Page:A Little Country Girl - Coolidge (1887).djvu/151

 steamer. The "Cornelia" followed; and the Captain with a twist of the tiller threw her into the wind just beyond the great net, which by that time was being rapidly hauled in.

It was a wonderful thing to see,—the heavy mass of floundering fishes pouring over into the steamer's hold. Thousands and thousands of quivering silvery shapes of all kinds, from the fat, oily-bodied menhaden, to weird horned monsters with gaping mouths, and strange, half-translucent blocks like jelly, which seemed to have no mouths at all. Large and small, pinky white, black, blue,—in they poured. Now and then some fish more lucky than his fellows would splash over the side of the net and escape to liberty and the deep sea; now and then a fisherman with a sudden dash of his hand would single out a specimen choicer than the rest, a blue-fish, a chicken cod, or a sea-bass.

The little company in the sail-boat shared all the excitement of the catch. The young men left their flirtations for the boat's side, where they could get a better view. A great