and from France; caviar from Russia; shrimp which comes from Florida,
Mississippi, and Georgia, or salmon from Alaska, and Puget Sound, and
the Columbia River.

Take the obituaries of fishermen. "In his prime, it is said, there was
not a better skipper in the Gloucester fishing fleet." Take disasters
to schooners, smacks, and trawlers. "The crew were landed, but lost
all their belongings." New vessels, sales, etc. "The sealing schooner
_Tillie B._, whose career in the South Seas is well known, is reported
to have been sold to a moving-picture firm." Sponges from the
Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. "To most people, familiar only
with the sponges of the shops, the animal as it comes from the sea
would be rather unrecognisable." Why, take anything you please! It is
such stuff as stories are. And as you eat your fish from the store how
little do you reck of the glamour of what you are doing!

However, as it seems to me unlikely that a man of genius will be a fish
reporter shortly I will myself do the best I can to paint the tapestry
of the scenes of his calling. The advertisement in the newspaper read:
"Wanted--Reporter for weekly trade paper." Many called, but I was
chosen. Though, doubtless, no man living knew less about fish than I.

The news stands are each like a fair, so laden are they with magazines
in bright colours. It would seem almost as if there were a different
magazine for every few hundred and seven-tenth person, as the
statistics put these matters. And yet, it seems, there is a vast, a
very vast, periodical literature of which we, that is, magazine readers
in general, know nothing whatever. There is, for one, that fine, old,
standard publication, _Barrel and Box_, devoted to the subjects and the
interests of the coopering industry; there is, too, _The Dried Fruit