170 Fish Stories 



strange characters. Up the canon lives one Barney Raf- 

 ferty (this name is as good as any) , he of the confessional. 

 Cabrillo is said to have told the story, or perhaps it 

 was Cabrera Buena. Barney had led a wild life on 

 sea and land, and there were hints and suggestions of 

 piracy, of smuggling and of the Spanish main. In due 

 time, so it is said in the Porch Club annals, Barney was 

 induced to go to confession in the old mission in Los Angeles. 

 He had many sins to confess, and in fear and trembling 

 took an old friend and boatman, one Phil O'Connor, with 

 him. Barney entered the confessional, and for two hours 

 old Phil sat hard by, waiting; then the good father came 

 out, weary and haggard, mopping his face, and disappeared, 

 but Barney remained. 



Old Phil stood it a few minutes longer, then he crept up 

 to the confessional, lifted the black curtain, and whispered, 

 " Are ye there, Barney ? " 



" I am," replied the penitent. 



" Are ye through? " asked old Phil. 



" Through, is it? " retorted Barney, " we've just begun." 



" But where's his riverence gone ? " asked Phil, in hushed 

 tones. 



" Bedad ! I don't know, but I think for the police? " was 

 the answer. 



It was the same Barney who took a tenderfoot out and 

 left him upon a rock, where he waved a scoop-net half the 

 night at the small bats of the island, believing them to be 

 flying fishes, and that this was the manner of capture. An- 

 other time, he carried an angler new to the wiles of wits and 

 wags of the Pacific, far up into the mountains in a deep 

 canon where he left him holding open a gunny sack, by the 

 mouth of which was a lighted candle — the lure for snipe. 

 When the morning began to break, the victim, weary and 

 chilled to the bone, came in, still believing that bagging snipe 

 was one of the sports of the Isle of Summer, as he said he 

 had caught no snipe, but he had heard them. 



