Fires were blazing under a number of great kettles half filled with boiling water.

Into these, green lobsters were tossed by barrowfuls, to be taken out a little later smoking hot and coloured a vivid scarlet.

On the packing tables their shells were broken, and the extracted meat was put into cans, to which covers, each with a tiny hole in the middle, were soldered.

Then the filled cans were steamed, by trayfuls, to exhaust their air; a drop of solder closed each vent, and they were ready for labelling and packing in cases.

White Baldwin, in person, superintended all these operations, while David Gidge saw to the unloading of the "Sea Bee," and kept sharp watch on a gang of shouting urchins, who were withdrawing the live lobsters from the outside salt-water pens, in which they had been kept while awaiting their fate.
White was in high spirits, for the travelling agent of a St.Johns business house had just offered a good cash price for his entire pack.
"Of course," the young proprietor said to Cabot, as they viewed the busy scone, "we won't make anything like what we would if we were allowed a whole uninterrupted season; but, if they will only let us alone for a week, I'll pack a thousand cases.