tells that the great shoal is moving to its fate; then there is the wild
bustle among the whole fleet while the nets are hauled in; and then
comes the pleasant morning lounge after the fish are sold.

Roughit and Lance were always lucky, and made lots of money during the
summer and autumn. In winter times were harder for them. They mostly did
all their work in the daytime, and sent their fish round to their
customers in the afternoons. In the evenings they sat on the bench in
the tavern and smoked silently until the time came for expeditions of
another sort. The friends were great poachers, and they carried on
their operations like a pair of vicious and well-trained lurchers.
Roughit had a small lightly built dog, bred between a collie and
greyhound; Lance had a big Bedlington terrier; and these two dogs were
certain to be the death of any hare they made up their minds to catch.
Lance and Roughit would sit down by the fence beside a gate; the lurcher
lay quietly down beside the gate-post, while the terrier slipped through
the gap in the hedge and sneaked quietly round to the top of the field.
When he had reached the furthermost hedge, he began to beat slowly down
towards his confederate: there would come a quick thud, thud of feet;
then a scraping on the bars of the gate; then a shrill squeak; and the
lurcher cantered quietly up with his game to the place where the two
fishermen sat. If old Sam, the Squire's gamekeeper, had ever had a
chance of putting a charge of shot into either of the dogs he would not
have thrown it away. But the brutes usually stayed indoors all day, and
never went rummaging the coverts on their own account. Roughit showed no
signs of sporting instinct; but Lance really liked the fun, and was
willing to run all kinds of risks.

Year after year the friends lived their silent life, dividing their time
between fishing, poaching, and drinking. Sometimes a spell of bad