238 NORTH SEA FISHERS AND FIGHTERS 



the skipper listens earnestly for a reply. Occasionally a 

 hopeful sound will be heard, and the fleet will be found, 

 but more often the rocket has been vainly fired and the 

 steamboat continues her prowling on the waters. It has 

 happened, but comparatively seldom, that a carrier has 

 burnt all her coal, as well as her empty trunks, in 

 searching for her fleet, and that at the end of her 

 tribulations she has had to return to port and start afresh ; 

 and that a steam-trawler has wandered for many days, 

 with the same distressing consequence. 



"An infant crying in the night, 

 An infant crying for the light ; 

 And with no language but a cry " 



might well express the attitude of carrier skippers who 

 are seeking fleets. A carrier goes towards the spot 

 where a fleet has been working ; but the admiral may 

 have given the signal to change ground, and the fleet 

 may have steamed a hundred miles or more from the 

 locality where the carrier left it. There is no help for 

 the skipper. He has to "seek" just as industriously as 

 an old-time tug from Tees or Tyne goes on the same 

 mission. He must hail in and out of season, and his 

 parrot-cry will be, "Seen anything o' the Gamecocks?" 

 or whatever the missing fleet may be. This is the old- 

 time cry and way, and there will be no change and no 

 saving either in pocket or temper until wireless tele- 

 graphy or the most up-to-date method of communication 

 is adopted. 



When the carrier reaches her fleet she will, if she has 

 time to spare, shoot her gear, for she is equipped with 

 trawling apparatus, and she will make one or more hauls 



