FISHING STATIONS— SCOTLAND. 307 



only with the number of strange vessels, but with the 

 relative success of the deep-sea and home fisheries. 



Among the places occasionally visited by a few Eng- 

 lish and Shetland smacks in search of cod is the very 

 uncertain ground at Rockall. This bank lies about 300 

 miles west of the Outer Hebrides, and is marked above 

 water by a single roughly conical rock about 30 feet 

 high, with a smaller one, usually uncovered, at a distance 

 of less than a hundred fathoms north of it. There is 

 more than 20 fathoms water close to the rock, and the 

 50-fathom line of soundings is nowhere so much as a 

 mile away. From this the bank gradually slopes for 

 about 20 miles in a direction a little east of north, and 

 about 35 miles west of south before the 100-fathom line 

 is passed ; and the width of the bank within these sound- 

 ings is from 20 to 25 miles. The fishery, how^ever, is 

 not carried on in a depth of more than about 50 fathoms, 

 and therefore must be very near the rock. The very 

 limited extent of ground on which the fish are found, 

 the danger of keeping near the rock in bad weather, 

 and the difficulty in finding it again when, as sometimes 

 happens, the vessels are blown away, all combine to 

 prevent regular fishing at Rockall ; and there is further 

 discouragement in the fact that except quite at the early 

 part of the season the fishery is not likely to be success- 

 ful, and even then there is often a great scarcity on the 

 ground. Still good work has been done there at times, 

 and stories are told of gigantic cod, six feet in length, 

 having been caught there when the bank first came into 

 notice. The locality has probably been long resorted to 

 by the cod at particular seasons, and we have no evi- 

 dence that the fish are not there throughout the winter, 

 when there is no deep-sea line-fishing carried on. 



Rockall had been seen on several occasions, but its 



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