V + 

The Fishing Prize + 

That night, before we went to bed, the five of us sat on the riprap rocks in front of the cottages, and Jibby told all he knew about the land pirate and his treasure again, and we got up the Land Pirate’s Treasure-Hunting and Exploration Company. We sat there and swatted mosquitoes and talked like good friends and Dutch uncles, and swore a cross-my-heart and hope-to-die oath to be faithful and true to the constitution and bylaws of the Land Pirate’s Treasure-Hunting and Exploration Company. There wasn’t any constitution or any bylaws, but that did not matter⁠—we swore to be true to them, anyhow, and maybe, sometime when we had time, we might get up some, if we thought we needed them. + 

But, when we had talked it all over and had come right down to facts, the only thing about the treasure that Jibby seemed to be real sure of was that the old negro Mose had been awful dead earnest. That old negro had been mortal sure there was treasure somewhere. He would have bet a million dollars on it. And that was what made Jibby think there must be some treasure hidden somewhere. There was no doubt that there had been a land pirate named John A. Murrell. + 

Talking it over together that way, we asked Jibby a million or two questions, and it came out that the old negro Mose had said that “Riverbank” was the key to where the treasure was hidden. There was no “Riverbank” on the map side of the map, but on the back of it the one word “Riverbank” was written, old Mose had said, and old Mose said his father had said that was the key. “You go whar Riverbank is, up the river whar black folks is free,” was what his father had said. Of course, that was away back when there were slaves, and Mose was a slave then, and so was his father. + 

The other thing Jibby had to go on was the pine tree⁠—the signal pine that every friend of John A. Murrell and his pirates set out in the corner of the lot or yard or farm. The thing to do, Jibby said, was to find a lone pine tree, because that would be a sign and a signal and a symbol and a sort of trademark, showing that place had something to do with John A. Murrell. We tried to think of lone pines, but, just offhand, we couldn’t think of any that night. All we knew were planted in rows. + 

So there did not seem to be much to do but elect Wampus the Captain of the Land Pirate’s Treasure-Hunting and Exploration Company, and go to bed. We thought we would go up and down the river when we had time, and explore back into the country here and there, and look for lone pines, and, if we found one in the corner of a lot or farm, we would look for a likely treasure-hiding place. + 

Early the next morning, Parcell, who runs the boathouse down at town, came up with my sister May and a load of groceries and meat for everybody, and he brought my dog along. My dog is one of the bulliest dogs you ever saw, but along about April that year all the hair came off his back, and mother said he was an awful sight, so we let a man take him, to grow his hair back on. The man was a horse doctor and good at making hairless dogs hairy again, and he had fixed Rover up fine. And now he had sent him back. + 

I was tickled to see Rover again, and he was tickled to see me, and I guess my mother was almost as glad, because some pretty tough customers live in houseboats on the river, sometimes. Most of the houseboaters are all right, and are kind and nice, but some mean ones come floating down the river, and you can never tell what they’ll do. So a dog comes in handy, especially a good-sized dog like Rover. + 

The only thing I was sorry about was that Rover had come this particular day, because the next day I would have to tie him up and leave him at home, because it was the day of the Uncle Oscar Fishing Prize. You can’t have a dog along when you are fishing from a skiff for a prize. And Uncle Oscar’s Fishing Prize was one of the most important things of the whole summer, always. + 

The way of the Uncle Oscar Fishing Prize was this: Every year, as long as we had been going up to the island, Wampus Smale’s Uncle Oscar had given a prize to the fellow who made the best fishing record on a certain day, and that day was Uncle Oscar’s birthday. That was why we fished for the prize on that day, and not on another day. + 

This Uncle Oscar just lived and breathed on the river, as you might say, and loved it, and he thought nobody fished enough or boated enough or swam enough or loved the big old river enough. That was the way he was. He almost wept when he told about the old days when the river was full of fish and the big old packets and logging steamers were as thick as mosquitoes, and great long log rafts used to float down with huts built on them, and campfires, and men pushing the long sweeps to steer them. + 

That was why, every year, he offered the fishing prize, but we boys got so we didn’t take much interest in it. + 

“He just gives it so Wampus can win it,” Skippy Root said to me this year. “He knows Wampus is the best fisher, and he knows Wampus is sure to win it.” + 

