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Ella M. Sexton - Stories of California
morning. As they came off the boat, there was a crowd of people on the wharf who were pulling in
"yellow-tail" as fast as they dropped their lines. This fine fish is a little like a big salmon, but with
golden-yellow fins and tail. Its body is greenish gray, with spots of the prettiest rainbow colors, which
grow brighter as the fish dies. These fish bite easily, but as soon as caught begin to rush back and forth,
fighting and trying to snap the line.
The children here took a smaller steamer for the twenty-mile trip across to Catalina Island, and on the
way over they saw a whole "school" of whales and a flight of flying-fishes. Yes, really and truly, these
little fish fly or sail through the air, for their fins balance them like a parachute. They skim along ten or
twelve feet above the waves, and then drop in the water to rest, taking another flight whenever their
enemies, the porpoises, chase them.
How happy the children were to land at the little town of Avalon, and to know that they were to have a
month at this beautiful place! They hurried down to the beach and their first choice of amusements was
the glass-bottomed boat. These boats have "water-telescopes," which are only clear glass set in boxed-in
places. The glass seems to make the ripples still, so that you can look down, down to the bottom of the
ocean, twenty or thirty feet below you.
The boatman rowed the children out in the bay, where the water, now green, now blue, was always clear
as crystal. On the rocks and sand at the bottom starfish and crabs crawled slowly along or clung to some
stone. The purple sea-urchins, queer round-shelled creatures covered with thorny spines, crowded
together, and the ugly toad-fish hid in the green and brown seaweeds. Blue, purple, and rainbow-colored
jellyfish floated on top of the waters, while gold perch with red and green sunfish swam through the
seaweed "like parrots in some hot country's woods," Retta thought. In the shallow places on the rocks
those curious sea-flowers, the anemones, looked like pink or green cactus blossoms. The children never
tired of the water-telescope in all their stay at the island.
At night the warm ocean waters seemed on fire, since they are full of very tiny, soft-bodied creatures,
each of which gives out a faint, glowing light. Every day the fishermen brought in new and strange
fishes. The black sea-bass, heavier than the fisherman himself and longer than he was tall, were
wonderful, and they could hardly believe that such big fish were caught with a rod and line.
But the leaping tuna pleased Tom the most, since he thought it such fun to watch them jump into the air
like silver arrows after the flying-fish. Not so large as the black bass, the tunas are strong enough to tow a
boat along when running with a hook. One will drag a heavy launch through the water as if a tug had
hold of it, and will fight for hours, rushing and plunging till tired out. Then the fisherman pulls him up to
the boat and ends his struggles.
Tom and Retta were fond of watching the curious fish and sea-plants in the glass aquarium tanks on
shore also, but their happiest time was when they gathered shells on the beach. They never found out the
names of more than those of the limpet, turban, and scallop, though they picked up baskets full of tiny
pink and white beauties, all frail and of many kinds. These shells were once the homes of sea mollusks,
as such soft, fleshy creatures are called. But to Tom and Retta the shells were only pretty playthings, to
be doll's dishes, or cups, or pincushions, perhaps.
One morning some fishermen saw a shark, and no one dared to go in bathing for a few days. This great,
savage, "man-eater" shark does not often come north of the Gulf of California. Sometimes small ones are
caught with a hook and line off Catalina Island, and Tom was always glad to see such sea-tigers
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