OLD FLOUNDER FISHER. 185 



flocks, except during the time of sowing the oats, when bean- 

 geese arrive in great numbers. 



This bay, like that of Findhorn, is always swarming with 

 waders of every description, from the curlew to the redshank, 

 and from the smallest kind of sandpiper to the old man we 

 see yonder, who is wading mid-leg deep in the tide, keeping 

 even pace with the water as it flows in to till the basin. His 

 occupation was for some time a mystery to me, till approach- 

 ing him, I saw that he had a singular kind of creel slung to 

 his neck, and a long, clumsy-looking kind of trident in his 

 hand. Walking slowly backwards, but still keeping in two- 

 foot water, with poised weapon and steady eye, he watches 

 for the flounders which come in with every tide. When he 

 sees one, down goes his spear; and the unlucky fish is hoisted 

 into the air, and then deposited in the creel. 



I waited until, having either filled his basket or being 

 driven to land by the increased depth of the tide, the old 

 man quitted the water. He either had not noticed me or did 

 not choose to do so before he landed. When I accosted him 

 by asking him what luck he had had, I got at first rather a 

 grunt than an answer, as he seemed in no very communi- 

 cative mood ; but having refreshed himself by a spoonful of 

 snuff, which he crammed into his nose with a little wooden 

 kind of ladle, he told me that he " had na get muckle vcnnison 

 the morn," adding that he " did na ken what had driven the 

 beasts out of the bay of late ; " venison, or, as he pronounced 

 it, '' ven-ni-son," meaning in this country any eatable creature, 

 fish, flesh, or fowl. The old fellow seemed of a most bilious 

 and irritable temperament ; and I believe had I not won him. 

 over by dint of whisky and fair words, ho would have laid 

 his bud success in flounder catching to my shooting wild 

 fowl in the bay. As it was, he gradually became tolerably 

 gracious, and told me many marvellous stories of the good 

 old time, when salmon fishers were fewer and seals more 

 plentiful ; so much so, that, according to his account, every 

 tide left numbers of these now rare animals in the pools of 

 water in the bay ; and a "puir man wha wanted a drop oil or 

 bit seal-skin had only to go down at low water to the pools-, 

 and he could get a sealgh as sune as I can get a fluke in 

 these days." Since this colloquy I and the old flounder 

 fisher have always been on tolerable terms. 



The sea in this bay, as well as in ether similar ones on the 

 coast, runs in so rapidly that without keeping a good look- 



