'you get past it?"

"Right across there, almost in a straight line. We'll run it, next week,
in Ham's yacht. Splendid weak-fishing, right in the mouth of that inlet,
on the ocean side."

"Hurrah!" exclaimed Ford. "I'm in for that. Is the bay deep?"

"Not very," replied Dabney, "but it gets pretty rough sometimes."

Ford was getting red in the face, just then, with his unaccustomed
exercise, and his friend added:

"You needn't pull so hard. We're almost there. Hullo! if there isn't
Dick Lee in his dry-goods box! That boat'll drown him, some day, and his
dad, too. But just see him pull in crabs!"

Ford came near "catching" one more as he tried to turn around for the
look proposed, exclaiming:

"Dab, let's get to work as quick as we can. They might go away."

"Might fly?"

"No; but don't they go and come?"

"Well, you go and drop the grapnel over the bows, and we'll see 'em come
in pretty quick."

The grapnel, or little anchor, was thrown over quickly enough, and the
two boys were in such an eager haste that they had hardly a word to say
to Dick, though he was now but a few rods away.

Now it happened that when Ford and Dab came down to the water that
morning, each of them had brought a load. The former had only a neat
little japanned tin box, about as big as his head, and the latter,
besides his oars, carried a seemingly pretty heavy basket.

"Lots of lunch, I should say," had been Ford's mental comment; but he
had not thought it wise to ask questions.

"Plenty of lunch, I reckon," thought Dab at the same time, but only as a
matter of course.

And they were both wrong. Lunch was the one thing they had both
forgotten.

But the box and the basket?

Ford Foster came out, of his own accord, with the secret of the box, for
he now took a little key out of his pocket and unlocked it with an air
of "Look at this, will you?"

Dab Kinzer looked, and was very sure he had never before seen quite such
an assortment of brand-new fish-hooks, of many sorts and sizes, and of
fish-lines which looked as if they had thus far spent their lives on dry
land.

"Tip-top!" he remarked. "I see a lot of things we can use one of these
days, but there isn't time to go over 'em now. Let's go for the crabs.
What made you bring your box along?"

"Oh," replied Ford, "I left my rods at home, both of 'em. You don't
s'pose I'd go for a crab with a rod, do you? But you can take your pick
of hooks and lines."

"Crabs? Hooks and lin