The citizen. (Frederick City, Md.) 1895-1923, 1908-07-03

Breenlsh veil hung from the rim of
ais swollen and spotless helmet to his
shoulders, which were clad in a coat
pitted with an extraordinary number
Of pockets On the lower half of his
person he wore tweed knickerbockers
and cloth puttees with white spats.
A minnow net and camp-stool with
pneumatic seat were bound upon his
pack, and in his hands he carried a
sheaf of rods and a repeating rifle.
By his side young Boiling, with
oft of shark-line round his waist to
keep his shirt down and his trousers
up, and with plenty of tanned skin
visible, seemed figure of barbarism,
out the contrast was only external.
The Boston professor and the brown
Floridian were pupils at the same
school, and youth knew at first hand
some of the wonderful facts that age
had met only in textbooks.
The professor had come to study
marine animals, and when he met
Boiling on the beach and talked with
him, he beamed upon the tall, 1.-the
boy whose eye was as keen as a
heron's, and offered him three dollars
a day for his services. Five dollars
would not have been enough to Danish
the repugnance Boiling felt at first
sight of the knickerbockers and spats,
but when he found out the sort of
man the professor really was, he sur
rendered tO him oomplataIv
Those were pleasant days. They
explored reef and shore and pot-hole.
and gave each other of their own
knowledge and learned new lessons
together. One day they dropped an
Choir on shoal between two man
grove points, where the yellow CLINT
Of sand quivered up through the
water. 1t was warm there and pro-
tected, and many smaller species of
fish swan busily about in its COM
parative quiet. 1t was good collect
ing-ground. The professor, with eyes
swapping behind the green veil,
dropped close-meshed seine over the
side and began to draw it through
the water at the end of long bamboo
rod
Perhaps the light disturbance of it's
passage was the attraction. At any
rate, he had made but two OF three
attempts when broad underwater
shadow drew down upon the launch
and paused below the next, which the
professor in his curiosity held mo-
tionless.
What is that?" he asked, and
pointed.
Boiling looked over the gunwale
with no more than idle interest.
"What did you see? Where?" he
said. The shadow stirred at the mo-
ment, became more distinct and
Opaque, and the professor gazed down
with startled eyes at the rising bulk
of the most repulsive fish he had ever
seen.
Its the devil" exclaimed Boiling,
stepping back from the gunwale.
The professor had lost his rudy
color.
"Manta birostris!" he breathed.
He caught Boiling by the sleeve.
What are those big spots? What
they're eyes. Look at them"
The gigantic ray rose until scant
film of water protected it back, and
peered upward with cold eyes set
shallow and wide apart. For a mo-
ment it lay there, undulating like
sail in light air; then with a supple
folding of its huge pancake body, :.
curved downward and became
shadow again, that drifted over the
wavering yellow bottom and disap-
peared.
The professor drew long and sat
isfied breath, and looked up at the
sun, then across the topaz-hued
water.
Mature is wonderful" he said,
gently. I'VE must get that fellow"
Get the devil-fish." cried Boiling.
Certainly" said the professor.
"I've seen pictures and read descrip-
tons, but He waved the memory
of them aside contemptuously. Jim,
! never imagined anything like that
since l was small boy afraid of the
dark. Look here"
He held out his hand, and his fin
gers danced like the prongs of tun-
ing-fork.
I'm! You-all are scared" said
Boiling, appreciatively
Interested, jim, Excited" cried
the professor. Il don't know whether
I'm afraid or not. It's immaterial.
A ray twenty feet acrossl must get
that fish, dissect him, know every inch
OF his monstrous body before l do
anything else. Will you help me?'
Bolling's eyes suddenly glowed.
Sure I'll help you! You're game,
all right, professor This shoal would
be heap nicer If we beached that old
devil somewheres.
The ray, apparently so open in its
movements, proved difficult quarry.
1t seemed to have none of the activity.
the daring impetuosity of the game
fshes. Boiling and the professor,
quartering back and forth across the
shoal, with the engine down to the
quietest notch, saw nothing rise to
their mullet and glistening squares of
pork but an occasional dull sand
shark. Somewhere, basking placidly
upon the bottom, lay the devil-fish,
ana doubtless, with more or less regu-
larity, 1t moved about in the search
Ior food, but the occupants of the