CHAPTER XXI.

Red Admiral Butterfly.

The afternoon was exceedingly hot, and the sun blazed from a cloudless sky, and birds'-nesting and butterfly-hunting was tiring work. The scent of the hay made the air fragrant, and the sharp whisk of the scythes of the mowers in those meadows which were not yet cut, was the only sound which disturbed the evening stillness.

Crossing one of the commons which are to be met with everywhere in the enclosed districts of Norfolk, they saw a little brown bird fly out of a hole in a low hedge bank. Very cleverly hidden there, in a hole covered with a clump of primrose flowers, was a winchat's nest. It contained five blue eggs spotted with rusty red at the large end. Taking two of these they went on their way, and presently entered a thick and tangled wood, where the underwood was so close that they could with difficulty make their way through it. The brambles and briars were breast high, and the ground was ankle deep inhalf rotten leaves of the previous year. In a bush through which Jimmy was trying to force his way he saw a nest, which he took to be a thrush's or blackbird's. He put in his hand just to see if there were any eggs in, and to his surprise he felt something cold and slimy. Before he could withdraw his hand he felt a sharp blow and a prick on his finger, and he drew back with a cry of dismay as he saw a viper uncoiling itself from the nest and wriggle down to the ground, where it was soon lost in the thick vegetation. Frank and Dick hurried up to him, and he held out his finger, in which were two small blue punctures.

Winchat and Egg.

"An adder has bitten me," he said, with blanched cheeks.

Frank at once whipped out his penknife, and seizing Jimmy's hand, he made a deep cross cut over the bites, and as the blood began to flow, he put the finger to his mouth and tried to suck the poison out with all the force of his strong young lungs, only just waiting to say to Dick—

"Go at once to the village and get a bottle of olive-oil at the chemist's, and come back to the cottage at the edge of the wood. Be as quick as you can."

Dick burst out of the wood and set off for the village, which was a mile away as the crow flies. As straight as an arrow and as fleet as a deer, Dick sped on his friendly errand, and in six minutes he had reached the chemist's. The chemist gave him what he asked for, saying, that if rubbed in before the fire it was the best remedy.

"Are snake-bites fatal?" said Dick.

"No, sir, not in England, unless the person bitten is very delicate; but they are very painful, and I should advise you to be quick back."

Viper.

Dick was off again at the top of his speed, and reached the cottage a quarter of an hour after he had left Frank and Jimmy.

"Well done, Dick!" said Frank; "but go outside and face the wind a bit. You are dead beat."

Jimmy was pale, but collected. His arm had swelled up to a great size already, and was very painful. Frank held his hand as near the fire as he could bear it, and rubbed the olive-oil in for half an hour; and then Dick and Frank walked himhome between them. Mrs. Brett was naturally much alarmed, but Frank soothed her fears, and Jimmy was put to bed.

"Thank you, Frank," he said, "I am awfully much obliged to you."

"Then prove it by going quietly to sleep if you can. You will be all right in a day or two."

"How did you know about the olive-oil being a cure, Frank?"

"I was reading about it not a week ago, and as we were walking along this afternoon I was, strange to say, thinking about it, and imagining that I was bitten and curing myself, like one does make up pictures and rehearse scenes to oneself, when one has nothing better to do. It was a very strange coincidence."1

1 The best remedy for viper-bite is the injection of ammonia into the veins.

Common Ringed Snake.

Frank went home with Dick, and they took a short cut through the copse. Dick was looking about him very suspiciously, seeing the coils of an adder in every twisted root. Suddenly his eye caught sight of a snake lying across the path.

"There is another viper!" he exclaimed.

"No, it is only a snake," said Frank, coolly stooping down and taking the snake in his hand, while it coiled about his arm. Dick looked horrified.

"Won't it bite?" he said.

