om out on the water; an' ef they did,
distance wouldn't sarve us a bit. The Feweegins kin climb up the
steepest places, like squir'ls up a tree. Once seen by 'em, we'd stan'
no chance with 'em in a run. Ther'fore, we'd better abide quietly hyar.
Mebbe, arter all, they mayn't come ashore. 'Tain't one o' thar
landin'-places or we'd 'a' foun' traces of 'em. The trees would 'a'
been barked all about. Oh, I see what they're up to now. A fish-hunt--
surround wi' thar dogs. Thet's thar bizness in the cove."

By this, the four canoes have arrived at the entrance to the inlet, and
are forming in line across it at equal distances from one another, as if
to bar the way against anything that may attempt to pass outward. Just
such is their design, the fish being what they purpose enfilading.

At sight of them and the columns of ascending smoke, the pelicans and
other fishing-birds take flight in a chorus of screams, some to remain
soaring overhead, others flying altogether out of sight. The water is
left without a ripple, and so clear that the spectators on shore, from
their elevated point of view, can see to its bottom, all around the
shore where it is shallow. They now observe fish of several sorts
swimming affrightedly to and fro, and see them as plainly as through the
glass walls of an aquarium.

Soon the fish-hunters, having completed their "cordon," and dropped the
dogs overboard, come on up the cove, the women plying the paddles, the
men with javelins upraised, ready for darting. The little foxy dogs
swim abreast of and between the canoes, driving the fish before them, as
sheep-dogs drive sheep, one or another diving under at intervals to
intercept such as attempt to escape outward. For in the translucent
water they can see the fish far ahead, and, trained to the work, they
keep guard against a break from these through the enclosing line. Soon
the fish are forced up to the inner end of the cove, where it is
shoalest, and then the work of slaughter commences. The dusky
fishermen, standing in the canoes and bending over, now to this side,
now that, plunge down their spears and fizgigs, rarely failing to bring
up a fish of one sort or another; the struggling victim shaken off into
the bottom of the canoe, there gets its death-blow from the boys.

For nearly an hour the curious aquatic chase is carried on, not in
silence, but amid a chorus of deafening noises--the shouts of the
savages and the barking and yelpin