Part 1

Produced by Annie R. McGuire

Copyright, 1896, by HARPER & BROTHERS. All Rights Reserved.

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PUBLISHED WEEKLY. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, JULY 28, 1896. FIVE CENTS A COPY.

VOL. XVII.--NO. 874. TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.

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A THRESHER THRASHED.

BY DAWSON STEARNS.

"Talk about catching fish," remarked Walter Clay, in a phlegmatic and yet rather sarcastic style, "it seems to me that Katie has caught one now, if she never did before."

The youth addressed showed that he was more hot-tempered than his companion, as his cheeks flushed and his eyes danced angrily for an instant when the comprehension of his friend's double meaning flashed upon him.

"Oh, stop punning, and look out for that line, quick!" was the sharp reply.

"Better mind your helm, or you'll have your boom gybe, if this lovely fish doesn't gybe it for you, my boy," retorted Walter, as his attention was more closely called to the line he was paying out, as he stood near the weather-bow and watched carefully ahead.

The boys were in a cat-boat of comfortable build, heading toward the mouth of Long Island Sound, close-hauled on the port tack, Brentons Reef Light-ship a mile or more off on the weather-quarter, and a breeze so true and sternly that they felt no uneasiness about getting back to Newport before sundown if they devoted most of the afternoon to sport. The boat was named the _Katie_, and was owned by the young man at the helm, Harry Main, who had chosen the name and had it painted in neat letters on her stern with the consent of one who did not hesitate to acknowledge the flattery of the compliment. Hence his companion's good-natured play upon it, as well as intimation of the important aspect of the present occasion.

The _Katie_ was a very weatherly craft, as well as a good sailer, and was highly prized by her young owner; in fact, she was a prize. The boat had been built to his special order by one of the most experienced of cat-boat constructors, after many long consultations with his _fidus Achates_ and constant chum Walter, as well as the benefit of professional advice, and the sanction of his father, who footed the bills in redemption of a promise made if Harry attained a certain record at his college examinations. The record had been made through faithful work, the prize had been earned, and the boys were now right heartily enjoying the fruit of their labors in the summer vacation. Little wonder that their good fortune was envied by many, and that their popularity was in no small degree enhanced by the nautical tone acquired through their amateur sailorizing, while their manliness was increased, lung power developed, brains brightened, complexions enriched, and muscles toughened by the glow of such healthful exercise and invigorating pastime.

That morning the boys had started out for bluefish, their boat equipped with outriggers to facilitate the handling of the lines, as is customary; and with reefed sail, to prevent the gaining of too much headway, they were making a fair catch, when a tremendous splashing in the water ahead and rapidly nearing them attracted their attention. It was soon seen that the commotion, whatever it might be due to, was frightening away the fish, and indignation took the place of satisfaction on the part of the fishermen. Watching the disturbance in the water as it drew nearer, the boys could soon make out that it was caused by some monster of the deep, and presently resounding slaps on the surface of the Sound could be plainly distinguished with the creature's tail, making a noise and splashing as though a massive plank were dropped flat side into the water fairly from a height. This was done not only once, but many times, the reports sometimes resembling gun-shots, and indicating that more monsters than one were causing the racket.

"Whales fighting!" suggested Harry.

"No; not big enough; they're closer than you think," said Walter, as he stood with his hand shading his eyes, intently watching them.

"Not sharks, eh? Horse-mackerel, I guess, or sturgeon," rapidly conjectured Harry.

"Great Scott! No, old man--threshers, as you're a sinner!" concluded Walter, decisively. "And there's a whole school of 'em. Look out for your lines!"

But even as the truth flashed upon him his caution was too late, for one of the threshers dashed alongside, sweeping it clear of lines and leaving them afar off, as the school proceeded to gambol in a new direction.

"This is interesting, but I don't think it will pay as well as bluefish," remarked Walter; and even as he spoke another line on the opposite side went with a snap, as the fish scurried off with a vindictive splash of his mighty caudal appendage.

"Let's make it pay!" ejaculated Harry, quick to resolve.

"Capital idea, my boy! Will you kindly elucidate your proposition?" inquired Walter, as he ruefully gathered in some wreckage of bluefishing gear.

"Why," said Harry, "let's make over to Brentons Reef Light-ship, and see if we can't get some shark hooks and bait from the crew, and capture one of the beggars."

"We might try it," said Walter, contemplatively. "Those piratical splashers certainly have assumed too much audacity to suit my equanimity, and they deserve to be punished. Well, get her around, and we'll run over to the light-ship and see."

