If the lion-hunter's rifle misses fire he loses his life, but if the steamship-hunter misses his game he loses most of his good name and all of his employment. Imagine, then, the studious skill he devotes to sweeping the wide field of ocean with his glasses. He knows that half a dozen other tug-loads of reporters are out on the same errand, and that if any of them "beat" him he'd better sail right down into Davy Jones's locker and lock it from the inside. The tug of a New York paper went down to the Quarantine Station at Staten Island on that very cold Friday evening three days before _La Gascogne_ was heard from. She was then eight days overdue. Three reporters and an artist were aboard the tug. They called at the telegraph office at Quarantine, and learned that nothing had been heard of the French ship from Sandy Hook or Fire Island. The only thing to do was to go down to the entrance of the Harbor and wait and hope--especially hope. Just before the steamship-hunters left the snug warm telegraph office the instruments began to sputter. The operator in the Sandy Hook tower was saying, "Wind blowing fifty-six miles an hour from the N. W." Two wise men, who had been to sea a few times, insisted on staying several miles inside of Sandy Hook, but the other man insisted a great deal harder on going. Off we went after a very short debate. The wind rattled the pilot-house windows, and if the door fell ajar a moment the breeze nearly whipped it off and blew it away. The bay was covered with floating ice. There were some cakes almost as big as a city block, and some looked tiny enough to put in a glass of water; but most of them were as long and wide as the deck of a big canal-boat. Every time one of the big fellows crunched against our bow we couldn't help wondering whether it was coming through. The moon flooded the vast field of white, and made it look as if we were sailing over a great prairie. Now and then we came to patches of clear blue water, and these danced in the moon's rays like giant turquoises. The tug's condensed steam rolled and bounded along, seeming like great masses of ivory. The intense cold caused this curious effect. Everything was fairylike, except the harsh grinding and cannonlike thumps of the ice. Off the point of Sandy Hook we were almost clear of ice. Nobody could see anything that looked like a steamship coming from the eastward. The ice had kept the water quiet, but here in the open it was heaving and pitching under the lash of the gale. We ran into the Horseshoe inside of Sandy Hook, trying to get up to the landing, so that if we had very late news to send we could telegraph it from Sandy Hook, instead of Quarantine, which was an hour to the north of us. Ice was packed and jammed so thick and tight inside the Horseshoe that not even an icicle could be pushed into it. After our tug narrowly escaped being caught and held fast for the night we backed out. No use trying to land.