"How dreadful!" said Candace, her eyes measuring the long distance between the two points. "And it seems so far away. I suppose the young lady felt perfectly safe. I am sure I should have. Did it kill her?" "Oh, no! they thought at first it had, but it didn't turn out so bad as was expected. The soldiers, they felt mighty mean, I expect. You see, they didn't intend a mite of harm to her or anybody; but it just shows how far them big guns carry now-a-days. A war-ship now, unless she was some kind of a monitor or that, would stand a fair chance of being stove and sent to the bottom before she could get in to attack Newport." "What a fanny little house that is close down to the water!" remarked Candace, looking off to the opposite shore. "That's Professor Agassiz's laboratory. Do y' see that kind of a cove which sets in there near by the building, and a little black thing sticking up out of it? That's the pipe of his steam-launch. He and the rest go out in it and dredge for fish and such like, and then they experiment on them inside." "What do they do that for?" asked Candace. "Wa'al, they want to find out about 'em, I reckon. I was in there once and saw them at work, but I couldn't make nothing out of it, and there wasn't anybody I could ask." "Oh, what is that?" cried Candace, as the "Cornelia," tacking again, opened one of the little bays on the south end of Conanicut, where a small steam vessel was lying. Two boats, which seemed to belong to her, were rowing in a parallel line with each other, and behind them appeared a long line of bobbing points which she could not at all understand. "That's one of the fishing steamers, and the boats are drawing her nets," explained the Captain. "Didn't you ever see a seine drawn before? Wa'al, I declare! I'm mighty glad we happened just in time, for it's a cur'us spectacle. I guess we'll kind of hang about till they get the nets in, and then I'll take the 'Cornelia' up near enough for you to see." "Captain, there are the seine-boats out," called Tom Joy at the same moment. "Let's sail up and see what they've caught." The two boats began to near each other as they reached the limits of the long elliptical curves which made their course; and presently a great number of scintillating specks were seen in the space enclosed between them. There were the leaping fish, just conscious that they were crowded into a confined place, and desirous of escape. When they were quite close to one another, the boats turned and began to row for the steamer. The "Cornelia" followed; and the Captain with a twist of the tiller threw her into the wind just beyond the great net, which by that time was being rapidly hauled in.