"But if we bait our hooks, and leave them in the water, won't the fish run away with our lines if we are not here to watch them?" asked Mab.

 

"We'll fix the lines so the fish that bite will ring a little bell, to tell us to come and take them off the hook!" replied Daddy Blake with a laugh.

 

"Oh, now I know you're fooling us!" said Hal.

 

"No, really I am not," replied his father, but Mr. Blake could not keep the funny twinkle out of his eyes, and Hal was sure there was some joke.

 

From a small satchel¹, in which he had put the things for fishing, Mr. Blake took several pieces of wire. On the ends were some bits of red cloth, and also, on each wire, a little brass² bell, that went "tinkle-tinkle."

 

"Oh, they are really bells!" cried Mab, as she heard them jingle³.

 

"Of course they are" said her father. "Now I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll bait our hook, and lower it into the water through a hole in the ice. Then, close to the hole, we'll fasten one of these pieces of wire each one of which has, on the upper end, a bell and a bit of red cloth.

 

"When the wires are stuck in the ice we'll fasten our lines to them, and then, when the fish, down in the cold water, pulls on the baited hook he will make the piece of red cloth flutter, and he will also ring the bell."

 

"Oh, now I see!" cried Hal. "And if we are off skating we can look over here, and if we see the red rag fluttering we'll know we have a bite, and can come and pull up the fish."

 

"That's it," said Daddy Blake, smiling.

 

"And if we don't happen to see the red rag fluttering, we will hear the bell ring," added Mab, clapping her hands. "How nice it is to fish this way!"

 

The hooks were soon baited, and lowered into the water through the holes in the ice Then the other end of each fish line was made fast to a wire sticking up, with its bit of red rag, and the little brass bell.

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