A Typical Seal Rookery, half abandoned.
A Typical Seal Rookery, half abandoned.
Showing the massing of the harems, the watchful figures of the beach-masters, and the idle bulls in the background.
Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries.
"Row-boat hasn't much chance against a launch, has it?"
"Oh, I see now," Colin said understandingly; "you covered the water with another party."
"In a very swift gasoline launch we have. While you were waking the village, I got a wireless to a revenue cutter. I caught her at less than fifteen miles away, and she's headed here now."
He turned to the Japanese.
"What is your ship? Schooner or steamer?" he asked.
"Schooner," was the reply.
The agent rubbed his hands delightedly.
"It's a clean haul," he said. "Thanks to you, Hank. Principally. To the boy, too! We've caught six men red-handed right on the rookery, with dead seals, most of them females. The launch ought to intercept the boat. There's not wind enough for a schooner to get far away by the time the revenue cutter arrives. Besides, the schooner will be short-handed since we have six of the crew here."
A sudden puff of wind lifted the fog still further and revealed the schooner herself, lying not far from shore. A row-boat was about one hundred and fifty feet from the vessel and the station launch was two hundred feet away, approaching from a different angle, but outspeeding the row-boat.
"A race!" cried Colin.
It was a closer race than at first appeared. Under the strange light of the full moon shining grayly through the silvering mist upon the seals in their countless thousands, the scene seemed most unreal. Before him appeared the principals in this dramatic encounter, revolvers and rifles in the hands of all parties, the Japs being still covered; while beyond, at sea, the two boats cleaving the water, their objective point the shadowy schooner, looking like a phantom ship, made a picture of weird excitement in an unearthly setting. The seconds seemed like hours. The row-boat was nearer the schooner and was traveling fast, but the launch was speeding even more rapidly, throwing up a high wave at the bow. It looked as though both boats would reach the schooner's side at the same instant.
"She'll do it! She'll do it!" the boy exclaimed. "If only an oar would smash!"
The Japanese, though not saying a word, were bending forward eagerly, watching the race with every nerve on the strain.
Colin fairly danced with excitement, nearly bringing down on himself the wrath of a neighboring sea-catch, who was roaring angrily at this intrusion.
"If she only had another couple of horsepower——" he cried.
The Japanese smiled.
A port in the rail of the schooner opened and the muzzle of a small swivel-gun projected, aimed full at the launch. Colin caught his breath.
A puff of smoke followed, and a couple of seconds later the sharp crack of a small gun. A crash and a few sharp explosions were heard from the launch, but, so far as could be seen from the shore, no one was injured. The engine gave a 'chug-chug' or two—then stopped dead.
Colin dropped his arms limply by his side in despair.
The leader of the Japanese took a quick step forward and whispered a word or two to the nearest man, who passed it down the line. The agent strained his ears to hear what was said, but could not distinguish the words.
"What's that you were saying?" he asked in Japanese.
The man replied calmly, and in English.
"We say nothing," he answered blandly, "only that you have made big mistakes. That is not our ship!"
The agent stared at him, but the Japanese smiled affably.
"We are shipwreck on the island," he said. "We not know what place it is, have no food, hungry, kill some seal for food, anybody do that."
At this impudent and barefaced falsehood, the agent was tongue-tied, but he turned to Hank.
"These men say," he said, "that they are shipwrecked sailors and do not belong to that ship. Let's get this thing right. Tell us what you know about it."
Hank straightened up.
"After the boy left me," he said, "I saw it wouldn't do any good to tackle 'em at once, there bein' no way of gettin' at 'em from the shore side. If I let 'em know they were watched, they would be off, sure, an' what I wanted was to find some way to head 'em off. I knew if you came down the beach after 'em they'd have the start, an' you can't always depend on shootin' straight at night in a fog."
"What did you do, then?" asked the agent.
"I just slipped into the water, down by theend o' the causeway," the old whaler said, "an' there were scores o' seals around, so that it didn't matter how much I splashed."
"You must be half a seal yourself," the agent said. "Swimming among rocks in the dark is no joke."
