198 IOWA STUDIES IN NATURAL HISTORY 
much that was new to me. For instance, he had observed that the 
seales of New Zealand fishes are larger than those of similar 
species in British waters. They were both honest, God fearing 
men, steady and sober, used to privation and hardship. They 
were cheerful and uncomplaining and I remember that after a 
gruelling struggle in getting up the trawl, which was badly torn 
and spilled nearly all the fish, the captain was not at all ruffled 
and merely remarked, ‘‘A bit of bad luck wasn’t it? but we ex- 
pect it in our work.’’ I could not help remembering how some 
skippers I have known would have made the air blue with their 
fervid profanity under much less pressure. I learned a good deal 
that was worth while from these two men, tossing about in the 
trawler in the Gulf of Hauraki. 
To return to my note-book, I find that we spent the night of 
July 20 in the little cove where we ran for shelter; we got away 
at 7:30 the next morning, and reached the fishing grounds about 
9 o’clock. We then shot the trawl and commenced the regular 
routine of work at sea. I spent nearly an hour overhauling a 
magnificent, finely-branched sponge about three feet in height 
which the captain had saved for me from his last trip. It was too 
large for me to attempt to preserve, but yielded several kinds of 
hydrocorallines, bryozoans, crabs, serpent stars and mollusks which 
I put away for further reference. We were dredging off Little 
Barrier Island and the trawl came up about one o’clock yielding 
about four one hundred pound baskets of fish, rather poor results. 
There were a number of interesting things for me, particularly 
some fine, large, bright red brachiopods, beautiful red and white 
striped anemones, a number of small corals, Pecten, chitons and 
serpent star. The trawl had dragged at a depth of about twenty- 
four fathoms over a shelly bottom composed very largely of the 
dead shells of a large Pecten. 
That evening after dark the trawl was raised again but with 
great difficulty as it was ‘‘hung up’’ on the bottom, catching on 
what appeared to be a large sunken tree. It had also captured 
a large slab of voleanic rock looking like a good sized grave-stone. 
As a consequence the net was badly torn and most of the fish lost. 
The sea was sloppy and the men had a bad time generally, strain- 
ing with every ounce of their strength to get the trawl in-board. 
As it would take several hours to bend on a fresh net, I went to 
bed after writing up my notes for the day. 
It was a rough night but the morning of the 22nd was bright 
