[Sidenote: _AND RETURNS_] "Who be yu?" was the greeting from a rabble of youths who scuttled up and down the waters' edge to guide boats to their berths and gain first news of the catches. "Have 'ee see'd ort o' the _Shuteing Star_?" they shouted. "No-o-o-o!" "_I_ shan't go to bed till they comes in," said Uncle Jake. "Cuden' sleep if I did. '_Tis_ a craft! Her's so leaky as a sieve, lying dry all these years. Not but what her was a gude 'nuff li'l craft in her time--tu small for winter work. But I wishes 'em luck, I du." At last, the _Shooting Star_ did row in. They had not dared to sail her. She touched the beach before we glimpsed her, for all our watching. A crowd ran down to haul her up and to crack jokes on her. "Have 'ee catched ort, Harry?" "Tu or dree dizzen, an' half a ton o' coral an' some wild-crabs." "Did 'er sail well--keep up to the wind? Eh?" "Us rowed. 'Tis blowin' a gale out there." "What yu done to your nets?" "Broke 'em." "On to the bottom?" "Iss." "Why didn't 'ee go crab-fishing proper? Be 'ee going again?" The little Russan saw no joke. He bustled about the boat and replied: "A-course we be, if 'tis fit." "Well, I wishes 'ee luck then." We all wished luck to the _Shooting Star_--to that cranky old boatload of pluck, ill-luck, and ancient desperation. Said Uncle Jake: "I'd rather see they come in wi' a boatload o' herring than any boat along the beach. 'Tis a purty craft an' a purty crew, but they du desarve it." So said we all. 'Twas the least payment we could make for our entertainment. As soon as they were hauled up, Joe Barker lit his pipe, and, instead of going to bed, he went west along the shore, and carried up and sifted sand till dawn. "Jest what he be fit for now," Uncle Jake remarked. "That'll get 'en his bread an' baccy far sooner'n drifting for herring in thic _Shuteing Star_." But if we only could have looked into the _Shooting Star_ at sea. The _Shooting Star of Seacombe_! 6 "Us got 'em at last then!" so we tell one another. We have caught the catch of the season. For three or four days the hauls had been fairly good. Elsewhere on the coast, the snow, sleet, wind and wrecks continued. Here alone, in Seacombe Bay, it got colder and colder, and the sea became calmer and sunnier. "Tis like old days," Uncle Jake said while he spliced a new cut-rope to the drifter. "The herring be come again, in bodies, and the price be up. Us'll hae 'em." [Sidenote: _PAYING CALLS AT SEA_]