"No, Dick. Don't you know the difference between a snake and a viper? Then I'll tell you. The viper is ash-brown in colour. Its neck is narrower and its head broader in proportion. The viper has a couple of fangs, or long hollow teeth, which lie flat along the back of its mouth, but when it is angry it opens its mouth, erects its teeth and strikes with them. They are hollow, and down through the tubes the poison comes from a bag at their roots. The snake has no such teeth, and it is harmless, for it cannot sting, as many country people think it can, with its long forked tongue which it is now shooting out. Then the snake lays eggs. I dare say if we were to dig in the manure-heaps in the farm-yard, we should find a lot of white eggs covered with a tough, soft skin and joined together with a sort of glue. The viper's eggs are hatched inside it, and the young ones are born alive."

"I have read that the young ones of the viper will run down their parent's throat when alarmed for safety. Is that true?"

"It seems so strange that I can scarcely think it to be true, but so many respectable people say they have seen it that one does not like to say that it is not so; and it is, of course, difficult to prove a negative. I suppose the question will be settled some day."

The snake Frank held in his hand was a large and handsome one. It was olive-grey in colour, with rows of black spots on its back and sides, and greenish-yellow beneath, tinged with black. The snake changes its skin just like a caterpillar, but the skin preserves the shape of the snake, and is a very pretty object. Often have I seen a sunny corner in a quiet wood covered with many of these cast-off skins all glittering in the sunlight; and they are so very like real snakes as easily to deceive the casual observer.

During the winter both vipers and snakes hybernate in holes, or under tree-roots, and require no food.

The slow-worm or blind-worm is often mistaken for the snake. It is about twelve inches long, with a smooth skin, and is dull brown in colour. It possesses a curious faculty of parting withits tail when it chooses. If it is seized by the hand or otherwise annoyed, the tail separates from the body and commences a series of war-dances on its own account. While you are occupied in observing this, the body quietly and expeditiously moves away out of danger. Snakes and vipers live on frogs, small birds, &c., when they can catch them. The slow-worm lives almost entirely upon the white garden-slug.

Slow-Worm

Jimmy's arm and side were very much swollen and inflamed, and it was quite a week before he was free from pain. The doctor said that if the olive-oil had not been used he would have suffered very much more from the bite, and the consequences might have been serious, for Jimmy had not a strong constitution. He was very careful after that of putting his hand into a bird's nest without getting a look into it first.

Fishing.—Jimmy's Dodge.—Bream-fishing.—Good Sport.—Fecundity of Fish.—Balance Float.—Fish-hatching.—Edith Rose.—A Night Sail.

Itmust not be supposed that the boys neglected that most fascinating of all sports, fishing. They fished in the broads and rivers whenever they had an opportunity. Pike, perch, bream, and eels—all were fish that came to their net; and now that birds' nesting was over they devoted some special days to the pursuit of the gentle art.

Some years ago, and at the time of my story, the broads were as full as they could be of coarse fish, especially pike; but by the indiscriminate use of the net and the destruction of spawning fish, the poachers have so thinned the water of pike and perch, that the proprietors are preserving them, and the public are agitating for a close time at certain seasons of the year, so as to protect the breeding fish. Even at the present time, however, the bream is so abundant as to afford plenty of sport to every fisher, however poor he may be. In shape this fish is something like a pair of bellows and it is commonly met with from one to five pounds in weight. It swarms in vast shoals and when it is in the mood for biting, you may catch as many as you like—and more sometimes, for the bream is not a nice fish to handle; it is covered with thick glutinous slime, which sticks to and dries on the hands and clothes. Bream-fishers provide themselves with a cloth, with which to handle the fish and wipe off the slime.

One morning Frank, while dressing at his open window, looked at the broad and was surprised to see it dotted with round, bright coloured objects.

"What can they be?" he said to himself in surprise. "They cannot be trimmers. They look like bladders, but who would paint bladders red, blue, green, and yellow? I am going to see."

He dressed rapidly and ran towards the water. Standing on the margin was Jimmy, his hands in his pockets and a self-satisfied smile on his face.

"What have you been doing Jimmy?" said Frank.

"Oh! I thought you would be astonished. I bought the whole stock of one of those fellows who sell India-rubber balloons, and I thought I would have a great haul of fish; so I fastened a line and hook to each balloon and set them floating before the wind. Don't you think it a grand dodge?"