It was always the quick brain of Harry that planned such expeditions, and as the _Katie_ made good time on her course he eagerly pictured the heroic effect of capturing a thresher and towing it to port. Walter Clay, always willing for any sort of adventure that was not too reckless for a fair chance of safety, and warranted not to get "rattled," but preserve his good-nature and presence of mind under all circumstances, carefully arranged the details of the proposed venture. The men on the light-ship happened to have just such gear as was required for the purpose, and willingly lent it, including a cable's-length (120 fathoms) of stanch half-inch hemp line coiled in a tub, and a big shark-hook with several feet of chain, as well as some chunks of salt pork for bait. They likewise informed the boys that the threshers were probably the same school that had been reported the day before as greatly interfering with the fishermen off on Montauk Shoal.

Specimens of the genuine thresher-shark indeed these creatures were--those _Alopias vulpes_, or sea-foxes, the dorsal lobes of whose tails are nearly as long as the rest of their bodies, and are used in splashing the surface of the water to aid in securing their prey of small fish. Exceedingly grotesque in appearance they seemed sometimes, the upper lobe of the long tail curving upwards and resembling in form the blade of a scythe. One of the men on the light-ship said he had always heard them called "swingle-tails," and also volunteered the information that the biggest he had ever seen was one caught at Marion, Massachusetts, in November, 1864, which measured thirteen feet long and weighed about 400 pounds. Some people believed that they attacked whales, but he had seen them all up and down the North Atlantic coast, as well as in the Mediterranean and off California, and "in all his going to sea he had never found a whale yet that wouldn't laugh at a thresher." The most damage they did was to fishermen's nets and lines.

The threshing and splashing of the fish had attracted the attention of a great flock of gulls as the boys headed the _Katie_ once more toward the scene of activity; and in the bright sunlight, with the glinting slippery bodies of some of the threshers almost constantly visible, the spray flying, and the bead-eyed sea-birds fluttering and watching overhead, the picture was rather a thrilling one. They were both determined enough in their intentions, yet when they actually arrived upon the scene and a thresher of apparently abnormal size rushed to meet them with a resounding slap of his tail upon the surface of the water that sent the foam flying skyward and seemed like a laughing defy to their plans, even the cool-blooded Walter began to feel a little excitement.

This selfsame thresher lost no time in making good his challenge, but swallowed the bait, and ran off with it away to windward so rapidly that it seemed as if he were going to tow the boat, which was again got full and by on the port tack. Walter was now paying out the line as slowly as he could, with a turn under a belaying-pin, as he made the first remark recorded in this sketch. But it soon became evident that something would have to be done if they did not wish to be towed to sea, so Harry ported his helm to let the boat fall off and endeavor to check the creature in its mad career. As the wind came more abeam, however, so did the shark, and instead of making leeway, the attraction to windward was so powerful that the situation looked almost dangerous, and as if the only way to counteract the shark's tow-line was to let it over the stem with a free sheet. It was just a question, however, whether even then the boat might not be drawn astern, and Walter was actively considering the advisability of cutting the line, when all at once the fish took a turn and once more made toward them.

"Head her up again, quick!" shouted Walter. "Down your helm. He's coming!"

The boat had fortunately way enough to bring her quickly up into the wind as Harry shoved his tiller hard over to starboard and hauled in his sheet, then jumped to help his friend get in the slack of the line as the infuriated monster dashed toward them. He was not a moment too soon. Had the boat not changed direction and forged ahead a little the wildly rushing thresher would have struck it a terrific blow on the port-quarter. As it was, he passed the boys with a leap clear out of water that sent a tremendous splash of spray in their faces, and just missed the boom as he dived astern. It was a thrilling moment; but, indeed, the whole affair, from the time the shark first swallowed the bait, seemed to have happened in less time than one could tell it.

"By jingo!" cried Walter. "What's he going to do next?"

They had not long to wait for a reply. Circling around to seaward, the thresher repeated exactly the same manoeuvre, this time a streak of bloody foam following in his wake. The boys had all they could do to handle the boat in consonance with the shark's movements. As he madly rushed ahead, the line began to smoke from its friction with the rail at the velocity it paid out, and Harry again had to leave his helm to bail water and pour it upon the hempen coils, so quickly snaking out, with the threat of possible disaster when the tub should be emptied. Walter's hands were burned and blistered and raw in spots from contact with the flying line, in a vain endeavor this time to grasp it and get a turn around a pin. The fish went too fast. The boys looked at each other, too excited to speak, as they glanced at the rapidly emptying tub and the flying streak of blue foam ahead. Another instant and the line was all paid out. The last coil of it swirled over the side as they both grasped the tub with all their might to see if they could hold it. The end of the line was made fast to the tub. It might have been a dangerous thing to do, for if the line had parted under the strain, and hit one of them a blow with its rebounding end, it would have been a severe one. But fortunately this shark felt the check, and with a mighty splash he turned again and made back towards them.

"Haul in and coil down for all you're worth!" commanded Walter, as he heaved a sigh of relief, and applied his bleeding hands vigorously to getting the slack of the line inboard again.