“Well,” I said, “ain’t you going to try for it? Fishing is luck, and sometime Wampus’s luck is going to go back on him.” + 

“Sure, I’m going to try,” Skippy said. “I’m going to try, but not because I’ve got a chance to win. I’m going to try because Uncle Oscar Smale is a bully fellow and he’d feel bad if we didn’t let on we were trying to win the prize he gives. But Wampus will win it, like he always does.” + 

I thought so, too, and so did Tad Willing. Wampus always won. But, when we saw the prize Wampus’s Uncle Oscar offered this year, we did wish we had a chance. It was a jointed fishing-rod, with a five-dollar reel, and it was a beauty. + 

So, a week or so before Uncle Oscar’s birthday, we were squatting on the shore of the river talking about things, and Jibby Jones came along and sat down beside us. We were talking about crawfish holes and where bees had their bee trees with the honey in them and all sorts of things, just as we happened to think of them. There was a yellow-jacket bee on a flower just in front of us, getting honey, and Skippy said he wished he knew where that bee’s bee tree was. + 

Jibby Jones leaned over until his big nose almost touched the bee. + 

“I can’t tell by this bee,” he said, “but by and by there will be a bee come along and I can tell you.” + 

Pretty soon the bee flew up and circled and went down and lit on a rock and walked around. Then it flew out over the river and back and zigzagged off. Then two or three other bees tried the flower for honey, and each time Jibby Jones put his nose close to it and said, “No; not this one.” After a while a bee lit on the flower that seemed to satisfy Jibby. + 

“Now I can tell you,” he said. “You watch this bee when it flies away.” + 

So we did. When it got enough honey, it flew into the air and made a beeline off for somewhere. Jibby pulled a pocket compass out of his pants pocket. + 

“A bit west of southwest-by-west,” he said. “Any time you want to find that bee tree you start from here and go just west of southwest-by-west and you’ll find it. That bee was going home.” + 

“How did you know that one was going home and the others were not?” Wampus asked. “Was that a pilot bee?” + 

“Maybe it was,” said Jibby. + 

“Well, how did you know it was a pilot bee, then?” asked Skippy. + 

“Maybe I could smell the difference,” Jibby said. “I’ve got a lot of nose; it ought to be good for something.” + 

So we all laughed, but we didn’t know whether Jibby was fooling or in earnest. That was the way he was. Sometimes he fooled just for the fun of it, and sometimes he was in earnest. We could never quite make out which he was, but we had found out one thing⁠—if we waited long enough and didn’t keep joshing him too much, he always ended up by telling us what the truth was. So now Wampus sort of laughed. + 

“Aw, quit!” he said. “You can’t smell like that; you can’t smell the difference between one kind of bee and another kind. Nobody can; I never heard such nonsense. I bet even my Uncle Oscar can’t, and he knows just about everything.” + 

“Has he got a nose like mine?” Jibby asked. + 

Well, Wampus couldn’t say he had, because nobody we knew had a nose like Jibby. There were no other noses like it. It was the biggest and thinnest nose anybody ever saw. + 

“No,” Wampus said, “Uncle Oscar’s nose is just a common nose.” + 

“And does he exercise it regular?” Jibby asked. + 

“What do you mean by ‘exercise it regular’?” Wampus asked. + 

“Why, exercise it right along,” said Jibby. “Like you exercise your arms and legs if you want to make them good for what they are good for. Or like you would exercise your eyes if you wanted them to be good at seeing things. Or your ears if you wanted them to be ’cute at hearing things. You know you can do that, don’t you?” + 

“How?” asked Skippy. + 

“Well, the Indians did it,” said Jibby. “They began when they were young, and they exercised their ears and their eyes, and soon they could hear the grass grow and see a hair as far as you can see a fishpole. You can exercise your nose the same way, can’t you?” + 

“Well, it sounds sort of reasonable,” said Tad Willing. + 

“Of course, it sounds reasonable,” Jibby said, as pleasant as could be. “Can you do this?” + 

He put his thumb against the side of his nose and pushed it until most of his nose lay flat against his left cheek; then he put his thumb on the other side of his nose and pushed until his nose lay flat against his right cheek. We all tried it, but we couldn’t do it. Wampus was the worst at it, because his nose is a pug and sticks up. + 

