down there now, and I want to
ask him if he won't let me go and join the Bureau of Fisheries."

"Well," the officer replied, "before you do that, I think you ought to
get some idea about the sort of work there is to do. It happens that one
of my brother's friends is on the Columbia River just now, making some
kind of experiment on salmon. He has a cottage not far from one of the
state hatcheries, and if you like, I'll give you a letter to him. If you
are really determined to enter the Bureau, you might stop on your way to
Santa Catalina and see the work from another point of view."

"I'd like to ever so much," said Colin, "but I couldn't very well go
uninvited."

"He'll be only too pleased to see you," was the reply; "he's a Westerner
like myself, and will enjoy putting you up for a day or two."

"It's right in my way, too," remarked Colin, yielding to his desire to
go.

"Quite a few of the steamers for 'Frisco stop at Astoria, at the mouth
of the Columbia River," the lieutenant suggested, "and the professor's
cottage is not more than half an hour from there, near the state
fish-hatching station at Chinook, Wash."

"Just across the river, then?"

"Exactly. The way I look at it, you're not at all likely to have
anything to do with fur seal if you go into the Bureau, certainly not
for a good many years. So you can't judge the Fisheries' scope from
that, and you ought to see the work that will probably fall to your
lot."

"Very well, sir," said the boy, "I'll go gladly, and thank you ever so
much."

"I'll drop a note to Professor Todd, then," the lieutenant said, nodding
as he turned away, "and as we may be delayed a few days in Valdez, the
letter will reach him before you will."

On their arrival at the Alaskan town, Colin learned that some time would
elapse before the trial of the Japanese prisoners, as the court would
not be in session until later in the summer, and he was told that when
his deposition had been taken, there would be no need to keep him as a
witness. Accordingly, after the boy had related the story of the
discovery and of his entire connection with the affair, he was told that
he might leave.

As the revenue officer had expected, within a week a steamer left Valdez
for San Francisco, calling at Astoria on the way, and Colin took passage
aboard. Aside from meeting on board an old shell collector, who taught
him a great deal about the principal valuable sea shells of the world,
the voyage wa