"I had plenty of time, and I can swim a little," the old man modestly admitted. "Wa'al, pretty soon I saw the boat an' I swam under water till I came up right behind it. The Jap what was sittin' in it wasn't expectin' any trouble an' as he was nid-noddin' and half asleep, I put one hand on the stern o' the boat, bringin' it down in the water. With the other hand I grabbed the back of a blouse-thing he was wearin' an' yanked him overboard."
"You didn't drown him, did you, Hank?" asked Colin.
"Not altogether," the old whaler answered. "I held him under, though, until he was good an' full o' water an' had stopped kickin', an' then I climbed into the boat. Next time he came up I grabbed him an' took him aboard. The fog was pretty thick an' none o' the rest of 'em saw what was goin' on. In a minute or two I could see he was beginnin' to come round an' I didn'tquite know what to do. I didn't want to knock him on the head, he hadn't done anythin' to hurt me, an' so I dropped the row-locks overboard, tossed the oars ashore—there they are, lyin' among the seals—an' got ashore myself. As soon as I was on solid ground I untied the painter what held the boat an' set it adrift, givin' it a push off with one o' the oars. The tide's goin' out, so I knew he couldn't get ashore again. I'd hardly got the boat shoved off when he yelled an' the rest of 'em heard it."
"What did they do?"
"Come rushin' for the boats. Most of 'em went over to the south'ard," he pointed down the rookery, "where there was a boat I hadn't seen, but these six tried to rush me. I just had time to shove the boat off, grab my guns, an' face 'em."
"It was a bully hold-up," said Colin delightedly, "one against six."
"Had to," said the sailor, "or the six would have made mincemeat o' the one. Besides, I had to give the tide a chance to get that boat out o' the way. After I held 'em a few minutes I knew it was all right, because they had no boat, their own bein' adrift without oars."
"Big lie," said the Japanese leader placidly, "we shipwreck sailors, nothing to do with that ship at all. This man tell story about boat—we not know anything of that boat. Our boat sunk on rocks, away over there!"
He pointed to the other side of the island.
"But you were killing seals!" protested the agent.
"Yes," said the Japanese, "we think islands have not any person on. Need food, we kill. Of course."
"Clever," said the agent, turning to Hank. "This isn't as simple as it looks. We have no direct evidence that these men belonged to that schooner."
"But we know they did!" said the whaler emphatically.
"Of course," agreed the agent. "But we can't prove it. Law demands proof. If we only had that boat, with the schooner's name on, it would serve."
Suddenly there came a hail from the crippled launch which was being brought in under oars.
"Mr. Nagge there?"
"Yes, Svenson," was the reply, "what is it?"
"They smashed our engine all to bits," answered the engineer of the boat, "but we've just picked up another boat, empty."
"That's the boat," said the agent with satisfaction in his voice. "Now we've got them!"
A smile, a very faint smile, crossed the features of the Japanese leader.
"What's the name on the stern of the boat?" the agent called.
There was a moment's pause, then came the answer in tones of deep disgust:
"The name's been painted out!"
The agent looked round despairingly and caught Colin's look of sympathy.
"The slippery Oriental again!" the boy said.
"Not quite slippery enough this time, though," said Hank in a voice which betrayed a discovery.
"What do you mean?" asked the agent.
"Uncle Sam's gettin' into the game," he answered, pointing out to sea.
"The revenue cutter?"
"Hm, hm," grunted the whaler in assent, "I reckon I can see her lights."
No one else could see anything in the fog anddarkness, but a minute or two later there came a flash, followed by a dull "boom."
Hank turned to the Japanese leader.
"Pity to spoil that yarn o' yours," he said, "but your ship can't run away from quick-firin' guns without a wind."
There was great excitement in the village the next day when the revenue cutter brought in the Japanese raiding schooner and her crew. The boat that had successfully reached the ship had already begun to load her quota of sealskins, and the men had not thrown them overboard, believing that they could get away. Consequently, with the evidence of the raid ashore and with the seals in the boat belonging to the schooner from which witnesses had seen the crew go on board, the case was complete.
"What are you going to do with the prisoners?" asked Colin. "Are you going to put them on trial here?"
