The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries Part 27

Colin didn't know, but he thanked his host heartily, and then turned to the Deputy Commissioner.

"What is it, Colin?" he was asked.

"Please, sir," the boy replied, "you haven't said anything about my chances in the Bureau."

The Fisheries official looked straight at him with a long, level glance.

"We need high-grade, well-trained men," he said; "the more so because there are no really good ichthyological schools. And no matter how well-trained a man may be he's got to have the practical experience and the grit behind it. If you show in this trip that you're made of the right kind of stuff and if your college work is up to standard, I'll promise you a summer job for next year and for each year that you're at college. You'll be advanced just exactly as fast as you deserve, and not a bit faster. If you want to go into the Bureau your record will be watched, and you'll sink or swim by that!"

"Very well, sir," said Colin, a little taken aback by this straight-from-the-shoulder statement. "I'll do my best, anyhow." He shook hands heartily, and thanking his new chief, hurried excitedly to the hotel where his family was staying to tell of his success and of the unexpected addition of the Florida trip.

His father was quite well satisfied that the boy should have so pleasant an initiation into the life he had chosen, and was quite content that this semi-holiday opportunity had arisen instead of hard work in one of the hatchery stations. Major Dare felt that Colin had already had a strenuous summer and that it was advisable for him to do something a little less adventurous before beginning his college work.

The evening that the lad spent with the scientist-artist was a revelation to him, for his host not only knew the life of the bottom of the sea as though he had always lived there, but he was a marvelous designer in gla.s.s, and possessed some of the most exquisite models of fragile sea forms, all of which had been made under his direction.

Several of these were magnified many times and were more beautiful even than any the boy had ever seen pictured.

There were no half-way measures in Colin's enthusiasm, and he begged Mr.

Collier to lend him books, so that during the days that were to elapse before starting on the trip, he could get an idea of the life histories of sea anemones, jellyfish, and the like, with which he would be working. His friend was both amused and pleased by the lad's eagerness.

Mrs. Dare had visited friends in the Bermudas once or twice, so that she was able to give Colin many suggestions which he found went far to increase the pleasure of his stay. A meeting was arranged, and Major Dare liked his son's new friend immensely, quite a pleasant relationship being established between the two men, so that Colin's departure for Bermuda was under the happiest auspices. He soon learned that the museum curator was not only an authority on his own subject of marine invertebrates, but that he was interested to the utmost in all sorts of affairs, and he admitted confidentially to the boy that he was an inveterate baseball fan. Best of all, perhaps, Colin gained from him the feeling that science and scholarship were two windows whereby one might see how much good there is in the world.

"Enthusiasm," Mr. Collier said, "is one of the best forces I know. A boy without enthusiasm is like a firecracker without a fuse. The powder may be there all right, but it will never have a chance to make itself heard."

The lesser-known life of the sea, in which the boy's interest was centered for the especial purposes of this trip, seemed to Colin at first even more interesting than that of fishes and the voyage to Bermuda was practically a continuous revelation of wonders. The scientist realized that he had not only an a.s.sistant, but a disciple, and went to much trouble to teach the lad. This was one of Colin's great characteristics, his interest was always so genuine and so thorough that others would do everything they could to help him.

The Bermuda Islands were sighted for the first time under a cloudy sky, and Colin thought he had never seen a more disappointing sight. Compared to Santa Catalina, the islands lay low and without sharp contrast, no cliffs rising bluff upon the sh.o.r.e, no mountains looming purple in the distance. The land was parched--for it was late in the summer--and the scattered foliage looked small and spindling after the gigantic forests of California. The "beautiful Bermudas" seemed plain and uninviting as the steamer pa.s.sed St. David's Head. Moreover, as they steamed down along the north sh.o.r.e, the same appearance was visible throughout, its low undulating sea-front of black, honeycombed rock lacking character, the rare patches of sandy beach and spa.r.s.e sunburned vegetation seeming bare and dreary.

