“I wonder if they mind it,” he once remarked to the captain.  “Do you suppose they think of their little baby sturgeons, and how they are getting along?”

“Guess they don’t bother much about it, lad,” was the reply.  “They haven’t enough sense fer that.  They are like a lot of people who are willin’ to be led around by the nose jist like that big feller out there.  He is always swimmin’ around, but he gits nowhere.  He soon comes to the end of his rope, and yet he keeps on swimmin’ the same as before.”

The day this conversation took place, the wind was blowing in strong from the northwest, and the captain was making ready for a trip to his nets.  Soon the boat was speeding up the river, with her sail full spread to the stiff breeze.  Having reached the cove and taken a number of fish from the nets, they began to beat homeward.  By this time the wind had increased in strength, and as they ran backwards and forwards across the river, they were continually washed by the waves which raced to meet them.

“Isn’t this great!” Rod exclaimed, as he nestled in the cock-pit, and held on firmly lest he should be swept overboard.  “I was never out in such a breeze as this before.”

The captain made no reply, though he gave a quick glance at the boy’s animated face.  If Rod had been frightened, the old seaman would have been terribly disappointed.  As for himself he was in his element, and he was reminded of the many times he had faced rough weather out on the mighty deep.  The howling of the wind, and the dashing waves made the sweetest of music in his ears, and he was delighted that the boy, on whom he had set his affections, should feel as he did.

They had just tacked and begun beating to the left, when the captain, glancing down the river, gave a start of surprise, and pointed with his finger to a small yacht in mid-stream, which was having a hard time in the wind.

“She’s got too much sail fer a breeze like this,” he remarked.  “If she isn’t well managed, she’ll go over.  Now, look at that!” he cried, grasping the tiller with a firmer grip, so as to be ready for any sudden emergency.  “My, that was a close call.  A little more and she’d a been on her beam ends.”

Hardly had he finished speaking, when a furious squall struck the staggering yacht, and like a wounded eagle she reeled, and flopped her big sail into the rough water.  With a roar which might have been heard a long distance off, the captain brought the Roaring Bess almost up to the teeth of the wind, and headed her for the wreck.  How her sharp prow did tear through the waves, and at times she was almost smothered by the leaping water.  But this course would not bring them to the overturned boat.  It was necessary for them to tack once more, and as they drew near they could see people clinging frantically to the half-submerged yacht.  The captain gave a loud shout of encouragement when he came within speaking