"Not here," the agent replied. "The Federal Courts look after that."
"But I thought you were a judge," the boy protested. "Who administers justice on the islands?"
"The chief agent," was the reply. "He is amagistrate. All the natives are employees of the Fisheries Bureau. He has a lot of authority over them. Obviously! But any really grave case is tried at Valdez, because that's the nearest Federal court from here. Sealing questions, too, are so confused with international issues that we don't undertake to decide them."
"And what will happen to the schooner?"
"A prize crew will be put aboard. Take her to Unalaska. The revenue cutter will pick them up afterwards. Probably start for Valdez without delay. Captain Murchison said this morning that he wanted to go along."
"I wonder if I'll have to go?" said Colin. "I'm sure I don't want to, at least, not yet. There's ever so much more that I want to find out about seals, and I've hardly started. If I'm ever lucky enough to get into the Bureau of Fisheries, I hope I shall have a chance to get something to do on this fur seal service."
"Fur seal's very important. But only a small part of the Bureau of Fisheries," the agent said, and outlined to Colin the general workings of the Bureau, in which he showed the practical value of the work.
"I know. I want to join the Bureau," the boypersisted, "not only because I think there's more fun in it than in anything else, but because I like everything about it."
"What do your folks say about the plan?" the Fisheries agent queried.
"They know I want it," the lad replied, "but I never felt that I knew enough about the Bureau to say that I didn't care to do anything else. Father's always wanted me to take up lumbering or forestry or sawmills or something to do with timber. He's quite a big lumberman, you know. But, some way, that never appealed to me."
"Your father ought to know," the other said. "Obviously! And if he owns timber lands, I think it's up to you to be a help. Lots of interesting angles to the lumber business. And if the timber lands are going to descend to you, you'll have to look after them, anyway."
"But they won't," objected Colin; "that's just it. In about ten years that timber will be all cut off. I'm pretty sure Father will let me join the Bureau," the boy continued, "because he's wild about fishing himself. Why, just now, he's down at Santa Catalina, angling for big game."
"Some difference between the Fisheries Bureau and angling for sport," the agent warned him. "I've been in the business all my life. But I've never even learned to cast a fly! It's a serious business, and down in Washington you'll find that the value of the work to the people of the United States is the chief aim of the Bureau."
"It may be serious, but I should think that there is always something new. And, anyway," Colin said enthusiastically, "fishes are ever so much more interesting than animals. There are such heaps of different kinds, too!"
"The interest in work depends on how you look at it," soberly responded the agent. "Obviously! But don't think the Bureau is experimenting with every kind of fish in the ocean. There are only a few food fishes or forms with commercial value that are exploited at all."
"But you were describing to me, only yesterday, the way they handle millions of baby fishes annually. I've just got to get into the Bureau."
"Go ahead, then. I don't doubt we'll be glad to have you. I've done my best to show you what you'll have to face," the official declared, "and if you're still eager for it, why, go in and win. There's always a place somewhere for the chap who is really anxious to work."
At supper that day, the decision was announced that the revenue cutter would start for Valdez next morning, and Colin had to scramble around in a hurry to take a last look at the seals, to get a small crate made for the blue fox pup, which he was going to send home for his younger brother to look after, and to put into a small trunk he had got from one of the villagers the few things he had saved from the wreck and had been able to buy in the village.
The trip down to the Aleutian Islands and through its straits was a delight to Colin, and he became quite excited when he learned that the second lieutenant had for years been attached to a revenue cutter which had a wharf at the Fisheries Bureau station at Woods Hole, Mass. This officer, who had a brother in the Bureau, was only too glad to talk to the boy about the service, and Colin monopolized his spare time on the journey. And when, one day, his friend depicted the immensity of the great salmon drives of the Alaskan rivers, the lad grew so excited that the lieutenant laughingly told him he expected some fine morning to find that he had jumped overboard and had started swimming for the Ugashik River or some other of the famous salmon streams of Alaska.
Native Salmon Trap on an Alaskan River.
Native Salmon Trap on an Alaskan River.
Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries.