"Well, you are a funny fellow. I call it a poaching trick, of which you ought to be ashamed, Master Jimmy but I suppose you are not. I expect these balloons will burst directly a big fish pulls them a little under the water. There goes one now; I saw it disappear,—and there's another, with a pop you can hear at this distance."

Bream.

Jimmy began to look rather blue, and said, "Hadn't we better go off after them in a boat, or we shall lose all our lines? All we had are fastened to them."

"Oh, you sinner! you don't mean to say that you have used our joint-stock lines?"

"Yes, I have."

"Then we had better go out at once."

They got into the punt and rowed off after the toy balloons, which were floating swiftly before the breeze. The first they came up to had a small perch on. The next burst just as they reached it, and they saw the glimmer of a big fish in the water. There were twenty balloons set on the water, and it took them a long hour's work before they could recover all that were to be recovered. Out of twenty they only brought in ten. The rest had burst, and the lines were lost. Of the ten which they recovered five had small perch on, which were not worth having. So Jimmy's grand scheme turned out a failure, as so many grand schemes do. The others chaffed him very much about it, as a punishment for losing the lines, and for doing anything on his own hook without consulting the others.

After a wet week in July it was resolved to have a good day's bream fishing. The broad itself was more adapted for perch and pike, for it had a clear gravel bottom; and the river was always considered the best for bream, because its bottom was more muddy, and bream like soft muddy ground. The boys collected an immense quantity of worms, and taking on board a bag of grains for ground-bait, they sailed one Friday evening down to Ranworth and selected a likely spot in the river on the outside of a curve. They proceeded to bait the place well with grains and worms, and then went to sleep, with a comfortable certainty of sport on the morrow.

The white morning dawned and made visible a grey dappled sky, the silent marsh and the smooth river, off which the mists were slowly creeping. Small circles marked where the small fish were rising, but all about where the ground-bait had been put the water was as still as death. The fish were at the bottom, picking up the last crumbs and greedily wishing for more.

Frank was the first to rise. "Now then, you lazy fellows, it is time to begin. There is a soft south wind and the fish are waiting. We will just run along the bank to have a dip away from our fishing-ground, and then we will begin."

After their bathe their rods were soon put together. Dick fished with paste made of new bread and coloured with vermilion. Jimmy had some wasp grubs, and Frank used worms. They tossed up for stations, and Dick was posted at the bows, Jimmy, amidships, and Frank at the stern. The hooks were baited, and the floats were soon floating quietly down the stream. Frank had a float which gave him a longer swim than his companions.It was made as follows. The stem of the float was of quill (two joined together) eight inches long, and was thrust through a small round cork which was fixed in the middle of it. The upper end of the float was weighted with shots, so that it lay flat on the water. The weight at the hook end was so placed, that when a bite took place the float sprang upright and remained so, this calling attention to the fact of a bite at a great distance. Frank was thus able to let his float swim down the river much farther than he could have done with an ordinary one, because he could distinguish a bite farther off.

Before the floats had completed their first swim, Dick cried "I have a bite."

"So have I," said Frank.

"And so have I," added Jimmy.

"How absurd," said Frank, as they were all engaged with a fish at the same time. All three fishes were too large to land without a landing-net, and Dick held Frank's rod while he helped to land Jimmy's fish, and then Jimmy helped to land the others.

The fishes were as nearly as possible three pounds each, great slab-sided things, which gave a few vigorous rushes and then succumbed quietly to the angler.

And so the sport went on. At every swim one or the other of them had a bite, and as they did not choose to lose time by using the cloth to every fish, they were soon covered with the slime off them, which dried on their white flannels and made them in a pretty mess.

"In what immense numbers these fish must breed," said Dick.

Angling.

