“No, Jack, those aren’t net buoys. Those are lobster pots. Some one has a line of traps set along here. Looks like he’d picked out a good place too. All rock bottom.”
“Are those lobster traps?” asked Jack, becoming interested immediately.
“Sure they are. Net buoys are entirely different looking affairs.”
“I never saw a lobster pot. What do they look like?” queried the Vermonter.
“Pshaw, don’t you know what they are like. Let’s row over and we’ll haul one. I don’t believe it would make any difference so long as we don’t take any of the lobsters. I know it’s considered a terrible thing among lobstermen for one man to haul another man’s trap, but we won’t steal anything.”
“Oh, I have an idea what they look like. Never mind about pulling it up,” said Jack.
“No, no, come on, we’ll row over. I’ll haul it. ’Twon’t make a particle of difference. And besides there’s no one around to see us. I wonder who owns it?”
“Why, perhaps that old fellow Captain Eli says lives on this end of the island. He’s a lobsterman,” said Jack as he headed the boat in the direction of the buoys.
“That’s right, perhaps they are his,” said Ray.
It was only a matter of a hundred yards or more to the buoy and soon Jack pulled the dory around close to the bobbing thing. Then Ray stood up and reaching the line attached to it began to pull it in hand over hand. Presently he reached a section of the line to which two tightly corked bottles were attached. He held them up for Jack to see, explaining in the meantime that they were fastened to the warping, which is the fisherman’s term for the line, to keep it off the bottom so that it would not foul with the rocks. The bottles, he said, acted as floats which kept the warping midway between the rocky bottom and the surface.