Modern Salmon Trap on an Alaskan River.
Modern Salmon Trap on an Alaskan River.
Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries.
Shortly before they arrived at Valdez, the lieutenant of the cutter called the boy aside.
"Colin," he said, "didn't you tell me the other day that you were going down to Santa Catalina?"
"Yes, sir," the boy answered. "Father's down there now, and I want to ask him if he won't let me go and join the Bureau of Fisheries."
"Well," the officer replied, "before you do that, I think you ought to get some idea about the sort of work there is to do. It happens that one of my brother's friends is on the Columbia River just now, making some kind of experiment on salmon. He has a cottage not far from one of the state hatcheries, and if you like, I'll give you a letter to him. If you are really determined to enter the Bureau, you might stop on your way to Santa Catalina and see the work from another point of view."
"I'd like to ever so much," said Colin, "but I couldn't very well go uninvited."
"He'll be only too pleased to see you," was the reply; "he's a Westerner like myself, and will enjoy putting you up for a day or two."
"It's right in my way, too," remarked Colin, yielding to his desire to go.
"Quite a few of the steamers for 'Frisco stop at Astoria, at the mouth of the Columbia River," the lieutenant suggested, "and the professor's cottage is not more than half an hour from there, near the state fish-hatching station at Chinook, Wash."
"Just across the river, then?"
"Exactly. The way I look at it, you're not at all likely to have anything to do with fur seal if you go into the Bureau, certainly not for a good many years. So you can't judge the Fisheries' scope from that, and you ought to see the work that will probably fall to your lot."
"Very well, sir," said the boy, "I'll go gladly, and thank you ever so much."
"I'll drop a note to Professor Todd, then," the lieutenant said, nodding as he turned away, "and as we may be delayed a few days in Valdez, the letter will reach him before you will."
On their arrival at the Alaskan town, Colin learned that some time would elapse before the trial of the Japanese prisoners, as the court would not be in session until later in the summer, and he was told that when his deposition had been taken, there would be no need to keep him as a witness. Accordingly, after the boy had related the storyof the discovery and of his entire connection with the affair, he was told that he might leave.
As the revenue officer had expected, within a week a steamer left Valdez for San Francisco, calling at Astoria on the way, and Colin took passage aboard. Aside from meeting on board an old shell collector, who taught him a great deal about the principal valuable sea shells of the world, the voyage was without incident, and he arrived in Astoria in time to proceed the same afternoon to the cottage of the professor, where he was to stay that night, having found a letter of welcome awaiting him in Astoria.
Reaching the house he presented his letter of introduction, and was cordially greeted. Finding that the boy was really interested, his host took him to a tiny laboratory of his own, where he was experimenting on the various diseases of the salmon and the trout.
This gave Colin an entirely new outlook on the Fisheries' activities.
"I never thought of fishes being sick before!" he exclaimed. "Are there fish-doctors in the Bureau?"
"There's a large division of the service given to that very work," the professor replied, "onlythere are so many millions of fish that we do not try to cure the individual, but only endeavor to prevent the disease. You know what the work of a veterinary is?"
"Of course," the boy responded.
"And you know that the United States Government has an inspector at every place where cattle and sheep and pigs are slaughtered to see that no diseased animals are sold?"
"Yes," the boy answered, "I have heard of that, too."
"Since there is almost as much fish eaten in this country as there is meat," the professor continued, "Uncle Sam sees to it that no diseased fish are sold for food."
"I don't quite see how," the boy responded; "there can't be an inspector at every place where they catch fish."
"Certainly not, but as long as there is no disease among fish, there can be no diseased fish. We try to prevent the diseases. Now here, for example," he continued, "are a lot of fish that have a kind of malign growth. It comes very frequently among the trout and salmon that are artificially raised, and sometimes we find it among fish that have been reared in a state of nature, andI have been working for some time on this and I hope this year—or at all events by next season—to be able to show the cause of the disease. That is really my problem, Colin, but the details of it are too complicated to explain easily. But you have come at a particularly good time," he continued, "because I have been wanting to do an experiment which I thought might interest you, and I waited until you came. If you like, we'll go out to-morrow."
