Arthur involuntarily began to draw up his legs, as he felt as if one were already loose in the bottom of the boat.
“But just you look ye here,” continued Josh, opening the little locker in the stern of the boat. “This is how I serves the big jockeys who’d be likely to give any trouble. I just give them a cut behind the head with this little fellow, and then they lie quiet enough.”
As he spoke he showed Arthur a little axe with a very small head, and an edge as keen as a knife.
“That’s too much for congers,” added Josh.
“I say, how cruel to the poor things!” said Dick laughingly; but Josh took it in the most serious way.
“Well, I have thought that ’bout the gashly conger, Master Dick, sir,” said Josh; “but I don’t know as it be. You see, they’re caught, and it puts ’em out of their misery, like, at once.”
“But it’s cruel to catch them,” said Dick.
Josh scratched his head.
“A mussy me, Master Dick, sir! that’s a thing as has puzzled me lots o’ times when I’ve been hooking and killing fish; but then, you see, it’s for victuals, and everybody’s got to live.”
“So have the fish,” laughed Dick.