n much more serious than the hitting or missing of a brace of
wild fowl.

Out on the smooth waters of the bay, about a quarter of a mile from the
spit on which they stood, there were two boats. One was a light skiff,
in which a girl, clad in white jersey and white flannel skirt, with a
white Tam o' Shanter pinned on her head, was sculling leisurely towards
the town. From the swing of her body, the poise of her head and
shoulders, and the smoothness with which her sculls dropped in the water
and left it, it was plain that she was a perfect mistress of the art;
wherefore the two men looked at her, and admired.

The other craft was an ordinary rowing boat, manned by three lads out
for a spree. There was no one steering and the oars were going in and
out of the water with a total disregard of time. The result was that her
course was anything but a straight line. The girl's sculls made no
noise, and the youths were talking and laughing loudly.

Suddenly the boat veered sharply towards the skiff. The Englishman put
his hands to his mouth, and yelled with all the strength of his lungs.

"Look out, you idiots, keep off shore!"

But it was too late. The long, steady strokes were sending the skiff
pretty fast through the smooth water. The boat swerved again, hit the
skiff about midway between the stem and the rowlocks, and the next
moment the sculler was in the water. In the same moment two guns and two
ducks were flung to the ground, two jackets were torn off, two pairs of
shoes kicked away, and two men splashed into the water. Meanwhile the
sculler had dropped quietly out of the sinking skiff, and after a glance
at the two heads, one fair and the other dark, ploughing towards her,
turned on her side and began to swim slowly in their direction so as to
lessen the distance as much as possible.

The boys, horrified at what they had done, made such a frantic effort to
go to the rescue, that one of them caught a very bad crab; so bad,
indeed that the consequent roll of the boat sent him headlong into the
water; and so the two others, one of whom was his elder brother, perhaps
naturally left the girl to her fate, and devoted their energies to
saving their companion.

Both John Castellan and the Englishman were good swimmers, and the race
was a very close thing. Still, four hundred yards with most of your
clothes on is a task calculated to try the strongest swimmer, and,
although the student had swum almost since he could walk,