Reaching Gra.s.sy Bay, however, past the navy yard and rounding Hog-fish Beacon, the sun came out and swiftly the scene became transfigured. As the steamer drew nearer and began to run between the islands in the channel, the undulating sh.o.r.es showed themselves as hills and valleys in miniature. The bare, white spots were revealed as white coral houses set in ma.s.ses of flowers, the foliage--sheltered from the north--gleamed dark and luxuriant, while the shallowing crystal water glinted from the white sand below as though the steamer were sailing through a translucent gem. Before the vessel had pa.s.sed the length of the Great Sound and had warped into Hamilton, Colin had changed his mind, and was willing to admit that, after all, Bermuda might be quite a pretty place.

But he could not have believed the transformation scene through which he seemed to pa.s.s on landing. Freed from the glare of the waterfront of Hamilton and on the road to Fairyland Bay, he seemed to have entered a new world. It was a Paradise of Flowers, even the Golden State could not outdo it. Hedges of scarlet hibiscus flamed ten feet high, cl.u.s.ters of purple bougainvillea poured down from cottage-porches, while oleander in radiant bloom formed a hedge twenty feet high for as much as half a mile at a stretch. At one moment the road would pa.s.s a dense banana plantation with the strange tall poles of the pawpaw trees standing sentinel, the next it would pa.s.s the dark recesses of a mangrove bay, where the sea ebbs and flows amid an impenetrable thicket of interlacing roots. And at frequent intervals a slight rise of ground would show the emerald sea beyond, gleaming as though lit with living light.

"'The land where it is always afternoon,'" quoted Mr. Collier softly, as they drove up to the house where they were to stay, a small hotel overlooking a narrow fiord of rock, into which the translucent water rippled. Beyond, upon the gleaming bay rested three or four tiny islands.

"It's almost the loveliest place I ever saw," said Colin; "but it isn't as grand and wild as Santa Catalina."

"I never want to leave Bermuda," said the other; "every time I visit the islands I decide that some day I must come and live here. And even when I am away, its memories haunt me. Everything seems so much worth while here."

"What's the programme, Mr. Collier?" asked Colin, after lunch, when they were comfortably settled.

"You are at liberty this afternoon," was the reply, "as I have a number of small things to look after, so that if you want to get a glimpse of the islands, you had better make good use of your time. You ride a wheel, of course?"

"Oh, yes."

"Then walk into Hamilton and rent one; bicycling is the only way to see Bermuda properly. And you'd better go to Devil's Hole this afternoon and see the fish there. Try and persuade the old keeper of the place to talk, and if you can get him started, he will tell you a good deal about Bermuda fishes. They're worth knowing about, too!"

Acting on this advice, Colin strolled into the little city and rented a bicycle. The roads, he found, were perfect for wheeling, there being only one hill too steep for riding, but in spite of all that he had heard about the absence of distances, it seemed incredible that an hour's easy wheeling should enable him to cover almost half the entire length of the main island. Everything was in miniature, and having a camera with him, he took snapshots recklessly everywhere, each turn in the road seeming to give a picture more attractive than the last. He was to find, however, that the charm of Bermuda is too subtle for the photographic plate.

On the way to Devil's Hole, taking the south-sh.o.r.e road, Colin had an opportunity of noticing its amazing contrast to the north sh.o.r.e, which had seemed so desolate and uninviting as the steamer came in. The conformation was widely different, marked by higher cliffs, rocks jutting out boldly into the sea, with the waves boiling over them and throwing up the spray, wide stretches of fine white sand, and as far as the eye could see, small circular atolls of coral level with the surface of the water. He paused for a little while at the house where the Irish poet, Thomas Moore, once dwelt while a government employee on the island, and--like every visitor--he sat for a while under the famous Calabash Tree, renowned in verse. Nor did he fail to visit the marvelous stalact.i.te caves of which Bermuda has five beautiful examples, lighted with electricity to display their wonders. The boy was greatly interested in the most recently discovered one of all, where the stalact.i.tes branch like trees in a manner but little understood by geologists. But, greatly though he wished to investigate this problem, Colin's objective point was the Devil's Hole; and fish, not stalact.i.tes, were his first consideration.