"Yes," answered Frank, "fish of this kind lay more eggs than those of the more bold and rapacious kind, such as the perch and pike. I have read that 620,000 eggs have been counted in the spawn of a big carp. You see that so many of the young are destroyed by other fish that this is a necessary provision of nature. I once saw the artificial breeding of trout by a way which I have never told you of, and it was most interesting. It was in Cheshire, where some gentlemen had preserved a trout-stream and wished to keep up the stock. Into the large stream a small rivulet ran down a cleft in the bank like a small ravine, and in this cleft they had built their sheds. The trout-spawn was placed in troughs which hadbottoms made of glass rods side by side, close enough together to prevent the eggs falling through, but wide enough to let the water pass through freely. Over these troughs a continual stream of water was directed. The eggs were pale yellow in colour when alive, but if one of them became addled or dead it turned white, and it was then picked off by means of a glass tube, up which it was sucked by the force of capillary attraction without disturbing the other eggs. By and by you could see a little dot in the eggs. This got larger and larger until the covering burst, and the fish came out, with a little transparent bag bigger than themselves attached to their stomachs. They ate nothing until this dried up, and they lived upon what they absorbed out of it. When the fish were about an inch long they were put into small pools up the brook, where they were watched very carefully by the keeper, who set traps for rats and herons. Then as they got bigger they were put into larger pools, and finally into the river."

Trout.

"I did not know that water-rats ate fish," said Jimmy.

"No, water-rats don't, although many people think they do. They live only on vegetable food, and it is a pity to kill them; but the common rat, which is as often seen by the river side as the other, will eat fish, or whatever it can get."

It would be tedious to recount the capture of every fish,since one was so like another. The sport far exceeded their expectations, or anything they had previously experienced; and before six o'clock in the evening they had caught over three hundred fishes, big and little, the largest about five pounds in weight. The total weight was about twelve stone. Norfolk bream fishers will know that I am not exaggerating.

"I am thoroughly tired of this," said Dick at length; "this is not sport, it is butchery, especially as we do not know what to do with them now we have caught them, except to give them to some farmer for manure."

"No," said Frank; "that is why I do not care much for bream fishing, or any sport where one cannot use the things one kills; but we will give the best of these fish to old Matthew Cox and his wife, who have nothing but the parish allowance to live on. I dare say they will be glad enough of them."

Cox, who was a poor old man scarce able to keep body and soul together, was glad indeed to have them, but their number puzzled him, until Mrs. Brett suggested that he should pickle them, and gave him some vinegar for the purpose.

Contrary to Frank's expectation, the wind had not risen, but towards the afternoon died away, and with the exception of a shower, so summerlike that the gnats danced between the rain-drops, the day had been very fine and calm. When the boys left off fishing the water was as calm as at five o'clock in the morning, and there was not the slightest chance of their reaching home that night. This was awkward, as the next day was Sunday, and they had no change of raiment with them. They made the best of it, sending a note home by post to explain their absence. In the morning there was a debate as to whether they should go to church or not.

"Let us go," said Frank. "No one will know us, so it does not matter what we have on."

So to church they went, in their dirty white flannels. It was their intention to sit near the door and try to escape observation, but they found the back seats of the little church full of children, and a churchwarden ushered them all the way up the church to the front pew, which they took. Just before the service began, a lady and gentleman, and a young lady who was apparently their daughter, came into the large square pew in which our boys sat, whereupon the tanned cheeks of ourheroes blushed vehemently. The young lady sat opposite Frank, and every now and then gazed at him curiously. When Frank mustered up courage to look back at her, he thought he knew the face, and as the sermon advanced he recollected that it was that of a friend of his sister Mary's, who had once stayed at his father's house. When they left the church he went up to her, and taking off his cap, said,

"I beg your pardon, but are you not Miss Rose?"

"Yes, Mr. Merivale, but I thought you would not have remembered me. Papa, this is Mary Merivale's brother."

Mr. Rose looked rather curiously at Frank and his friends, and Frank at once answered the unspoken question by saying,

"We are yachting, sir, and we are windbound, without any change of clothes. We should have been ashamed to come to church if we had thought we should meet anyone we knew."

"I am very glad to have met you. You and your friends must come and dine with me," was Mr. Rose's reply.

So, in spite of their slimy-covered clothes and fishy smell, they were welcomed, and had a pleasant day. Edith Rose was so very pretty and nice, that Frank began to think Dick was not quite such a goose for being spoons on his sister, as he had previously thought him.

