“Rather!” said Joe.  “That’s what I call—­um—­being useful in the world.  Bet you he’s a fine sort.  Bound to be, eh?”

“I’d like to make a trip with him,” said Perry.  “Gee, but it would be some sport, wouldn’t it?  Talk about finding adventures!  Bet you he has ’em by the hundreds.”

“I dare say,” said Phil, “that he’d be glad to dispense with a good many of them.  Hope I haven’t bored you, fellows,” he added, returning to his book.

“You haven’t, old scout,” answered Han.  “Any time you learn anything as interesting as that, you spring it.  Blamed if it doesn’t sort of make a fellow want to be of more use in the world.  Guess I’ll polish some brass!”

They passed many of those islands during the next few days, lonely, rock-girt spots scantily clad with wild grass and wind-worried fir trees.  Sometimes there was a lighthouse, and nearly always the rocks were piled with lobster-traps, for lobstering is the chief industry of the inhabitants.  They touched at one small islet one afternoon and went ashore.  There were but three houses there, old, weather-faded shacks strewn around with broken lobster-pots and nets and discarded tin cans and rubbish.  The folks they met, and they met them all, from babes in arms to a ninety-eight-year-old great-grandmother, looked sad and listless and run-to-seed.  Even the children seemed too old for their years.  It was all rather depressing, in spite of the evident kindliness of the people, and the boys were glad to get away again.  They bought some lobsters and nearly a gallon of blueberries before they went.  Ossie declared afterwards that those lobsters looked to him a sight happier than the folks they had seen ashore!

They went eastward leisurely, making many stops, and had fine weather until they sighted Grand Manan.  Then a storm drove them to shelter one afternoon and they lay in a tiny harbour for two days while the wind lashed the ports and the rain drove down furiously.  Nothing of great interest happened, although the time went fast and pleasantly.  To be sure, there were minor incidents that Phil entered in the log-book he was keeping:  as when Han fell overboard one morning in a heavy sea when the Adventurer was reeling off her twelve miles and was pretty well filled with brine and very near exhaustion when he reached the life-buoy they threw him.  And once Ossie pretty nearly cut a finger off while opening a lobster.  And then there was the time—­it was during those two weather-bound days and everyone’s temper was getting a bit short—­when Perry cast aspersions on Ossie’s biscuits at supper.  Perry said they were so hard he guessed they were Ossie-fied, and the others laughed and Ossie got angry and they nearly came to blows:  would have, perhaps, had not Steve promised to throw them both overboard if they did!

They spent two days at Grand Manan, and Perry, who had never before been further from Philadelphia than the Adirondacks, was vastly thrilled when he discovered that Grand Manan was a part of New Brunswick.  “This,” he declaimed grandly as he stamped down on a clam-shell, “is the first time I’ve ever set foot on a foreign shore!”