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The Adventure Club Afloat

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seems she's a sort of Mission boat, the Sea Coast Mission, I think it's called. The folks that live on these off-shore islands along here were in pretty bad shape a few years ago, bad shape in every way. There were no schools, or mighty few, and no churches, and the folks were just naturally pegging out from sheer loneliness and--and lack of ambition, just drifting right back into a kind of semi-civilized state, as folks do on islands in the Pacific that you read about. Well, someone realised it and got busy, and this Mission was started. There was a chap named MacDonald, Alexander MacDonald--" "Sounds almost Scotch," observed Joe dryly. "Never mind what he was. He's American now, if he was ever anything else," replied Phil warmly. "He was teaching school on one of the islands near Mount Desert in the Summers and going to college the rest of the time. There wasn't any church on this island and so he used to conduct services in the place they used for a school. Somehow, that put it into his head--or maybe his heart--to be a preacher. He preached around in all sorts of out-of-the-way places, and then this Mission started up and the folks behind it just naturally got hold of him and put him in charge. A New York woman had the _Sunbeam_ built for him three or four years ago and now he lives right on it, he and a couple of men for crew, and she keeps pegging around the islands, up and down the coast, Summer and Winter. You fellows know what Doctor Grenfell does up around Labrador and beyond? Well, this Mr. MacDonald does the same stunt along this coast, and, by jiminy, fellows, it's some stunt! Think of plunging around these waters in Winter, eh? Breaking his own way through the ice often enough--the boat was built for it they say--and plugging through some of the nor'easters! Say, I take my hat off to that fellow!" "Some job," agreed Steve thoughtfully. "Man's work, fellows." "What does he do for 'em?" asked Ossie. "Teaches them, son. Teaches them how to live clean, how to look after the kids, how to keep healthy. And prays with them, too, I guess. And brings them books and founds schools. Don't you guess that when this _Sunbeam_ comes in sight of some of those little, forsaken islands the folks on shore sort of perk up? Guess the Reverend Mr. MacDonald is pretty always certain of a welcome, fellows!" "Rather!" said Joe. "That's what I call--um--being useful in the world. Bet you he's a fine sort. Bound to be, eh?" "I'd like to make a trip with him," said Perry. "Gee, but it would be some sport, wouldn't it? Talk about finding adventures! Bet you he has 'em by the hundreds." "I dare say," said Phil, "that he'd be glad to dispense with a good many of them. Hope I haven't bored you, fellows," he added, returning to his book. "You haven't, old scout," answered Han. "Any time you learn anything as interesting as that, you spring it. Blamed if it doesn't sort of make a fellow want to be of more use in the world. Guess I'll polish some brass!" They passed many of those islands during the next few days, lonely, rock-girt spots scantily clad with wild grass and wind-worried fir trees. Sometimes there was a lighthouse, and nearly always the rocks were piled with lobster-traps, for lobstering is the chief industry of the inhabitants. They touched at one small islet one afternoon and went ashore. There were but three houses there, old, weather-faded shacks strewn around with broken lobster-pots and nets and discarded tin cans and rubbish. The folks they met, and they met them all, from babes in arms to a ninety-eight-year-old great-grandmother, looked sad and listless and run-to-seed. Even the children seemed too old for their years. It was all rather depressing, in spite of the evident kindliness of the people, and the boys were glad to get away again. They bought some lobsters and nearly a gallon of blueberries before they went. Ossie declared afterwards that those lobsters looked to him a sight happier than the folks they had seen ashore! They went eastward leisurely, making many stops, and had fine weather until they sighted Grand Manan. Then a storm drove them to shelter one afternoon and they lay in a tiny harbour for two days while the wind lashed the ports and the rain drove down furiously. Nothing of great interest happened, although the time went fast and pleasantly. To be sure, there were minor incidents that Phil entered in the log-book he was keeping: as when Han fell overboard one morning in a heavy sea when the _Adventurer_ was reeling off her twelve miles and was pretty well filled with brine and very near exhaustion when he reached the life-buoy they threw him. And once Ossie pretty nearly cut a finger off while opening a lobster. And then there was the time--it was during those two weather-bound days and everyone's temper was getting a bit short--when Perry cast aspersions on Ossie's biscuits at supper. Perry said they were so hard he guessed they were Ossie-fied, and the others laughed and Ossie got angry and they nearly came to blows: would have, perhaps, had not Steve promised to throw them both overboard if they did! They spent two days at Grand Manan, and Perry, who had never before been further from Philadelphia than the Adirondacks, was vastly thrilled when he discovered that Grand Manan was a part of New Brunswick. "This," he declaimed grandly as he stamped down on a clam-shell, "is the first time I've ever set foot on a foreign shore!" The end of the first week in August found them harboured at Eastport. They stayed there four days, not so much because the place abounded in interest as because the _Adventurer_, who had behaved splendidly for several hundred miles, suddenly refused to go another fathom. Steve said he guessed the engine needed a good overhauling, and Perry chortled and offered his services to Joe to help take it apart. But Joe, in spite of his invaluable and ever-present hand-book, acknowledged his limitations, and the job went to a professional and the _Adventurer_ spent most of three days tied up to a smelly little dock while the engine specialist took the motor down before be discovered that a fragment of waste and other foreign matter had lodged in the gasoline supply pipe. Fortunately, his charge was moderate. Had it been otherwise they might

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