"Thought so! Fifty fathoms!" He prepared at once to set the trawl. Dropping the outer jib and mainsail, he jogged slowly before the wind under the jumbo, or inner jib. "Now let her go!" Over splashed the buoy, an empty pickle-keg, painted red, and drifted astern. Next, down went the light anchor. As soon as it reached bottom Jim lifted the first tub of trawl to the wash-board. Then with the heaving-stick, eighteen inches long and whittled to a point, he began to flirt overboard the coils lying in the tub. Percy, holding the lantern, watched the steady stream of gangings and herring-baited hooks follow one another over the side and sink astern. In a surprisingly short time the tub was empty, and the five hundred fathoms of trawl, with more than a hook to a fathom, lay in a long, straight line on the muddy bottom, three hundred feet below. A second tub trailed after the first, its trawl being attached to the end of the other. The four remaining tubs followed in order. At the junction of the second and third a buoy was fastened, and another between the fourth and fifth. To the end of the trawl from the sixth and last tub was tied another anchor, and as soon as it had reached bottom the last buoy was cast over. They had set almost three and a half miles of trawl, bearing more than thirty-one hundred short, baited lines. "And there's a good job done!" exclaimed Jim, as the last buoy floated astern. "Here's to a ten-pound hake on every hook!" "Do you often catch as many as that?" inquired Percy, innocently. Jim laughed. "Hardly! We'll be more than lucky if we get a tenth of that number." Day was now breaking. The night wind had died out and, save for the long, oily swells, the sea was absolutely calm. Jim started the engine and swung the _Barracouta_ round, and they ran leisurely back to the other end of the trawl, meanwhile eating the lunch Filippo had put up for them. Soon they were close to the first red buoy. "Now for business!" said Jim. He stepped into the dory. "Guess you know enough about automobiles, Whittington, to handle this engine. Keep the sloop close by and watch me haul. You can take your turn when I get tired." Gaffing the buoy aboard, he pulled up the anchor, and soon was hauling in the trawl over the wooden roller on the starboard bow. Percy watched with all his eyes. This was real fishing. As the line came in Jim coiled it smoothly down into an empty tub on a stand in the bow. The first three hooks were skinned clean. "Something down there, at any rate," he commented. The trawl sagged heavily. "First fish, and a good-sized one! Pretty logy, though! Feels like a hake!" Percy stared down into the blackish-green water. Out of its gloomy depths rose an indistinct shadow, gradually assuming definite shape. A blunt, lumpy head with big, staring eyes broke the surface; two long streamers hung from beneath the lower jaw. Jim reached for his gaff. "Hake! And a good one, too!"