Devil's Hole was a strange place. Lying inland, a little distance from Harrington Sound, and with no visible connection with the sea, it seemed a creation of its own. It was a pool, sunk in a bower of trees, almost exactly circular and over sixty feet deep. Silent and reflecting every detail of trees and sky above, the dark water was filled with fishes of many varieties, nearly a thousand fish living near the surface or in its depths. Underground channels connected it with the Sound, that great inland sea of Bermuda, and the water in the pool ebbed and flowed with the tide, changing in level, however, but a couple of inches. A tiny bridge spanned the water.

The old keeper of the place greeted Colin and proceeded to deliver himself of a humorous rigmarole, designed for the benefit of tourists.

It was pure 'nature-faking,' since it ascribed human characteristics to some of the fish in the pool, the various specimens being called the "bride" and "groom" and so forth. The screed was rather wearisome to Colin, but when he tried to interrupt, the old keeper seemed so hurt and so confused that the boy let him go on to the end.

The feeding of the fish was a matter of more interest, and it was striking to observe that the angel-fish and groupers were able to recognize their respective summons to food, for when the keeper tapped one portion of the bridge it gave a sharp cracking sound to which the angel-fish came flocking, while in calling the groupers and other fish, he hit another portion of the bridge, which reverberated in a different tone, and the larger fish dashed through the water to the appointed places. After this performance was over the keeper was willing to talk less idly, and showed a very considerable knowledge of the species found in Bermuda waters.

"I noticed," Colin said, "that you fed the angel-fish with sea-urchin. I don't see how they can eat it with their tiny mouths, I should think the spines would get in the way."

"I crushes the spines before I throws 'em in," the keeper answered; "but they eats 'em in the nateral state. I don't know how they gets at 'em.

They has lots of savvy, sir, angel-fish has, and for a small fish they can 'old their own. Why, even the big groupers lets 'em alone."

"Are the groupers fierce?" the boy asked, with his arms on the rail, looking over at the fish.

"Fierce enough, sir," said the old man. "I was tellin' a party once, just what I was tellin' you a while ago about the fish----"

"Yes," said Colin wearily, realizing that the same nonsense about the bride fish and the bridegroom fish and the "old bachelor" and all the rest of it had probably been given as a dose to every visitor for twenty years back, "and what then?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE POOL WHERE THE DOG WAS DEVOURED.

Angel-fish and groupers in the Devil's Hole, Bermuda. Photographed looking down in the water from the bridge. Note the reflection of the trees on the water.

_Photograph by F. R-W_.]

"There was an officer in the party, sir," the keeper continued, "and when I spoke of the fish as bein' savage 'e laughed and said 'e didn't believe it. 'E said 'e'd swam around among sharks and never got hurt, but I told 'im 'e wouldn't be willin' to take a plunge in the pool."

Colin looked down at the fish.

"They don't look very bad," he said; "but I don't think I'd like to chance it."

"You're right, sir; I wouldn't go in, not for a thousand pound. Well, this officer--'e was a captain, I think--made some remark about it all bein' nonsense, and said that even 'is dog would scare the fish so that they wouldn't as much as come up from the bottom."

"That sounds reasonable enough," said Colin; "a fish wouldn't try to attack a dog."

"That's what 'e said," the keeper continued; "and 'e bet me a 'arf sovereign on it. I didn't want to see the dog 'urt, but a bet's a bet, and there weren't no ladies present, so I took 'im up."

"Well?" queried Colin, as the keeper stopped.

"'E threw the dog in," the keeper answered; "it was a spaniel and quite at 'ome in the water."

"What happened?"

"In about ten seconds the water was just alive with fish, swimmin' round and round, comin' up by the 'undred from the deep water. Then they all turned black, like they do always before they're goin' to feed.

Remember, I showed you that."

"Yes, I know; but go on."

"Then they all at once made a dash for the poor beast. I tried to pull 'im out, but there was a couple of 'undred of 'em there, and 'e 'ad no chance. 'E gave just one yelp and then was pulled under, and the groupers jolly well ate him clear down to the bones. We never saw 'ide nor 'air of 'im agen!"