Next morning, accordingly, the two started off together for the Fisheries Building, an antiquated structure standing in the magnificent park behind the National Museum and but a short distance from the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution. They entered on the ground-floor, seeing to the left a number of hatching troughs, to the right models of nets and fishing-vessels, at the far end a small aquarium, while in the center was a tank in which were the two fur seals that the boy had heard about in the Pribilof Islands.

He pulled his father's arm.

"Oh, Father!" he cried; "there are the fur seals. Come over and see them!"

But his father shook his head smilingly.

"They are not personal friends of mine, as they seem to be of yours," he said, "and I have no time to waste. Besides, we have an engagement with the Commissioner. You can come down and chat with your seal acquaintances after our talk."

The Commissioner greeted them cordially, and without waste of words.

"So this is the boy!" he said, after the customary greetings. "He'll need to grow a bit, eh?"

"So did both of us once," said Major Dare, looking at his own height and the Commissioner's burly frame. "We haven't done so badly."

"That's true. Well, boy, tell me just what you want to do."

"Everything that there is to do in the Bureau, Mr. Glades," answered Colin promptly.

The Commissioner rubbed his hand over his chin, with a short laugh.

"That's a big order," he said. "Willing to work?"

"Yes, sir," the boy replied; "I don't mind work."

"This is the place for it. There's just two kinds of people in the world," the Commissioner went on; "those who do just what they learn to do and nothing else, and those who do the work because they want to."

"Yes, sir," again responded the boy, wondering what was coming.

"The first lot keep things running and that's all. The others are the real men. The last are the men we've got in the Bureau and everybody has to be up to the standard. So, there you are."

"I don't know whether I can come up to the standard, but I'm one of those that want to!" the boy said emphatically, rightly judging that the Commissioner was not the sort of man who liked long speeches.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HEADQUARTERS OF THE U. S. FISHERIES BUREAU, AT WASHINGTON, D. C.

_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: HAULING THE LARGEST SHAD SEINE IN THE WORLD.

Sp.a.w.n-taking operations on the Potomac River. Trying to save from extinction one of America's finest-flavored food fishes.

_Courtesy of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries._]

"Good! Going to college?"

The boy looked at his father.

"I had thought of sending him to Brown," he said, "since he got this Fisheries idea. One of my friends told me that it was an excellent university for biology."

"Do it!" said the Commissioner. "Send him to college in the winter, let him work with us in the vacation. That'll give him four summers'

training with us. When he comes out of college he ought to be worth something to the Bureau. But don't start and then give up."

"Colin won't do that," his father said, then added pointedly, "I'll see to it that he doesn't."

"Very well," said the Commissioner, "that's settled." He rang a bell, and a messenger appeared at the door. "Ask Dr. Crafts to step here a minute if he is disengaged. Dr. Crafts," he continued, turning to Major Dare, "is perhaps one of the most valuable men we have on the Bureau.

Oh, by the way, boy, when do you want to start?"

"Right away, sir, if possible," Colin replied.

"Is that novelty or enthusiasm?"

"Enthusiasm, I think," Major Dare answered, smiling.

In a moment the door opened again, and the Deputy Commissioner came in.

"Dr. Crafts," the Commissioner said, after introductions had been made, "here's an enthusiastic youngster who wants the Commissionership! Not right away, perhaps," he added as the newcomer smiled at the boy, "but perhaps in a couple of decades or so. And he thinks he ought to start this minute. Have we anything for him to do?"

"I don't know of anything especially," said the Deputy Commissioner thoughtfully; "it's so late in the season."

"Let him have something to work off his animal spirits," the Commissioner said; "it's a pity to let so much energy go to waste."

"Very well," the other said genially; "we'll see what we can do. Will you join us, Major Dare?"

"I think not," the boy's father answered; "I will leave him entirely in your hands, and he can tell me all about it afterwards. I want just a word or two more, Commissioner," he added, "and then I must be going."

"What's your name, lad?" asked his new chief, as they walked along the hall.

"Colin Dare, sir," the boy responded.

"Which is it to be," the official asked with a pleasant smile, "'Colin'

or 'Dare'?"

The boy looked up at him and felt instantly the thorough kindliness and fine worth of his companion, and answered promptly:

"'Colin,' sir, if you don't mind. That is, at least, to you."

"All right, Colin," was the reply; "I suppose we must see what we can find for you to do. Tell me," he continued, as they entered his office, "how you came to think of entering the Fisheries Bureau?"

Thus adjured, Colin told briefly how his father had tried to interest him first in lumbering and then in engineering, but that neither had appealed to him. Then he told of his whaling adventures and of the few days he had spent on the Pribilof Islands, recounting the j.a.panese raid with great gusto. The Deputy Commissioner, who had heard nothing but the official account of the fracas was intensely interested and he questioned Colin closely, noting carefully the boy's clear understanding of the seal question.

"You have a head for facts, Colin," he said approvingly, when the whole adventure had been told, "because you really have noted the important points in that sealing business, and it is more complicated than it looks. Go on, now, and tell me how you came down from Valdez."

So Colin took up the story again, described his meeting with the lieutenant of the revenue cutter and the kindness he had received from him. The Deputy Commissioner smiled, for the officer in question was a close personal friend. Then Colin told of the salmon tagging and of his visit to the hatchery, not forgetting the capture of the sea-serpent.

"It seems to me," Dr. Crafts said jokingly, "that you have become a public personage in connection with Fisheries even before you come into the Bureau. To figure in a j.a.panese seal raid and to capture a sea-serpent in the same summer is enough fame for anybody!"

Colin laughed and answered: