips sometimes cutting like a knife through the yielding medium, ready to snatch up any unwary mullet or small fry that happened upon the surface in their path. Often a great pelican would come in from the sea and fish for a few hours over the schools of mullet or whiting until with heavy pouch and tired pinions he would withdraw to the sand-spit to gorge himself with the tender morsels.

The loggerhead was amused at the harried schools of fish as they scurried in terror for a shelter. He felt his superiority over all the other denizens of the lagoon, and the poor little creatures hurrying in terror from the destroyers filled him as before with disdain.

One day a fishing schooner hove to off the inlet. Boats were lowered and a long seine placed in them. The net was very strong and its leadline so heavy it took eight men to haul it. They headed slowly in for the inlet and lay off the entrance for some time waiting for the tide to favor an attempt to make the opening through the breakers. They headed the long rollers, rowing easily, and one man stood in the bow of the leading boat watching the shoaling water, ready to warn the helmsman in time to prevent getting ashore.

Soon they saw the way clear ahead and the rowers put some strength into their stroke, sending the small craft rapidly in. They went through the entrance safely, although a breaker rolling close to the outer edge of the sand-spit half filled the leading boat. Then they rested on their oars and began to clear the net.

The loggerhead was far away up the lagoon when the fishermen entered. He saw them as they were stretching the seine across the entrance of the inlet and watched them haul it slowly up the slue, driving all the fish before them. The mullet were jumping in terror and the whiting were hurrying for the shoal water half a mile away. The great sand shark who lay off the entrance saw the closing trap in time to make a lunge past the end of the line, splashing the man in the bow with a vigorous slap of his tail as he swung across and clear. He made a chop at the trailing net, but missed it in his hurry. Then he went sullenly to sea.

The fishermen landed on either side of the narrow lagoon and started to walk the net slowly up, gradually closing the space above into smaller and smaller scope. In half an hour they had gone more than halfway, and the frightened schools of fish began to grow more and more restless as they saw the strangers approaching. Some of them tried the meshes of the seine, but they were too small for any save the tiniest mullet to go through, and they fled back again to the shallow water farther up.

The loggerhead was resting upon the surface watching the men. They had not yet noticed him, but he had gone so long without harm from anyone that he anticipated none. He was satisfied that his superiority to all other creatures put him beyond the pale of becoming a victim to anything.

Suddenly a fisherman noticed him and yelled to his companions across the slue, pointing at the bony beak that showed above the surface. His companions were too far away to hear what he said, but their sharp eyes followed his signals and they soon noticed the turtle.

The net was drawing in closer and closer, the water was getting shoaler, and the men were walking the lines ahead more rapidly. The fish imprisoned beyond its scope now saw their danger plainly and they tore the water into foam in their frantic efforts to escape. The loggerhead saw them and watched them lazily, much amused at their struggles. His contempt for them grew so supreme that when they rushed past him in one of their frantic plunges he snapped viciously at a lagging mullet and very nearly cut him in two. Then he sank slowly down to the sandy bottom below, for the hurrying fish annoyed him.

The net was now nearly up to the end of the slue, and a giant leader of the mullet school made a mighty dash for liberty. He tore down the lagoon and rising with a sudden sweep upward, leaped high in the air and plunged over the line of corks which floated the top of the trap.

He went free. Another, encouraged by his example, made the dash also and went over. The rest, seeing the leaders leap to liberty, made a dash in unison and with a mighty rush plunged at the floating line of buoys. Hundreds went over in spite of the fishermen, who manned their boats and rowed along the net, holding it aloft wherever they saw the crowd coming. Some gave out at the jump and drove against the deadly meshes, and others, finding the crowd too close for them, swerved at the line and flowed past in a solid phalanx of shimmering silver to swim back and make a new trial.

The cries of the men and the rush of the passing schools began to make the loggerhead restless. There was something very extraordinary taking place. He was angry at the miserable fish who were so useless and helpless. His contempt finally became so great that he concluded that he would go down to the other end of the slue where the sand shark usually lay waiting for the little fish to come out in deep water. He started to scull himself forward and had just made headway when he suddenly brought up against the net.

The water was less than ten feet deep where he was, and he followed the obstruction upward to the surface, thinking to find it end before he came into view of the men. But the line of buoys held it well up and his head popped out of the water before he realized that he could not pass. A man in a boat made a vicious lunge at him with a boat-hook, but he got out of the way and followed the net along trying to find a way to get through.

The mullet and whiting were now leaping by scores over the corked line. Their active life had made them fleet and strong. They had fought for existence from the beginning, and the trap about them was but another of the many obstacles they must surmount if they would endure. They were terrified, but they acted quickly and sensibly, their fright not causing them to overlook any possible means of escape. They were getting clear in spite of the shouting men who were now hauling line as fast as they could. Several large skates and a couple of flounders who had lived up the slue were vainly trying to burrow under the heavy leadline that swept the bottom. The loggerhead noticed them as he passed, but they paid no heed to him. A troop of crabs were being hustled along the bottom by the weighted line. They were snapping at everything that came in their reach.

The loggerhead began to get anxious to go away. He made a savage lunge at the meshes closing about him and he drove his head through a great rent he made with his beak. His paddles, or flippers, however, caught in the snare and he struggled wildly and with gigantic power to get through. His tremendous struggles soon drew the corked line below the surface and brought the fishermen hurrying in their boats to find out what caused the trouble. They gazed down into the depths and soon made out the giant shape struggling frantically. Seizing the lines of the seine they quickly hauled the loggerhead to the surface, where one of them grasped his hind paddle and held it long enough to get a bowline around it. Then they rowed to the shore, towing him ignominiously behind the craft, while the few remaining mullet, who were too small and weak to make the leap for liberty, crowded swiftly through the gap and headed for the open sea.

Even the skates now made for the opening in the trap. They rose to the surface with difficulty, but managed to get clear. In less than five minutes every living thing in the shape of a fish had escaped.

The fishermen landed their prize and tried to haul him out of the water. The loggerhead objected to this, and he began to haul them bodily into the sea. The water was riled and he appeared monstrous in the foam. They could not tell what kind of creature he was, but it was for them to get him ashore, and six of them hauled on the line while two, wading in, began to pry at him with oars to turn him upon his back. In a little while they had him rolled over and helpless. Then they came close to examine their victim.

“I’d be willing to lose half a ton of fish fer a fine green turtle,” said the leader of the men. “He’s a corker, an’ that’s a fact.”

“Looks to me like he’s nothin’ but one o’ them loggerheads,” said an old fisherman; “if he is, he’s played it on us fine.”

They looked at the markings on his shell and pulled out his flippers. Then the leader mopped his streaming face with a handkerchief. The old fisherman looked up sheepishly and grinned.

“He aint wuth his weight in mud. Turn him lose an’ let him slide,” he said.

A sailor rapped him over the head and spoke feelingly. Then they cut the line adrift and went to gather in their torn net.

The loggerhead lay upon his back and waited. He was annoyed at the disturbance. It was provoking to be turned over by a lot of fishermen.

The mullet had seen him hauled out by the flipper, and he grew angry at the thought. He tried to twist round and get upon his belly, but could not.

All day he lay in the hot sunshine and snapped viciously at the sand-crabs who came to examine him. Then, as the tide raised and floated him, he managed to get again upon his paddles. He was disgusted. Far away down the lagoon a ripple on the water showed the returning mullet. He gazed at them for a moment, then hauled himself clear of the bottom. His ugly beak was stuck far out, and with steady strokes he pointed it for the open sea. He passed the returning fish, and they wondered at him. Then he went through the opening and disappeared into the great ocean to the eastward.

He was a little more than fourteen feet across the tips of his outspread wings, more than two fathoms, and his white breast, full and rounded, was as broad as that of the man who stood at the wheel and watched him go soaring past. The very tips of his huge wings were black as jet, showing in marked contrast to the unbroken whiteness of the rest of his feathers, and the only other dark spot upon his snowy form was his eye. This was as black and shiny as the lanyards in the rigging. It was large and held a steady gaze, fearless yet curious, so that when the man at the wheel looked up the bird tilted his head to one side to get a better view of him. The giant beak, nearly a foot in length and of heavy bone, had a strangely hooked end, which swelled a little in size from the middle portion. It was a serviceable pair of shears which could cut a five-pound fish in two at a bite. The two webbed feet, as large again as those of a swan, were held close in to the short tail feathers so as not to offer resistance to the air, through which the bird went at the speed of an express train. Silent and otherwise motionless, save for that turn of the head, the great creature swept past. Not a movement of leg or pinion, not a feather disturbed in that headlong rush. With the great wings stretched far out and slightly bowed, he held his way and tore past the fast-running ship as though she were at anchor, instead of plowing through the southern ocean at the rate of ten knots an hour with the wind behind her. Then, as she was left far astern, he tilted himself a little, and off into the curve of a tremendous circle he swerved, swinging with the speed of the wind over the rolling wave-tops until he had covered at least three miles upon the arc and was heading swiftly back again to repeat the maneuver.