"I should, ever so much," Colin exclaimed. "What's the experiment?"
"When the salmon come in from the sea," the professor began, "there is a great deal of hesitation among them sometimes before they go up the river to spawn, and we want to find out whether they go back to the sea again, whether they swim directly up the stream, or whether they remain in the brackish water at the mouth of the river."
"If you don't mind my saying so, what is the use of knowing?" asked Colin. "I mean, what does it matter as long as the salmon spawns?"
"The salmon is one of the most important food fishes of the country," the professor said rebukingly, "and it is as important for us to knowall about its habits as it is to know about the way a grain of wheat grows."
"I hadn't thought of that," Colin said, a little shamefacedly. "I suppose everything really is important, no matter how small."
The professor smiled at him.
"If you have much to do with studying fish," he said, "or, indeed, with any kind of science, you will find out it is always the little things that tell the story. Take the grain of wheat again. If one kind of wheat ripens two days earlier on an average than another kind, you might think that so small a difference wouldn't be of great importance, but those two days might—and often do—make the difference between a good crop and one which is frost-bitten and spoiled."
"That's a lot easier to see," agreed the boy. "But, sir," he objected, "you can pick out one little bit of a field and work on that, and it will 'stay put.' Fishes wander all over the place."
"We want them to do so, my boy," was the reply.
"How can you work on separate fish? One looks so like another!"
"And for that very reason we're going to tag them."
"Tag them?"
"With a little aluminum button fastened to their tail, just as bad youngsters fasten a tin can to a dog's tail. Every tag has a number, and we use aluminum because it corrodes rapidly in salt water."
"Then I should think," said Colin, "that was the very reason why you shouldn't use it."
"Why not?" asked the professor mildly. "We know that the salmon are not going to stay in the salt water, because they are going up the river to spawn. If, therefore, we catch a fish in the nets higher up stream, with the tag bright and shining, we know that it hasn't been in salt water at all; if dull and just a little worn away, that the fish with that tag has been staying in the brackish water near the mouth of the river; but if it is deeply corroded, that the fish returned to sea for a time. As you see, a good deal of information is gathered that way. But in the morning you will have a chance to see how it is done, and then the results—when they are published—will seem more interesting."
"Have you been associated with the Bureau of Fisheries, Professor Podd?" Colin asked.
"Not directly," the other replied. "I shouldhave enjoyed it, and it seems to me a work of the first importance, but every man is apt to think that about his own work, or work that is like his own. But I can tell you what decided me, nearly twenty years ago, to give all my spare time to the fishery question."
"What was that?" asked Colin.
"It was a phrase in a lecture that Dr. Baird, the founder of fish culture in America, was giving about the need of the work. He pointed out that there was more actual life in a cubic foot of water than in a cubic foot of land, and closed by saying, 'The work of conserving the Fisheries of the United States will not be finished until every acre of water is farmed as carefully as every acre or land.'"
"I never quite thought of it as farming," said the boy.
"Nor had I, before that time," the professor said. "But ever since then I have seen that we of the present time are the great pioneers, the discoverers, the explorers of this new world. Instead of blazing our trail through a wilderness of trees we dredge our way through a wilderness of waters; instead of a stockade around a blockhouse to protect us against wild beasts and wilderIndian foes, we have but a thin plank between us and destruction; instead of a few wolves and mountain-lions to prey upon the few head of stock we might raise, we have thousands of millions of fierce, finny pirates with which to do battle, and we work against odds the old pioneers could not even have estimated!"
"That's great!" cried Colin, his eyes shining.
"The surface of the sea," the professor continued, warming to his subject, "reveals no more of its mystery than the smoke cloud above the city tells the story of the wild race of life in its thronging streets, or than the waving tips of a forest of mighty trees reveal the myriad forms below. Each current of the ocean is an empire of its own with its tribes endlessly at war; the serried hosts of voracious fish prey on those about them, fishes of medium depth do perpetual war upon the surface fish, and some of these are forced into the air to fly like birds away from the Nemesis below."
"And much is still unknown, isn't it?"
