BRANT SHOOTING 289 



Me., to New York, struck in about fourteen feet of 

 water. She held fast until thousands of boxes of 

 merchandise were thrown overboard. Then with the 

 aid of a tug and a high tide she was gotten off, and 

 without rudder or stern-post was towed to New York. 



Our friends, the guides, lamented the fact that most 

 of the jettisoned cargo floated out to sea ; but the re- 

 mainder, which was weighty enough to sink, they 

 grappled in fifteen feet of water, bringing their find 

 to the surface and shore. Of course, some " odd " lots 

 were brought up. Among them was a case of 2,500 

 little boxes of split, leaden bullets for fish-line sinkers 

 and several cases of white, flinty rock, consigned to a 

 Trenton pottery. The wreckers were much out of 

 heart about the latter because of their weight and 

 also because no one could tell them whether they were 

 worth the freight to Trenton or not. 



These wreckers, branters and fishermen live a happy 

 life and are as full of content as an egg is of meat. 

 No fluctuations in stocks ; no frills of fashion ; in 

 fact nothing under the sun or over it can knock the 

 bottom out of a branter's content, give him but the 

 favoring tide and howling gust that bring the brant 

 in plenty, to his decoys. It is this hope that warms 

 his imagination and cheers his heart, for its realization 

 is apt to fill his pocket with a goodly share of the coin 

 of the realm. 