All the time that large black and shining pair of eyes watched the surface of the sea. Not a morsel of anything went overboard unobserved. From a distance of a mile or more the huge bird would note the smallest bits of food or grease which the cook would toss over the side when cleaning his coppers for a new mess of salt junk. Sailing over the bits of floating stuff he would hover a moment to see if they were really worth tasting. If so, he would soar in smaller and smaller circles until he would breast a sea. Then, dropping his legs and bracing his feet to retard the slowing flight, he would sink into the water and check himself with both feet and wings until his body finally rested gracefully upon surface. Folding his pinions slowly and a little stiffly, he would propel himself like a huge goose toward the floating prize and make a pass at it with his beak. Salt-pork rind, gristle, anything that had grease or taste to it, was chopped by the bony shears and quickly bolted. It mattered little just what it was as long as it had some grease or taste to it. His appetite was not squeamish.

When nothing remained he would slowly and stiffly again stretch out those wings and face to windward. Then he would propel himself along into the breeze until he rose upon a sea. A quick couple of strokes with the pinions and a sudden push with both feet generally lifted the great body clear of the water before it began to sink down the slope of the succeeding sea. After that it was but a detail to rise higher and higher into the clear air without perceptible motion save of rushing ahead and circling in spiral curves, which no mathematician might describe or define as a means of ascending.

The ship was something over six hundred miles off shore. She was heading for the last corner of the world, Cape Horn, to turn it and then go northward up the South Pacific. She would head up the middle of the great ocean and at times she would not be within a thousand miles of any land whatever.

For more than two weeks the albatross had followed in the wake, his tireless pinions showing no signs of weakening by the continuous flight. Steadily night and day he had followed, and the men aboard had watched him with the awe all deep-water men feel for the giant birds, which seem to be able to soar through space for a lifetime without tiring. Sometimes when he came up astern he slackened his pace by some method and remained for a short moment poised a few fathoms above the man at the wheel. Then his steady look as he slanted his head sideways made the man have a queer feeling, as though he were almost in communication with a stranger from the realms of space. When the captain happened on deck he paid considerable attention to the follower, but he never thought to harm him. The Winchester, which he often used to take snap-shots at blackfish, was always laid aside at his approach.

The great bird noted this. He was not afraid of the rifle, for although he saw the effects of the shot, he knew nothing of its power. The man was a creature of the earth like himself, and he had no reason to suspect him of harmful purposes simply on that account. He was interested in him, and a not unfriendly feeling came within his breast.

In the latitude of the “roaring forties” the weather is uncertain. Sometimes it blows high and sometimes low, which latter means it is dead calm for a spell. Under these conditions a sailing ship naturally comes to a sudden stop, and, with clewed-up courses, rolls and switches away often for days without making more than a degree of southing.

It was during one of these calm spells that the captain began to formulate a plan which would bring him in closer contact with the great bird which still soared and circled about the ship. He rigged a trolling line with a bit of wood for a float near the hook. Then he baited it with a piece of salt beef and tossed it over the side.

The ship was barely moving, but still had headway enough to get away from the bait. When it was fifty fathoms astern the captain held the line and waited.

The albatross soon sighted the piece of beef and circled slowly toward it. Then as it floated in clear view he settled upon the surface of the sea and paddled up to it and gave it a chop. He cut away half the beef, but missed the hook, and the captain’s jerk upon the line merely pulled it from him. He made another grab, and as he did so the line tautened and the barb of the hook caught under his beak.

Hand over hand the captain hauled him in. He spread forth his wings and backed water hard with his feet, but the seaman kept a steady strain upon the line and prevented the hook from slipping clear. Soon he was directly under the ship’s counter, and as she squatted down into the hollow of a swell the captain quickly hauled the bird over the rail to the deck.

Inside the poop-rail it was impossible for the albatross to get headway enough to rise into the air, the wind was so unfavorable in the shelter. While he might waddle about upon the white planks it was as impossible for him to get away as though he had been chained by the leg. It was most provoking to be in such an absurd position. The man at the wheel grinned at him, and the mate came up to take a better look at close quarters. He stretched forth his wings and tried to rise by a series of powerful strokes, but it was in vain. He only managed to go plunging into the rail before he got his feet clear of the planks. This made him angry and he snapped at the mate, making a savage chop with his great beak, which came together with a loud clap. But the seaman jumped aside, and the captain admonished him to keep away.