"We are discovering a new world!" was the reply. "No one for a moment can deny the greatness of the finding of America, and Columbus andthe other early navigators are sure of immortal fame, but even so, what was the New World they found to the illimitable areas of unknown life, in the bottom of the sea, that have been made known to man. Think of the wonder that has been revealed by theChallengerand other ships that have explored the ocean beds!"
"There is still a great deal unknown, isn't there?"
"Still an unknown universe! Lurking in the utter darkness of the scarce-fathomed deeps of the ocean, what Kraken may not lie, coil on coil; what strange black, slimy, large-eyed forms do their stealthy hunting in perpetual night by the light of phosphorescent lamps they bear upon their bodies? Many of these there are, every year teaches of new species. The land—oh! the land is all well known, even the Arctic and Antarctic regions no longer hide their secrets, but the ocean is inscrutable. Smiling or in anger, she baffles us and her inmost shrines are still inviolate."
The professor checked himself suddenly, as though conscious of having been carried away by enthusiasm.
"We'll try and get at some of the secrets to-morrow," he said, "but it will mean early rising, as the trap is to be hauled at slack water."
Acting on the hint, Colin bade his host good-night, but his sleep was fitful and restless. The sudden passionate speech of the grave scholar had been a revelation to the boy, and whereas he had felt a desire for the Fisheries Bureau before, he knew now that it had been largely with the sense of novelty and adventure. But the professor's words had given him a new light, and he saw what an ideal might be. He felt like a knight of the olden time, who, watching his armor the vigil before the conferring of knighthood, had been granted a vision of all his service might mean. He knew that night that the question he was to ask his father could have but the one answer, that the great decision of his life was made, his work was cut out to do.
Shortly after daybreak the next morning, Colin was called and he dressed hurriedly. After a hearty breakfast in which steel-head trout figured largely, he went down to the pier on the water and was not sorry to have the chance of showing his host that he was a good canoeist.
"How large is the work of the Bureau now, Professor?" asked Colin, as the light craft shotdown the magnificent stretches of the Columbia River.
"Over three and a half billion eggs and small fish were distributed last year, if I remember rightly," was the reply. "Of course, a large proportion of these fish did not reach maturity, but perhaps half a billion did so, and half a billion fish is an immense contribution to the food supply of the world."
"But aren't there always lots of fish in the sea?" asked Colin. "When you come to compare land with water it always looks as though there must be so many that the number we catch wouldn't make any sort of impression on them."
"Think a bit," said the professor. "You've just come down from the Pribilof Islands. How did you find matters up there? Had the catching of seals been harmful, or were there so many seals still in the sea that it didn't matter what line of hunting went on?"
"Of course, pelagic sealing had nearly killed off the entire species," said Colin, "but, somehow, fish seem different. Oh, yes, I know why. Seals only have one pup at a time and fishes have thousands of eggs."
"That's a very good reply," the professoragreed, "but why was it that pelagic sealing was so bad? Was it done all the year round?"
Millions of these Hatched Yearly.
Millions of these Hatched Yearly.
Brook Trout just hatching, showing fry with egg-sacs still attached.
Courtesy of the National Geographic Magazine.
"No," said Colin, "principally when the females were coming to the spawning ground."
"And the Pribilof Islands are only a small place. Especially when compared to the range of oceans the seal cover during the rest of the year?"
"Very small."
"Then," said the other, "it is easy to see that the respective size of land and water has very little to do with the general fishery question. But if a seal or a fish must come to the land or to narrow rivers to spawn, it follows that man possesses the power to determine whether spawning shall continue or not, doesn't it?"
"Yes," agreed Colin, "I suppose it does."
"And if you protect the seals, the herd will increase."
"It ought to."
"Very good. That is just the work we are doing here. The salmon come into fresh water to spawn—just like shad and a number of other species of fish—and when you kill a salmon just about to ascend the river, you destroy at the same time the thousands of eggs she bears."
"But I thought salmon were always caught running up a stream?" said Colin in surprise.
