of. The professor gave me an idea of all the different problems the Bureau was trying to solve, and each of them was more interesting than the last. You've got to be a doctor to study fish diseases, an engineer to devise ways and means for stream conditions, a chemist to work on poisons in the water that comes from factories, and all sorts of other things beside. It looks to me as though it had the best of all the professions boiled down into one!"
"That's an exaggerated statement, of course," was the reply; "but you seem in earnest. No," he continued, as Colin prepared to burst forth again, "you've said enough."
The boy waited anxiously, for he felt that the answer would decide his career.
"If your heart is set on the Fisheries," his father rejoined thoughtfully, after a few minutes' reflection, "I presume it would be unwise to stop you. But remember what I have told you before—I'm perfectly willing to fit you for any profession in life you want to take up, but only for one. If you begin on anything you have got to go through with it. I'll have no quitting. As you know, I would rather you had taken up lumbering, but I don't want to force you into anything, and per
haps your brother Roderick may like the woods. You're sure, however, as to what you want?"
"I want fishes!" said Colin firmly.
"I've been looking up the question a little since you wrote to me from Valdez," Major Dare continued, "because I saw that your old desires had increased instead of dying out. You know, Colin, I want to help you as much as I can. You realize that there's no school of fisheries, like the forestry schools, don't you?"
"Yes, Father."
"And that if you go into the Bureau the only way you can learn is by the actual work, hard work and dirty work, too, it will be often."
"Yes, sir," the boy answered, "I was told that, too."