208 THE SALMON 



which illustrates the wide diversity of opinion and 

 the marvellous elasticity of the conscience. They 

 were no gluttons ; but apropos to salmon, here is the 

 poet's notion of an insufficient supper. ' Ye dinna 

 mean to say, Mr. Aumrose, that that's a' ? Only the 

 roun, the cut o' saumon, beefsteaks and twa broods o' 

 eisters ! , This 'ill never do, Aumrose. Remember 

 there's a couple o' us, and that a sooper that may be 

 no' amiss for one may be little better than starvation 

 to twa.' The Homeric feasting in Gabriel's Road 

 was play of the fancy, though there was a fair foun- 

 dation for the romantic superstructures. Neither 

 Christopher nor the Shepherd could say with the 

 town clerk in 'The Antiquary,' that they were nae 

 glass-breakers, and both Wilson and Hogg played a 

 capital knife and fork. But for actual and authentic 

 performances we should be inclined to back the 

 annual salmon dinners which used to celebrate — as 

 probably they do still — the opening of the fishing 

 season in some of the Scotch boroughs. When a 

 party of the town bailies, with their chosen friends, 

 sit down to solid eating and steady drinking, it was hard 

 indeed to beat them. We have seen slice upon slice 

 vanishing like snow-flakes, and cutlet fast following 

 cutlet, like the cut and carve again at a round of beef 

 set down before a famishing beggar. The steaks, hot 



