The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-12-11

they go, pulling steadily and as easily as if they were rowing on a mill pond. up the long hills of gray and green. poising a moment on the sharp tops, and disappearing utterly in the hollow beyond, to climb up again and sink until they anchor at last, black specks, mile and more away from their house and home"
 It Is no weather for dories to be out: and many a skipper watches the growing sea and the whistling, strain ing wind anxiously from his leaping smack. But time is growing short. If the smack Is to have a full fare, she must get 1t now or never. in order to get 1t to the Christmas market.
 The Gamble With the Sea.
 So, weighing the chances of his ma rine dice with keen and instant de- cision, the fisherman gambles with the sea- and for unequal stakes. Against the fish that are staked by the gray old sea, the men stake lusty, brave young life.
 Harder and harder blows the wind ..
 The clear-cut rim of sea and sky In the north has insensibly grown trifle dull. Only the eye of a seagull or a
 fisherman could see the difference. But
 presently from schooner after schoon-
  home call to their dories.
 Specks appear, converging on the
 semi-circle of anchored vessels, grow from specks to tiny black shapes and | from shapes to dories, streaming home l in answer to the warning signals. Before the rearmost have more than come into fair sight, the thing that brewed in the north is on them white. blinding, a driving snow storm, 1 biting with the cold of the Labrador current.
 Now ring bells. blow horns. sound gun and pistol, The fishing fleet of the Grand Bank has lost too many men in the snow storms of the past to take | a chance. Too many Christmas mar kets have been supplied by vessels that came in with flag at half mast. while somewhere in the unknown plains of
 sea drifted their dories with men turn | ing frozen faces toward the staring | passionless Atlantic sky
 Dory after dory, with frosted white | figures in them and soft white mounds covering their fish. glide out of the storm and lie under our lee to toss their catch on deck and call out their scores before the men scramble heav- fly on deck and shake off the ringing Ice that covers them from eye lashes | to feet.
 | HOmewnrd Bound at Last. | The fish, herding fathoms deep, un-
 disturbed by the gale overhead, have .been biting we'll The piles grow high
 on deck with each dorys load. And
 when the cleaning and icing down is done that night, all hands stretch themselves happily to sleep with the knowledge that the next day will see | the riding sail replaced by the great mainsail. and that before noon the craft | will be gliding and sliding over the
 restless seas, bound west by south for port.
 | But 1t is no yachting cruise that awaits them. Between the Banks and Gloucester, Boston and New York fish markets Is a rolling ocean drunken with wintry temper. Before the fish ermen of America make the twin lights
 of Thatcher's Island. the steady eye of Minot's Lodge the welcome soft shine of the stepping Stones that tell Hell | Gate Is near, or the fierce winking of 1 Sandy Hook that shoots it's electric
 beam over thirty miles of sea, there will be frozen sails cracking like g board when they are moved, and ropes | of ice instead of manila hemp, ant decks glaring with sleet. There vii l be driving through arching seas anc | scudding before gales that DION
 straight down from Greenland. But the girls at home are pulling or 1 the tow rope; rolling, lurching on hel sides like q slipping horse, dipping into the trough headfrst like a wrestler tumblfng. she goes smoking through it Scared and frosted and salted and q | little shattered, she lies behind the long
 wharves of Boston town or in tC snug. populous square wooden cove of Fulton Market at last.
 Winch and windlass chatter, baskets flop into her hold and come up. twist ing slowly heaped with silvery loads Outside the wagons wait to carry the Christmas fish through the green anC
 red decorated town. And the skipper emerges from the cabin, transformed from an oilskin- clad merman into 2 spick and span person rigged in tho latest style of shore togs. to go anC see his girl. and tell her that they haC an ordinary cruise with nothing hap pening that was worth mentioning.
 The minister of the interior at San tiago. Chile. has granted a concession | for extending the railroad across tn I Cordilleras to Mendoza, Arengins
 Chile guarantees the interest paymen