Part 27 (1/2)
Colin didn't know, but he thanked his host heartily, and then turned to the Deputy Commissioner
”What is it, Colin?” he was asked
”Please, sir,” the boy replied, ”you haven't said anything about my chances in the Bureau”
The Fisheries official looked straight at hirade, well-trained ood ichthyological schools And no ot to have the practical experience and the grit behind it If you show in this trip that you're e work is up to standard, I'll promise you a sue You'll be advanced just exactly as fast as you deserve, and not a bit faster If you want to go into the Bureau your record will be watched, and you'll sink or swim by that!”
”Very well, sir,” said Colin, a little taken aback by this straight-from-the-shoulder statement ”I'll dohis new chief, hurried excitedly to the hotel where his fa to tell of his success and of the unexpected addition of the Florida trip
His father was quite well satisfied that the boy should have so pleasant an initiation into the life he had chosen, and was quite content that this semi-holiday opportunity had arisen instead of hard work in one of the hatchery stations Major Dare felt that Colin had already had a strenuous su a little less adventurous before beginning his college work
The evening that the lad spent with the scientist-artist was a revelation to him, for his host not only knew the life of the bottoh he had always lived there, but he was a lass, and possessed soile sea forms, all of which had been nified many times and were more beautiful even than any the boy had ever seen pictured
There were no half-way ed Mr
Collier to lend hi the days that were to elapse before starting on the trip, he could get an idea of the life histories of sea ane His friend was both aerness
Mrs Dare had visited friends in the Berive Colin estions which he found went far to increase the pleasure of his stay A ed, and Major Dare liked his son's new friend i established between the two men, so that Colin's departure for Bermuda was under the happiest auspices He soon learned that the museum curator was not only an authority on his own subject of marine invertebrates, but that he was interested to the utmost in all sorts of affairs, and he admitted confidentially to the boy that he was an inveterate baseball fan Best of all, perhaps, Colin gained fro that science and scholarshi+p were ts whereby one ood there is in the world
”Enthusiasm,” Mr Collier said, ”is one of the best forces I know A boy without enthusiasm is like a firecracker without a fuse The powder ht, but it will never have a chance to make itself heard”
The lesser-known life of the sea, in which the boy's interest was centered for the especial purposes of this trip, see than that of fishes and the voyage to Bermuda was practically a continuous revelation of wonders The scientist realized that he had not only an assistant, but a disciple, and went to reat characteristics, his interest was always so genuine and so thorough that others would do everything they could to help hihted for the first tiht he had never seen a ht Compared to Santa Catalina, the islands lay low and without sharp contrast, no cliffs rising bluff upon the shore, nopurple in the distance The land was parched--for it was late in the su after the gigantic forests of California The ”beautiful Ber as the steamer passed St David's Head Moreover, as they stea the north shore, the sa sea-front of black, honeyco character, the rare patches of sandy beach and sparse sunburned vegetation see Grassy Bay, however, past the navy yard and rounding Hog-fish Beacon, the sun caured As the steaan to run between the islands in the channel, the undulating shores showed themselves as hills and valleys in miniature The bare, white spots were revealed as white coral houses set in lealinted fro through a translucent geth of the Great Sound and had warped into Ha to adht be quite a pretty place
But he could not have believed the transfor Freed frolare of the waterfront of Hamilton and on the road to Fairyland Bay, he seemed to have entered a neorld It was a Paradise of Flowers, even the Golden State could not outdo it Hedges of scarlet hibiscus flaainvillea poured down froe-porches, while oleander in radiant blooh for as much as half a mile at a stretch At one moment the road would pass a dense banana plantation with the strange tall poles of the pa trees standing sentinel, the next it would pass the dark recesses of a rove bay, where the sea ebbs and flows a roots And at frequent intervals a slight rise of ground would show the eht
”'The land where it is always afternoon,'” quoted Mr Collier softly, as they drove up to the house where they were to stay, a s a narrow fiord of rock, into which the translucent water rippled Beyond, upon the glea bay rested three or four tiny islands
”It's almost the loveliest place I ever saw,” said Colin; ”but it isn't as grand and wild as Santa Catalina”
”I never want to leave Bermuda,” said the other; ”every time I visit the islands I decide that some day I must come and live here And even when I a seeramme, Mr Collier?” asked Colin, after lunch, when they were comfortably settled
”You are at liberty this afternoon,” was the reply, ”as I have a nuet a gliood use of your time You ride a wheel, of course?”
”Oh, yes”
”Then walk into Ha is the only way to see Bero to Devil's Hole this afternoon and see the fish there Try and persuade the old keeper of the place to talk, and if you can get hiood deal about Ber on this advice, Colin strolled into the little city and rented a bicycle The roads, he found, were perfect for wheeling, there being only one hill too steep for riding, but in spite of all that he had heard about the absence of distances, it see should enable hith of thea camera with him, he took snapshots recklessly everywhere, each turn in the road seeive a picture more attractive than the last He was to find, however, that the charraphic plate
On the way to Devil's Hole, taking the south-shore road, Colin had an opportunity of noticing its a contrast to the north shore, which had see as the steamer caher cliffs, rocks jutting out boldly into the sea, with the waves boiling over the up the spray, wide stretches of fine white sand, and as far as the eye could see, small circular atolls of coral level with the surface of the water He paused for a little while at the house where the Irish poet, Thoovernment employee on the island, and--like every visitor--he sat for a while under the famous Calabash Tree, renowned in verse Nor did he fail to visit the marvelous stalactite caves of which Berhted with electricity to display their wonders The boy was greatly interested in the most recently discovered one of all, where the stalactites branch like trees in a h he wished to investigate this problem, Colin's objective point was the Devil's Hole; and fish, not stalactites, were his first consideration
Devil's Hole was a strange place Lying inland, a little distance froton Sound, and with no visible connection with the sea, it seemed a creation of its own It was a pool, sunk in a bower of trees, almost exactly circular and over sixty feet deep Silent and reflecting every detail of trees and sky above, the dark water was filled with fishes ofnear the surface or in its depths Underground channels connected it with the Sound, that great inland sea of Bermuda, and the water in the pool ebbed and floith the tide, changing in level, however, but a couple of inches A tiny bridge spanned the water