The shark did not come toward them so directly as before, and the boat had not so much way on, so that they were able to finally get the line taut and a turn taken beneath a pin again. The strain was maintained anxiously for a few minutes, when the thresher took another sudden rush for their port-quarter. With all the vigor acquired by his momentary rest he leaped again clear out of water, and as the boys rapidly hauled in the line a strange thing happened. The strain came suddenly upon the leaping thresher, and brought such a snapping jaw upon his jaws that he actually turned a complete somersault in the air before he sank again beneath the surface astern, and as the line paid out once more the sweat streamed from the faces and bodies of the daring fisher-lads.

"We can't keep this up," said Walter, as he hugged his sore hands.

"What can we do?" questioned Harry.

The question was answered by the tooting of a naphtha-launch's whistle. The crew of the light-ship had been watching the _Katie_ through glasses, and divining their predicament, had hailed a passing yacht, which promptly sent the launch to see the fun and assist if necessary. The assistance was gladly welcomed, and after a spirited pull and a vast amount of powerful splashing in his dying agonies, the thresher was finally got alongside and the death-blow given with a boat-hook. The boys sailed back to Newport with jubilant hearts, and their prize in tow. He was a monster of his species, measuring nearly fourteen feet from tip to tip. And the sea-gulls followed them home with cheering screams!

THE SUMMER ANGEL.

Everybody knows what the funny man in the daily newspapers means by the "summer girl."

She is supposed to be a giddy and frivolous creature who wears mannish or boyish clothes. She is not a fine young woman. If she has noble and womanly traits, she is supposed to pack them away carefully in tar-paper and camphor with her furs for winter use at home.

Sometimes she is amusing. Often she is pretty and bright. She is always stylish.

It was such a description that happened to fall into the hands of a real summer girl who sat leaning against a rock basking in the sun at a mountain resort, and it set her to thinking.

She had been coming to this same place ever since she could remember, and the people of the little village on the mountain-side had seen her growing, like a tall rare flower of the conservatory, taller and handsomer each year. They had watched her pass their doors, but they had not known her.

It happened that she had been reading a description of the summer girl as wearing just such a hat and gown as hers--"nobby," and "fetching," and "chic." She had the same piquant face, and was said to pass like an annual vision of beauty before the delighted eyes of the poor mountain folk whom she had seen all her life and did not know.

This was all, but it startled her. It was as if the writer had known her--from the outside. Of course he didn't know her true heart and her refined inward nature, else he wouldn't have made her talk slang and paint her face. No, it was only an accidental likeness. But it set her to thinking, and while she thought her eyes happened to fall upon the door of a log cabin upon the mountain-side beneath her. The cabin was unpainted, poor, and shabby.

An old woman sat at the door sewing. A lame boy was coming up the walk from the village of the summer cottagers. He carried two empty pails in his hands, and he limped. He had been carrying milk to the summer people--probably to her own home.

She suddenly realized that she had always seen this boy here, and that he seemed never to have grown. He looked now as he had looked certainly for seven years. For the first time in her life this pathetic little crippled figure stood out before her as a real living, human person; not only a part of the summer landscape, like a gnarled and stunted tree, but a living, breathing, suffering, human creature, who was patiently living his poor life, carrying buckets of milk down the mountain, and trudging slowly back, day after day, year after year.

What was his name, his story? How came the ugly hump upon his narrow back? Were the people in the log cabin his own kindred? Were they good to him?

Why had she never wondered before, and found out? So in the breast of a real, sweet womanly summer girl awoke a new interest in the humble people of the mountain.

When she finally rose and started homeward she took the long foot-path leading past the mountaineer's door. She paid the old woman, who still sat patching, a real visit, and when she left she was asked to call again. So began the first of a number of humble friendships.

The "boy" with the hump she discovered to be forty years old, but he was still a child, for the illness that had deformed his body had laid a blight upon his mind too. Ho could carry the milk-buckets and bring the cows, and he could sing. He could even remember from summer to summer, and after a while he knew who it was who sent him pictures of beautiful things and a warm coat, and had been teaching him slowly to learn to read. Indeed, it was he who first called her the "summer angel," but he only half knew what he was saying. She looked like his ideal of an angel, and she came every summer. And the name, once given, clung to her.

So, in one instance, began to develop one of the sweetest types of the summer girl. She is not the one the funny man likes to describe, but there are many of her, and her number is growing.

In many poor little country villages the coming of the sweet, healthy, and helpful summer girl means the coming of new life and new interests to the village folk, who know the great world only through its summer representatives. There are more girls than boys who go to summer towns, because many boys have duties in the city.