“You don’t exercise your noses, that’s why,” Jibby said. “I don’t blame you. It is no business of mine what you do with your noses. But I exercise mine and keep it limber and flexible. I get up every morning and push my nose all around my face, to keep it keen and lively. It would be mighty dangerous for me if I ever let my nose get stiff and hard.” + 

“Why would it?” Skippy wanted to know. + 

“Because it’s my jib sail,” Jibby said, as solemn as an owl. “If I got out in a big wind sometime, say near the edge of a big precipice, and the wind caught my nose, it might blow me over and dash me to pieces on the rocks below. I’ve got to watch out for that, with a nose like mine. I’ve got to keep my nose limber, so that if a big wind comes up I can furl my jib, or jibe it to port or starboard, to steer me away from the precipice.” + 

We didn’t say anything. We just looked at one another. + 

“I might be out in Arizona, or somewhere else, where the wind blows hard for months at a time,” Jibby went on, just as solemn as before, “and a nose like mine would be a nuisance. The wind would catch it on one side and whirl me around one way, and then it would catch it on the other side and whirl me around the other way, and I’d never be able to get anywhere if I didn’t keep my nose soft and flexible, so I could lay it back against my face and fasten it there with a strip of adhesive plaster.” + 

“Oh, boy!” Skippy said then, because that was almost too much. + 

“But,” Jibby went on, “you fellows don’t need to exercise your noses that way because they don’t amount to much as jibs, anyway.” + 

“I’ll say mine don’t,” said Wampus, touching his pug. + 

“No,” said Jibby seriously. “I’ve often felt sorry for you, Wampus; having a stub like that. But it’s a good nose for smelling with, if you train it right. It ought to be a quick smeller⁠—a lot quicker than mine⁠—because it is so short. Smells ought to get in quicker. The only trouble is that you don’t any of you know how to smell.” + 

“You don’t have to know how to smell things,” said Tad. “You just smell them, and that’s all there is to it; you can’t help smelling them.” + 

“Did you ever read James Latimer’s book called ‘Odors and How to Improve the Sense of Smell’?” Jibby asked. + 

“No,” we all said. + 

“Neither did I,” said Jibby. “I never even heard of it, because there isn’t any such book, but there might be. Maybe I’ll write one myself, sometime. The trouble with you fellows is that you don’t think about your noses. I do think about mine; I think a lot about it. I can’t help thinking about it, there’s such a lot of it.” + 

That was true, anyway. + 

“You fellows just go around smelling what happens to come to you to be smelled,” Jibby went on. “You can tell a violet from a fish by the smell of it, maybe, but you don’t exercise your smelling apparatus. Can you tell the difference between a channel catfish and a mud catfish when they are down under the water ten feet or so?” + 

“No, and nobody can. Nobody can even smell a fish when it is under water,” said Wampus. “Can you?” + 

“No matter!” said Jibby, sort of tossing his head. “What I say is that, if people trained their noses and exercised their smelling powers properly, they might smell smells that they don’t even imagine they can smell now. That stands to reason. There are dozens of kinds of violets, but the most that most people can tell when they smell a violet is that it is a violet. A botanist, that has trained his nose to smell violets and knows there are dozens of different kinds of violets, gets so, after a while, he can tell most of them from the others just by the smell. And it is that way with everything.” + 

“Well, what good does it do?” asked Skippy. + 

“Everything you know does some good,” said Jibby. “That’s what knowing things is for, to do us good. It is just the ‘little bit more’ that makes anything the ‘most’ instead of leaving it the ‘least.’ ” + 

“I guess that’s so,” I said. “It’s partly because Wampus knows a little bit more about fishing than we do that he wins the Uncle Oscar Fishing Prize every year.” + 

“You mean he can smell the fish when they are under water?” Jibby asked. + 

“Pshaw, no!” said Skippy. “That’s nonsense.” + 

“Is it?” Jibby asked, grinning a little. + 

“Well, if it isn’t,” said Skippy, “why don’t you go in for the Uncle Oscar Prize this year?” + 

“Oh, I oughtn’t to do that,” Jibby said. “It wouldn’t be fair. What if I could smell the fish when they are under water? I’d know where all the fish were and you fellows that belong on the island here wouldn’t have a chance. No, I’d better not compete for that prize; I’d win it sure.” + 