342 AMERICAN GAME FISHES. 



the creature is not attached to the shell, but uses it as a sort 

 of nest, for incubating the eggs, as we learn from late observ- 

 ers. Closet naturalists declare that the old account, given 

 by poets and others, as to the sailing habits of the nautilus, 

 is a fable, but the present writer, having repeatedly seen, 

 on the calm surface of tropical seas this navigation in prog- 

 ress, believes they were correct, and man might 



"Learn of the little nautilus to sail." 



We put up many sea birds from their nests, slight depres- 

 sions in the sand, the eggs so concealed by their color as to 

 be almost invisible. There were gulls, terns, shearwaters, 

 petrels, and the like. In front was the ocean deeply and 

 beautifully blue, with a line of breakers outside the long nar- 

 row slough or gully which lay just outside low water-mark. 

 It was in this slough that we were to fish, and our guide 

 looked carefully along for the Bass. Presently he said he 

 could see them, and wading in till the water reached his 

 waist he swung the baited hook and the lead around his head, 

 and cast it away into the surf. The major followed with a 

 hand-line, and I having also waded into the slough cast from 

 the reel as far as possible — the water I found to be pleas- 

 antly warm; the sun was hot and the wind southerly. It 

 was young flood, and the tide rolled the baited line ashore, 

 making frequent casts necessary. Our guide, whose casts 

 were longer than ours, got the first Bass — a six-pounder — 

 then another before we either of us had a strike. "We must 

 make longer casts, major; as far as the line of surf." This 

 being done, both of us soon had a fish hooked and in full 

 play. I found that the Bass here in open water make a 

 longer and fiercer struggle than those in the river, but assisted 

 by the incoming waves, we were able to handle them. 

 There was quite a large school in the slough, and we got 

 seven of them, from four to six pounds in weight. 



"There," said P., "I think we have as many as we want to 

 tote across the beach." 