If every summer-girl would resolve that to some one, at least, she would come as a summer angel, brightening and helping, what joy would the season bring? Her helpfulness may be of any kind whatever. It may be lending books or papers to such people as scarcely ever have them, or reading to some old person in a busy household.

A dozen wide-awake clever girls who are banded together can accomplish wonders. They can get up tableaux in the hotel parlor or farm-house sitting-room, charging from ten to twenty-five cents admittance to raise money to buy a horse for the old coachman, whose horse has just died. They might even help to cure a lame horse or dog on his own account, if they are real summer angels. They can send magazines all the year round to special "shut-in" people whom they discover.

They can have a very good time among themselves too. They can compare and exchange specimens of pressed wild flowers or sea-weeds or shells. They can write to the ROUND TABLE, and tell what they are doing, and perhaps their letters, if they are fairly well written, and show a serious purpose, will be printed. Then others may join the "summer sisterhood," and form small circles in out-of-the-way places.

RUTH MCENERY STUART.

THE CARE OF A DOG.

BY JAMES STEELE.

There are dogs and dogs, of course, and while some members of the canine family are gifted with the capacity of looking after themselves, because they cannot help it, and to all appearances thrive well when combating hardships, a good dog is worth all the care and trouble that his master may choose to expend upon him. This article is not intended to tell how to rear delicate dogs, but simply to give an idea how to make your canine friend and companion more happy and contented, and to give him a start in life.

In looking to his comfort, the first thing to take up is the dog's home. Every one is familiar with the little house to which is attached a poor, unhappy specimen of the dog tribe, with a heavy collar about his neck and a jangling chain that admits of a few feet of freedom and is suggestive of confinement. Now, bear this in mind, no dog is happy when chained up; thus we take up the kennel first.

Dogs are liable to many ailments that afflict human beings. Rheumatism is a common disease with them, and they suffer from cold and heat and lack of shade and warmth quite as much as they suffer from lack of proper food and drink. Thus a dog owner is responsible for his dog's health, and this means a great deal, for if a human being's good spirits depend upon the way they feel, surely a dog's do also.

A kennel's first essential should be dryness; next, warmth and ventilation. To secure all this, the floor of a dog-house should always be raised off the ground. Especially is this true where the dog is young or in the state of puppyhood. Dampness is his foe. A good idea is to have the dog-house elevated at least six inches, and have the opening front upon the exercising yard, where the dog can have plenty of room to play and jump about without being hampered by a fraying, dangling chain.

Although we learn from the old adage that "dogs delight to bark and bite," this is not true. The dog is naturally gregarious, and loves companionship of his own kind. Therefore, two dogs are happier than one. If they are allowed to be together continually, each appears to adapt himself to the other's disposition, and it is only those who seldom meet their kind that love to fight.

We will suppose that a kennel is to be built for one dog, for instance. He should have a yard of at least fifteen feet square to run about in, and opening on this should be a dog-house with two entrances, that could be shut in case of cold weather.

Fleas are the great enemies of a dog's comfort. The poor beast, whose thoughts and actions are interrupted constantly by a desire to scratch or nibble fruitlessly at the irritating little enemy to peace, is to be pitied. A great deal can be done, in constructing a dog-house, to do away with the pest. If possible, the floor and sides of the house itself should be made of good red cedar. For some reason, dogs domiciled in houses made or lined with this wood are almost entirely free from fleas, and this is a good thing to keep in mind.

It does not pay to give a dog hay or straw to sleep on, and old carpets or blankets should not appear in any well-regulated kennel. Appended are diagrams and drawings of a house and yard for one dog. It can be enlarged or diminished, as may be necessary.

There is not space in this article to go into the subject of dogs' diseases and ailments. If a dog is ill, he needs a physician as much as you or I. In his puppyhood he is liable to distemper and mange--the childish diseases that carry off so many of his kind. But once safely through them, if he is well looked after, he can count upon a happy existence of from ten to twelve years if his master is kind and considerate.

Now let us suppose that the dog or dogs, whose proper care and bringing up we are to treat of, are of that intelligent and useful class known as sporting or hunting dogs, setters or pointers, and there are no finer kinds to have about even if their owner does not possess a gun or lives far from a game country. It is these dogs' first and natural instinct to have their attention arrested by the peculiar scent that attaches itself to game birds and animals. Most sporting dogs have to be taught to discriminate and to learn that chickens and sparrows are things to be left alone, however.

Now, to bring up a dog successfully his master should study the animal's character and individuality, and adapt himself to him the way a teacher should try to adapt himself to a pupil's natural gifts. There are ambitious dogs, bright dogs, lazy dogs, and dunces, and to make anything of the last requires both time and patience. It is a good dog's natural instinct to endeavor to please his master; he is conscious of the encouragement of praise, and knows well when he has not done his duty. It is firmly believed by many that dogs have a conscience, and proof is not wanting to substantiate this theory.