"They are," was the quick response; "by far the larger number are caught that way, and as long as a certain proportion go up the stream there's no great harm done. But if every one of the salmon is caught, as happens when nets are put all the way across a stream, there will be none to spawn, and in a few years there will be no fish in that river."
"Do the fish always return, when grown up, to the river in which they spawned?"
"That is disputed. But the large proportion of such fish do not travel very far from the mouth of the river in which they were born and the natural impulse for fresh water at spawning-time leads them naturally to the nearest stream. So, it is imperative that some fish be allowed to go up-stream, or in other words, that salmon-catchers allow a certain proportion to escape their wheels and nets."
"They ought to be willing enough to do that, I should think," said Colin; "it's for their own good in the long run."
"A lot of them want quick profits now, without any regard for the future," his host saidscornfully. "Of course, there are laws for fishery regulation in many of the States, but inspectors have their hands full in preventing violations. In Alaska, which is a territory still, that supervision is done by the government through the Bureau of Fisheries."
"It must be a little aggravating to the salmon men, just the same," said Colin thoughtfully, "when they are trying to keep their canning factories going full blast, to have to allow half the catch to go on up the stream. But," he continued, "why don't they catch the salmon coming down the stream again? I should think that would settle the whole question."
"It would," said the professor, "if they came down! But they don't. Every single salmon, male and female, that goes up the river in the spawning season dies up there. None of them ever comes down alive."
"I don't think they did that way in Newfoundland!" ejaculated Colin in surprise. "When I was staying with my uncle there I saw lots of salmon, and it seemed to me that they went down the river again."
"They did," was the reply. "The Atlantic or true salmon does not die after spawning, but nota single fish of any one of the five different kinds of Pacific salmon ever spawns twice. Every yard of the shores of the upper reaches of Pacific coast rivers is covered almost solidly with dead salmon from September to December!"
"How awful!"
"It makes some places uninhabitable," the professor replied. "Where a market is near enough, the dead fish are collected and sold for fertilizer."
"Is it the fresh water that kills them?"
"No," was the reply; "that is one of the most curious features of the life-history of the Pacific salmon. As soon as the fish are nearly ready for spawning, all their digestive parts shrivel up, so that they can't eat. In the male salmon, too, the end of the upper lip turns into a sort of hook so that the fish can't even open his mouth wide enough to eat anything. Then in the fresh water their scales turn slimy and, as they often get injured trying to leap falls and rapids, all sorts of skin diseases attack them. A salmon in the upper reaches of the Columbia headwaters is a pitiful wreck of the magnificent fish that entered it to spawn."
"Do they go far?"
"As much as a thousand miles," was the reply."The quinnat and blue back—or the spring and the sockeye, as they are generally known, take the long journeys, but the silver or coho, and the humpback and dog salmon keep to the small streams near the sea. The young fry cannot live in salt water and the instinct of the salmon is to swim up-stream as far as possible, no matter what obstacle is in the way. When they have gone to the very limit, the salmon make pits and holes in the gravel and sand at the bottom of the stream for nests, and drop the eggs in these. The male salmon immediately afterwards floats over the nests and does his share in making sure that the eggs will hatch out."
"How big are the salmon?" asked the boy.
"You'll have a chance to see," the professor answered, as he swung the canoe in to the wharf, at the state hatchery station, "because we're going to measure the ones we tag this morning."
The foreman and one of the men of the station were waiting for them in a good-sized motor boat, towing behind which was a curious-looking affair composed of two small barrels fastened together by long slats.
"Don't you know what that is?" queried the professor, noting Colin's puzzled look.
"No, sir."
"That's a live car. The barrels at each end have enough water in them to sink them to a certain depth. Then the slats, as you see, are nailed two-thirds of the way around the barrels, leaving just enough space for the water to flow in and out freely. They put the fish in that to tow them home alive. The slats are better than netting because sometimes the fishes catch their scales in the meshes and get hurt."
The run to the fish-trap was made in a few minutes, and the boat went inside to the 'pound,' the net was partly hauled up, and the professor took out his punch and the buttons. Colin had put on a pair of rubber boots and oilskin trousers, as had all the rest of the party, and he was ready for anything that came along.
