252 THE JOURNEYMAN. 



c Soon after sunrise the" mist began to dissipate, and 

 the surface of the water to appear for miles around 

 roughened as if by a smart breeze, though there was not 

 the slightest breath of wind at the time. " How do you 

 account for that appearance ? " said I to one of the fisher- 

 men. " Ah, lad, that is by no means so favourable a 

 token as the one you asked me to explain last night. I 

 had as lief see the Bhodry-more" " Why, what does it 

 betoken ? and what is the Bhodry-more ? " " It betokens 

 that the shoal have spawned, and will shortly leave the 

 frith : for when the fish are sick and weighty they never 

 rise to the surface in that way : but have you never 

 heard of the Bhodry-more ?" I replied in the negative. 

 " Well, but you shall." " Nay," said another of the 

 crew, " leave that for our return ; do you not see the 

 herrings playing by thousands round our nets, and not 

 one of the buoys sinking in the water ? There is not a 

 single fish swimming so low as the upper baulks of our 

 drift: shall' we not shorten the buoy ropes, and take 

 off the sinkers ? " This did not meet the approbation of 

 the others, one of whom took up a stone, and flung it in 

 the middle of the shoal. The fish immediately disap- 

 peared from the surface for several fathoms round. 

 " Ah, there they go," he exclaimed, " if they go but low 

 enough ; four years ago I startled thirty barrels of light 

 fish into my drift just by throwing a stone among 

 them." 



' The whole frith at this time, so far as the eye could 

 reach, appeared crowded with herrings ; and its surface 

 was so broken by them as to remind one of the pool of 

 a waterfall. They leaped by millions a few inches into 

 the air, and sunk with a hollow plumping noise some- 

 what resembling the dull rippling sound of a sudden 

 breeze ; while to the eye there was a continual twinkling 



