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 MACKBREL TROLLING. 184 was only just sufficient time for the captain to give the man att the heim a sign or they would have gone clean over him. They hove to, threw him a rope, and hauled him up." In the afternoon the wind fell and wc began fishing again. Wc caught a few fish, whiling away the time with all sorts of stories. " Ah, well, well," said Rasmus, and shook his head as he lighted a fresh pipe, " there is something brewing over there to the south ! The wind wc had was only an early puff! You'll see wc shall have our full allowance ! Even the fish know it ; they don't rise to the bait any more and the birds are scared—hear how they wheeze and cry as they seek the land. There will be the right sort of weather for witches and such-like to-night. But see! if he doesn't tumble himself so close to us that I might " spit upon him he was going to say, but at that moment I fired —I had put up my gun and aimed at a porpoise which was gambolling about in the sea close to us. Being hit, he lashed the water so violently with his tail that he sent a shower of spray over us as high as the mast of our boat, and made us all wet through. " That witch will not send us any bad weather, anyhow ! " I said, when I saw the water coloured red from his blood. Soon after he appeared again, blowing very hard, but the next moment he turned over ; Rasmus was not slow in putting the boat-hook in him and hauling him into the boat with my assistance. He was much pleased at the prospect of the oil he would get from him, turned the heavy creature from one side to the other, fondled him like a baby, and assured me he was a " stunning fat sea-cub," which should be welcomed at home for boot-grease and lamp-oil. While wc thus were joking about trolls and witches who cause gales and bad weather, a very remarkable witch-story came to my mmd, which I believed I had heard Rasmus tell me in my childhood, but my recollection of it was so faint, that I was not sure whether I had heard it or dreamt it. I asked Rasmus if he had not told me such a story about three witches. Ah, that one ! " he answered, and laughed ; " thafs one of the sort wc call skipper's yarns nowadays, but in the olden days they believed them like gospel. Old grandfather told it me when I was