hooks; but,
instead, commenced darting through the water in various directions,
until they had got scattered about over the sea.

Was it fear of the predatory birds hovering above that was producing
this change in their tactics?

It could not be that. They did not appear to be acting under any alarm;
but rather as if prowling in search of something not yet visible either
to them or to those who were watching them from the deck of the
_Catamaran_.

Ben Brace and Snowball knew the fish were not frightened by the presence
of the birds; but William, whose experience of sea-life was more
limited,--although the albacores did not look alarmed,--thought,
doubtingly, that they were so.

"Surely," said he, appealing to his older companions, "such big fish
needn't be scared of them?"

As he put the interrogatory, he pointed upward to the two birds, now
within a hundred fathoms of the surface. "Surely they can't kill an
albacore? If they did, they could never swallow it, I should think?"

"'T ain't the albacore they be after," replied Ben Brace, "nor be the
albacore afeerd o' them,--not a bit. There be another sort o' fishes
not far away, though we can't see 'em. No more do these sky-blue chaps
as be swimming around us. They be now lookin' for 'em,--mighty sharp,
as ye see; an' they'll be sartin to scare 'em up in three shakes o' a
shark's tail."

"What other sort of fish?" inquired William.

"Flyin'-fish, lad; same's you an' I made our first meal on, when we wur
wellnigh starvin'. There's a school not far off. The frigates has
spied 'em from aloft, an' that's what's brought them hoverin' over.
They've seed the albacores too; and as they know that these preys on the
flyin'-fish, they've come down to be nearer thar game. Unless the
albacores get thar eyes on the winged fish, and run down among 'em,
there'll be no chance for the frigates. They can do nothin' till t'
other jumps 'em out o' the water. The sky-blues don't seem to see 'em
yet; but I dare say it'll not be long afore they do, judgin' by their
manoeuvres. Thar! Didn't I tell thee, lad? See yonder! They be off
after something."

As the sailor spoke, several of the albacores were seen suddenly heading
in a direction parallel to the course of the _Catamaran_ and passing
rapidly through the transparent water.

In an instant after, several white objects were seen springing up before
them, which, after glancing for a moment in the air, plunged back aga