le about, making preparation to let down the gear whenever the
Admiral should give the signal.

"We carry two sorts of trawl-nets, Andrew," said the captain to his
mate, who was like-minded in all respects, "and I think we have caught
some men to-day with one of 'em--praise the Lord!"

"Yes, praise the Lord!" said the mate, and apparently deeming this, as
it was, a sufficient reply, he went about his work in silence.

The breeze freshened. The shades of night gathered; the Admiral gave
his signal; the nets were shot and the Short Blue fleet sailed away into
the deepening darkness of the wild North Sea.

Note. Since that day additional vessels have been attached to the
Mission-fleet, which now, 1886, consists of five smacks--and will
probably, ere long, number many more--all earning their own maintenance
while serving the Mission cause. But these do by no means meet the
requirements of the various North Sea fleets. There are still in those
fleets thousands of men and boys who derive no benefit from the Mission
vessels already sent out, because they belong to fleets to which
Mission-ships have not yet been attached; and it is the earnest prayer
of those engaged in the good work that liberal-minded Christians may
send funds to enable them not only to carry on, but to extend, their
operations in this interesting field of labour.

CHAPTER TEN.

A STRONG CONTRAST--A VICTIM OF THE COPER.

Birds of a feather flock together, undoubtedly--at sea as well as on
land. As surely as Johnston, and Moore, and Jim Frost, and such men,
hung about the mission-ship--ready to go aboard and to have a little
meeting when suitable calms occurred, so surely did David Bright, the
Swab, and other like-minded men, find themselves in the neighbourhood of
the Coper when there was nothing to be done in the way of fishing.

Two days after the events narrated in the last chapter, the Swab--whose
proper name was Dick Herring, and who sailed his own smack, the _White
Cloud_--found himself in the neighbourhood of the floating grog-shop.

"Get out the boat, Brock," said Herring to his mate--who has already
been introduced to the reader as Pimply Brock, and whose nose rendered
any explanation of that name unnecessary; "take some fish, an' get as
much as you can for 'em."

The Swab did not name what his mate was to procure in barter with the
fish, neither did Brock ask. It was an old-established order, well
understood.

Soon Brock and t