300 



DEEr-SEA FISHING. 



large supply of bait is now procured from the winter 

 herring fishery. 



There is nothing to be particularly noticed in the 

 mode of conducting the drift-fishery on the coast of 

 Scotland. The principle on which these nets are 

 worked is the same everywhere, and it has been fully 

 described in previous pages. We may mention, how- 

 ever, that here, as elsewhere, there has been a gradual 

 increase in the size and number of the nets employed, 

 and as larger boats come into use the trains of nets will 

 no doubt be further lengthened. Cotton, as a material 

 for nets, has been generally substituted for hemp ; it is 

 lighter and undoubtedly more effective. The buoys 

 used for supporting the drift-nets are, at Wick and 

 many other places, made of sheep-skin. The skin is 

 cut so as to take a globular form when the edges are 

 gathered in, and they are then fastened to a flat circular 

 wooden head, on which a cross piece of wood is nailed, 

 and to this the buoy-rope is made fast. The buoy is 

 inflated through a hole in the flat head, and the small 

 opening is then closed with a plug. Sheep-skin buoys 

 are also frequently used with longlines, but in these a 

 light pole passes through the buoy, and a short wooden 

 nozzle is fastened into the skin so as to provide the 

 means of inflating it. 



Kirkwall to Lerwick — Number of Boats. 



These two joorts include the several fishing villages 

 in the Orkneys and Shetlands. 