"Do you want my slicker?" the professor asked him. "You're apt to get splashed."
"I don't mind a bit, thanks," answered the boy, rolling up his sleeves; "a little shower-bath will feel good on a hot day like this!"
"All right, then," the leader of the party declared, "we'll give you a chance to make yourself useful. Here you are!"
Colin took the large flat-bottomed net and awaited further instructions.
"Catch one of the salmon," he was told; "never mind the rest of the fish. And," he was warned, "don't bring the net clear out of the water."
"Very well, sir," the boy replied, then his curiosity getting the better of him, he asked, "Why not?"
"Because if you do, the salmon will struggle against the meshes of the net, bruise himself, and probably scrape off some scales. I told you how easy it is for a fish to get diseased if he loses any of his scales. If you keep the net about four inches below the water, the fish has the resistance of the water to fight against, and it will tire him out quickly without doing any harm."
"All right," Colin answered, and commenced scooping for the fish. In a minute or two he had a large twenty-pounder in the net and he raised it until the bottom was a little below the water, as he had been told.
"You're right about getting wet!" cried Colin, laughing, as the salmon began to whirl and plunge and dance in the net, sending a shower of water all over him and nearly blinding him by the forcewith which the drops of water struck as they were splashed upwards by the powerful strokes of the fish's tail.
The instant the salmon stopped struggling, the hatchery boatman seized it by the tail with a strong grip, swung it clear out of the net and over his left arm, laying it immediately on the measuring platform. This consisted merely of a wide board with an upright at one end, a rule giving both metrical and standard measures being nailed to the side of the board. Instantly the measurer called out the length and the professor noted it down, the hatchery foreman—famous for his expertness in judging the weight of a fish—calling out the weight to be recorded. Laying down his pencil, the professor then, with a small punch, made a tiny hole in the tail-fin of the salmon, the fish having been thrown over the captor's left arm again, slipped an aluminum button through the hole, and riveted it securely. The entire process took less than a minute and a half, and by the time the salmon had been released and tossed into the water again, Colin was ready with another fish.
"I don't see why the fish don't die as soon as they come out of the water!" exclaimed Colin.
"For nearly a minute, some fish breathe better out of the water than in it," the professor answered, "but after that the gills stick together and the fish strangles. Two or even three minutes will not injure salmon, and some fish will recover if they are out of water for hours. Indeed, there are some fish that live out of water most of the time."
"Live out of water?" the boy said in surprise.
"Certainly. Some kinds of fish, at least, can't stay in the water very long, but remain perched up on the rocks."
"Perching like birds?" Colin said incredulously.
"I know that sounds a little improbable, but it's true, just the same," the professor said, smiling. "This is a Fisheries story, not a 'fish story.' There's a difference. They come from Samoa and belong to the skippy family. Most of them live on the rocks, and they jump from rock to rock instead of swimming. Some of them even are vegetarians—which is rare among fish—and their gills are smaller and stouter. Plenty of them are only in the water for a little while at high tide, living in the moist seaweed until the tide rises again."
Colin was silenced, and he went on vigorously dipping up salmon.
"How many fish are you going to tag?" the boy asked, when a couple of hours had passed by.
"Sixty," the professor answered, "and we must be nearly through, for I have only a few buttons left."
Secretly the boy was much relieved, for his back was tired from stooping and netting heavy fish for two hours, but he would have worked to utter exhaustion rather than complain. However, within another quarter of an hour, the last fish was dropped over the side and the party was on its return journey.
"Why don't you stop and see the hatchery?" suggested the professor, in return to a host of questions put to him by the boy concerning salmon culture.
"I'd like to, ever so much, if I might," was the answer, and Colin looked up at the foreman.
"Come right along," was the latter's immediate response. "It isn't much of a place to look at, but you can see whatever there is to see."
The hatchery itself was simple and bare, as the foreman had suggested, consisting merely of a row of boxes arranged in such a way that waterflowed through them constantly, bringing a steady supply of fresh water without carrying away the light eggs and tiny fry. Colin was thoroughly interested, and followed the foreman from place to place, eagerly watching the processes of hatching the fish and asking unending questions.