BLUE FISHING IN A THUNDER STORM. 



E. M. LEETE. 



General Wood and his wife; Earl Brown, 

 a young law student; Miss Hart, of New 

 York ; my wife and I, were out for an 

 afternoon sail. We had left the dock at 

 ii o'clock, and had cruised to the West- 

 ward 6 or 7 miles up as far as Pine Or- 

 chard, where we had taken dinner at the 

 hotel. Our yacht was a little sloop rigged 

 boat, 25 feet over all, with a beam of 9 feet ; 

 a neat, tidy boat, whose otherwise comely 

 proportions were somewhat marred by a 

 roomy house that came well aft, leaving a 

 small cockpit. She was built for bluefish- 

 ing outside of Montauk. The fall before 

 she came into my possession she was the 

 only boat in the fleet that dared put to sea 

 and come across from Montauk to New 

 London, to carry the news of a wreck and 

 summon help for a small schooner that 

 went ashore on the beach in a Northeaster. 

 Her skipper was an artist in his profession, 

 a man who knew no fear. With 3 reefs in 

 her mainsail, a bobbed jib and cabin doors 

 tightly battened down, she came across 

 that stormy stretch of water, through the 

 foaming race, and into port, with not a 

 ropeyarn parted. She was not so hand- 

 some as some yachts, nor did she spread so 

 much canvas as a modern racing machine ; 

 but she was mine. Many were the good 

 times we had enjoyed in that snug cabin, 

 and many were the bluefish we had lifted 

 over her white sides into the little cockpit. 

 Her strong points came out in a breeze. I 

 always felt as much at home at her tiller 

 as in my back yard, and could sleep as well 

 in the little cabin as in my own bed at 

 home. 



It was a glorious day for a sail. The 

 sky was blue, without a cloud in sight ex- 

 cept in the Northwest, where a low, dark 

 bank gave promise of a thunder storm later 

 in the day. The wind was Southwest, a 

 good breeze with the whitecaps showing to 

 windward. With our boom wide off and 

 everything drawing, we were sliding along 

 to the Eastward, climbing the green seas to 

 slip into the billows beyond, with the white 

 water boiling away from our keen stern, 

 our boom now skipping the crest of a wave 

 and then pointing high in the air with the 

 windward roll of the yacht. 



George and his wife sat to leeward, he 

 quietly smoking his pipe and watching the 

 sails, while she dabbled her hands in the 

 white water, that nearly covered our rail. 

 Earl and Miss Hart were in the cabin 

 looking at a chart, and presumably study- 

 ing navigation; while my wife sat in the 

 stern by my side. Off on the weather bow 

 lay Faulkner's island, with its white light- 



house. West of it was Goose island, and 

 some distance South and East of us was 

 the rip on North reef. As I glanced in 

 that direction, something caught my eye. 

 It might have been the white crest of a sea, 

 a distant sail, or the glint of a gull's wing. 

 I looked again and low down, where sea 

 and sky came together, I saw the gulls 

 playing. A look through the glass and 

 they showed plainly. A flock of tern gulls 

 playing over a school of bluefish. 



I might forget to mail a letter, I might 

 possibly forget to do an errand, or to get 

 up in the morning; but bluefish jigs I never 

 forget. All my gear was in the cabin. I 

 spoke to George and Earl, and they were 

 anxious to have a try for the fish, so it was 

 down helm, flatten in the sheets, and point 

 for North Reef. That brought the wind on 

 the beam and made pleasanter sailing than 

 before, although the breeze was dropping 

 somewhat. The boys put out the outrig- 

 gers for the trolling line, overhauled the 

 jigs and sharpened up the hooks. Twenty 

 minutes, and we had the gulls right ahead 

 of us. It was pretty to see the birds play- 

 ing over the school of fish. Birds and fish 

 were both after the same food, a little bait 

 fish a few inches long. With a hungry 

 bluefish below and a keen eyed gull above, 

 it was hard times for the little fellows. 

 Now and then a bluefish would break, and 

 sometimes one would jump clear out of 

 water in its mad rush for food. 



Turn about is fair play, and we were 

 after the bluefish. George hooked one on 

 his line ; then a scream from Miss Hart, 

 as a lusty, big one snapped her jig, and 2 

 came aboard. About we went, and through 

 the bunch once more, when my wife took 

 one. The lessening wind helped us on that 

 tack. We hung in the school, barely stem- 

 ming the strong floodtide, and took out 6.. 

 Our fine breeze was then about done, and 

 we drifted away from the reef into deeper 

 water, unable to longer stem the tide. 



What wind there was we wanted to make 

 the most of, so I slacked off my sheets and 

 pointed for home, when George called my 

 attention to the cloud in the West. The 

 dark bank we had before noticed had 

 grown huge, and was rapidly rising, while 

 our wind was about gone. We were miles 

 off shore, with the tide setting us rapidly 

 Westward. We could not reach the main- 

 land before the storm broke, and the water 

 was far too deep to anchor. All we could 

 do was to get ready and await further de- 

 velopments. The cloud rushed on, the 

 thunder muttered and the increasing dark- 

 ness put us in anything but a desirable sit- 