About ten they returned to the yacht, and found that the wind had risen, and was blowing tolerably hard. As they were anxious to get back in time to be with Mr. Meredith on Monday morning, they resolved to sit up until twelve o'clock and then start homeward. The night was starlight, and light enough for them to see their way on the water; and as the hands on their watches pointed to twelve they hoisted sail and glided away through the grey stillness of the night, beneath the starlit blue of the midnight sky, with no sound audible save the hissing of the water curling against their bows, the flapping of the sails as they tacked, and the occasional cry of a bird in the reeds; and about five o'clock they arrived home, and turned in on board the yacht for a couple of hours' sleep before breakfast.

Calling for Landrails.—Landrail Shamming Death.—Yellow Under-wing Moth and Wasp.—Dragon-Fly and Butterfly.—Stink-horn Fungus.—Sundew.

Ona stile under the shade of a chestnut Frank sat, calling for landrails. Every now and then he rubbed an instrument on his thigh, which made a noise so like the cry of the corncrake that one could not have distinguished it. This instrument was very simple, and he had made it himself. It was a piece of hard wood, with a stock to it like the lettery. Between the prongs of theywas a wooden wheel, with its circumference cut into cogs. A slip of wood was screwed to the stock, and pressed against the cogs. When the wheel was turned by being pressed against the leg, a grating noise was produced, which answered the purpose admirably. Frank sat with his gun upon his lap and called away most patiently, but not hurriedly. A landrail was answering him from the further side of the field, and was approaching nearer. At last, just as its note seemed further off, he caught sight of its long neck and head peering above the grass, which, although it was only the aftermath, had grown a good height. Frank gave another creak, and the bird ran on a few yards nearer. Frank raised his gun to his shoulder and took aim, and as the bird took fright and began to run away a report rang through the summer stillness. The corncrake ran on with one wing trailing. The distance had been too great, or Frank would not have done so little damage. Just as it seemed that the bird would get away, Dick and Jimmy appeared over the opposite hedge. The corncrake seeing them, immediately fell down and lay apparently dead. They picked it up and brought it to Frank, who laid it on the ground by his side, and went on with his calling, while the others lay on the grass and talked.

A heap of hay had been left by the side of the hedge, and Dick lazily stirred it with his foot. A large yellow under-winged moth (a moth with grey upper-wings and bright yellow under-wingsbordered with black and very common in our hay-fields) arose, and Dick ran after it with his hat. Another entomologist, however, was before him. A wasp pounced upon the moth, and the two fell fluttering to the ground, and Dick caught them both, and afterwards mounted them in the attitude in which he caught them.

"It was a pity to kill the wasp," said Jimmy. "It was doing just the same as Frank here. I dare say that corncrake would like to see him killed."

Dragon-Fly.

"It is the law of nature," said Frank; "and see, there is a dragon-fly following the wasp's example."

A large dragon-fly had seized a white butterfly, and then as it flew in the air, it was depriving it of its wings, which fell fluttering to the ground.

Jimmy happening to cast his eyes upon the corncrake, saw it cautiously lift its head, then gather itself together, looking about, and evidently preparing for flight.

"Look, Frank," he said, "the corncrake was only shamming death!" The corncrake was on its legs and running away by this time, but Frank fired and killed it.

"I would have let it go for its cunning," he said, "but it would only die with a broken wing. It could not live the winter here, and of course it could not migrate. I have known the water-hen sham death in the same way, and many insects do it. I wonder if that is instinct or reason. How does it know that if it seems dead you will not touch it, and therefore it may get an opportunity to escape?"

"It is very wonderful," said Jimmy; "but you will get no more birds to-day after two shots. They will be too wary. Come with me, and I will show you something equally wonderful."

"What is it?"

"I will not tell you. Wait and see."

They followed him to the shrubbery of Mr. Meredith's garden, and he led them to a laurel-bush, and pointed out to them an upright fungus, creamy white in colour, but not by any means handsome. Dick and Frank bent forward to examine it, when suddenly they clasped their noses between their fingers, and ran away, followed by Jimmy exulting.

"How terrible," said Dick, blowing his nose.

"That is the vilest smell I have ever smelt," said Frank, doing likewise. "What is it?"

"The common stink-horn fungus," answered Jimmy; "I thought you would like to see it."

"We might have liked to see it, but not to smell it. Have not you a nose, Jimmy?"

"Yes; but I wanted you to share my pleasure."

"It was uncommonly kind of you, I must say."

Mr. Meredith came up smiling and said,

"Now, if you will come with me, I will show you a plant much more interesting, and a plant which is like Dick, in that it catches flies."

In a small marsh near the end of the garden were some plants of the sundew. It is some years since I gathered one, and I have not one before me to describe, so I quote from a little book calledOld English Wild Flowers:—

"Of all the interesting plants which grow on marsh-lands, the most singular is the sundew. Those who have never seen itswhite blossoms growing, can form but little idea of its singular appearance. Round the root it has a circle of leaves, and each leaf has a number of red hairs tipped with pellucid glands which exude a clear liquid, giving the leaves a dew-besprinkled appearance as it glistens in the sunshine. These have proved a fatal trap to numbers of insects. The foliage and stem are much tinted with crimson, and the plant is small."

Setting Night-lines.—An Encounter with Poachers.

OldCox met Frank one day, and said to him in his broad Norfolk, which would be unintelligible to you were I to render it faithfully,—

"I wish you would give me some more fish, Mr. Merivale. You catch plenty, and if you would give me some that you doesn't want, I would take them to Norwich market and sell them. I sorely want to buy a pair of blankets for the old woman and me afore the winter comes."

"Well, Cox, you shall have all we catch and don't want," said Frank; and when he saw his friends he said,—

"Let us make a mighty night-line, and set it like the long lines the Cromer fishermen set for cods, and lay it in the broad for eels, and give all we catch to Cox. Two or three nights' haul will set him up for the winter."

So they made a long night-line. They bought a quarter of a mile of stout cord, and at distances of a yard from each other they fastened eel-hooks by means of short lengths of fine water-cord. Cox himself got them the worms, and then one fine night they rowed the punt to the middle of the broad, and set the night-line in the deep water of the channel.

"Well," said Dick, "this is the longest and most wearisomejob I have ever done, and old Cox ought to be infinitely obliged to us. We have been two hours and a half setting this line."

Early in the morning they went out, and took up the night-line, but to their great surprise they found but very few eels on it, and plenty of bream, which they did not want. They were much disappointed at this, and went to Bell, and asked him the reason, for there were plenty of eels in the broad.

"Where did you set the line?" he asked.

"In the deep water of the channel."

"Then that is just the place where you ought not to have set it. At night the eels make for the shallow water to feed, and if the grass is wet they will even wriggle out among it. I have seen them myself many a time. You must set your line along the edge where the water is about a foot or two feet deep, and you will have as many eels as you can carry."

They tried again, and set the line as Bell had directed them, and the next morning they began to haul it in. The first hook came up bare. So did the second, and the third. As they hauled in the line their faces looked very blank, for every hook was bare.

"We are not the first," said Frank savagely, "some other fellows have been here before us, and have taken up the line, and robbed it. They must have watched us laying it. Now I'll tell you what we will do. We will set it again to-night, and watch in the yacht, and if we see any fellows touching it we will give them a drubbing. Are you game?"

"Yes," answered both Dick and Jimmy readily, "we are."

So the third time they set the line, and then as soon as it got dark they crept quietly on board the yacht. They had set the line within 150 yards of theSwan, and as there was a glitter on the water from the reflection of the stars, they could see if anyone approached it.

"What shall we do if they do touch it?" said Dick. "How shall we get at them?"

"I did intend to take the boat, and row after them," answered Frank; "but see, we are to windward of them, and there is a good breeze, so that if we let the yacht drift towards them until they take the alarm, and then run the sails up, we shall overtake them."

"And what shall we do then?" said Jimmy, who was becoming a little nervous.

"Run them down—the water is not deep enough to drown them—and take away their boat if we can, and then make them come and beg our pardon before we give it up to them. If they attempt to board us, knock them over again."

Frank spoke decidedly and hotly, for he was much put out at the theft of the fish. His family had so befriended the poor people around, that it was very ungrateful of some of them to rob their line. His spirits rose, too, with a force he could not resist, at the thought of a midnight engagement, and the chance of outwitting those who had thought to outwit him. Dick and Jimmy were ready to follow their dux at any instant, and anywhere.

"They won't come till about midnight," said Frank, "so we may as well take a little sleep."

About two o'clock they were broad awake, and lying flat on the deck of the yacht, peering into the darkness in the direction of the night-line.

"Hush," said Dick; "I heard a noise like that of oars."

They listened, and sure enough they heard the noise of oars splashing in the water, and grating in the rowlocks.

"Here they are," whispered Frank. "We shall soon be in the thick of it."

Dick had been trembling for some time in his nervousness, and he thought somewhat bitterly, "What is the matter with me? Am I a coward?" and he felt ashamed at the thought. It was not cowardice, however, but pure nervousness, and the moment he heard the sound of the approaching voices his nervousness departed, and he felt as cool and collected as Frank.

A black patch soon became visible on the water, and they could just distinguish the outline of the boat. A splash in the water told them that the mooring stone had been thrown out, and that the robbers were at work. Frank quietly slipped his mooring, and the yacht drifted quickly towards the men. They were soon near enough to see that there were two men in the boat, and they heard one of them say in a startled tone,—

"I say, Jack, that yacht's adrift."

"Is there any one on board, did you see?" said the other.

"No, I don't think so."

"Yes, there is though. Pull up that stone and row off as fast as you can," answered his companion.

"Up with the sail!" shouted Frank, as he flew to the helm. Dick and Jimmy threw themselves on the halyard, and the great sail rose with surprising quickness against the dark night. The men in the boat were now pulling away at the top of their speed, but with the wind dead aft the yacht bore swiftly down upon them. The water was only about two feet deep, and began to shallow. The yacht's centre boards were up, but still she could not go much further, and they could tell that they were continually touching the mud.

"They will escape us," said Dick.

"No, there is a deep bay just where they are rowing," said Jimmy.

As the water deepened the yacht started forwards, and in another minute they were on the runaways. Crash went their bows against the boat: she was at once capsized, and her occupants were struggling in the water. One of them scrambled on board theSwan, and rushed aft with an oar upraised to strike, but Frank laid the helm over as he put the yacht about, and the boom struck the fellow on the head and knocked him overboard.

Meanwhile Dick had with the boat-hook tried to catch hold of the boat. In this he failed, but he got hold of something far more important, and that was a large fine-mesh net, which the poachers had no doubt intended to use after robbing the night-line. With such nets the damage done to fishing is enormous. Shoals of fishes as small as minnows, and useless for anything except manure, are massacred with them, and it is by the constant use of such nets that the fishing on the broads falls now so far short of what it used to be. Night-lines set for eels are not poaching or destructive. The quantity of eels is so great, that, as long as the young ones are spared, either night-lines or nets of the proper kind may be used.

The yacht swept on, leaving the men up to their waists in the water, and swearing horribly. Frank felt a wild impulse to return and fight them, for he was of a fighting blood, such as a soldier should have, but he thought, "If we go back there are sure to be some hard blows, and I have no right to take Dick or Jimmy into a scrimmage and perhaps get them severely hurt, for they are not so strong as I am," so he refrained, and they sailed back to the boat-house, and waited until the dawn. Their adversaries dared not attack them, but went off out of sight and hearing.

In the morning they took up the line, and were well-rewarded for their previous trouble. The eels they took pretty well loaded the donkey-cart which old Cox had borrowed, and he took them to Norwich and made a good profit out of them.

Having amused themselves once with the night-lines the boys did not care to use them again, for it wasinfra dig.to catch fish for profit. However the profits were good to other people, so they gave the line to old Cox, and told him that he must get some one to set it, and go shares with him.

The next day Frank walked down to the village public-house and stuck up the following notice in the bar,—

"If the person to whom the nets I have belong, will call at my house and claim them, he shall have the nets and a good thrashing."

Frank was five feet eleven inches high, and well built in addition, and he had always a look on his face which said "I mean what I say;" and the nets were never claimed.

Water Insects.—Aquaria.

OneJuly afternoon the boys had been fishing, and to seek some shade and coolness while eating their lunch, they had driven the yacht into a quiet pool among the reeds, which almost met over them. The water below them was very clear and still, and as it was only about two feet deep they could see the bottom quite plainly, and they soon found that it was well worth a close inspection. The pool was teeming with insect life. The surface of the water was covered with tiny whirligig beetles, which were skimming about in mazy, coruscating evolutions.

"Those whirligig beetles," said Dick, "have their eyes madewith two faces—one to look down into the water, and the other to look into the sky."

"What a lot you have learnt about insects, Dick, in the course of a few months," said Frank.

Metamorphoses of Flesh-Fly.

"It is a grand study," said Dick enthusiastically; "and I have worked my best at it. When one goes hard at a thing it is astonishing how soon one picks up a lot of knowledge about it. I have read over and over again about the common insects, or those that are the most noticeable."

"Well, tell us about all those insects we see now."

Water-Beetle.

"Look at those long-legged narrow-bodied flies which are sliding along over the surface. These are called water-measurers. That oval beetle which is swimming on its back, and using two legs like oars, is the water boatman. It fastens on to the head of small fish, and soon kills them. It lives in the water, but if put on land it can fly. Look at that brute crawling over the mud, with its lobster-like head. It has sharp claws and a hollow snout. It lies in wait for its victims, and when it seizes them it sucks the juice out of them with its beak. It looks only of a dull brown now, but when its wings are expanded itsbody is of a blood red colour, and its tail is forked. It sometimes comes out for a fly at night."

"And what is the fearfully ugly thing climbing up that reed-stem just out of the water?"

Pupa of Dragon-Fly.Compound Eye of Dragon-Fly (Section).

Pupa of Dragon-Fly.

Compound Eye of Dragon-Fly (Section).

"Oh, that is the larva of the dragon-fly. The fly is about to come out of the case. Just watch it for a while."

Larva of Gnat.Escape of Gnat from its Pupa-case.

Larva of Gnat.

Escape of Gnat from its Pupa-case.

The larva of the dragon-fly is one of the ugliest of creatures. It has a long light-brown body and six legs. It has a fierce wide mouth and projecting eyes. Attached to its head are two claws, which with a pincer-like movement, catch up anything eatable and pass it to the mouth. In its larva and pupa state it has just the same appearance, and when it is about to change into a perfect dragon-fly it climbs up out of the water andemerges out of its case, just like the butterfly, and sails away a perfect and gorgeous insect, leaving its case a transparent brown shell, still clinging to the reed or grass-stem on which it contracted its last change.

"Bother the gnats!" said Jimmy brushing some off his face. "There is nothing interesting about them."

"Oh yes, there is," said Dick. "They lay their eggs on the surface of the water, making a raft of them, and the larvæ escape through the bottom of each egg into the water; and I have read that it is a very pretty sight to watch the perfect insect coming out."

Metamorphoses of Plumed Gnat.

"I would prefer their staying down below; they bite me," answered Jimmy.

Crawling along the bottom were numbers of caddis-worms in tube-like cases made of sticks and stones. Inside these cases are the plump white grubs which turn into flies.

"Where the bottom is gravelly these caddis-worms make their cases of little stones," said Frank.

"Yes, and I read the other day that an experiment had been tried by some one, who took some out of their nests and put them into an aquarium with some finely-broken glass of different colours, and the caddis-worms made their cases of this broken coloured glass, and very pretty they looked."

"Their own bodies must supply the glue which fastens the pieces of gravel or glass together?"

"Yes, it does."

As the fish were biting very badly the boys left the broad early and went for a stroll. While passing through the village they saw a sale of stock going on in the open space round which the houses were ranged. They stopped to look on. The goods which were being sold were the stock in trade of a chemist, and among them were three large glass bowls, such as are used for aquaria. These were put up by the auctioneer in one lot, but there was no bid for them. They were articles not in request in that rural district.

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