WAYWARD MOVEMENTS. 183 



inents. There is reason for believing that a little en- 

 terprise would often be rewarded by the discovery that 

 the fish had moved to no great distance, and that their 

 change of habitat might be traced by observing that 

 luminosity of the sea caused by medusae and other mar- 

 ine animals on which the herrings feed. 



As already mentioned, the speculations in supposed 

 explanation of the wayward movements of the herring 

 are many. In illustration of the propensity of certain 

 minds to join together, in the relation of cause and 

 effect, things which are only accidentally connected, so 

 that coincidences are mistaken for consequences, it may 

 be mentioned that in the Hebrides the manufacture of 

 kelp is popularly regarded as the reason why the herring 

 deserted the Long Island ; and that the lighting of fires, 

 the ringing of bells, and the firing of cannon, are all 

 associated with the vagaries of the herring. Will 

 people never learn to be decently modest, and not afraid 

 to say, " Such is the fact, but why it should be so we 

 cannot tell "? When not ashamed to confess ignorance, 

 we shall no longer read that herrings forsook the coast 

 of Sweden on account of the din of the bombardment of 

 Copenhagen; or that " Inverness, where sumtym was 

 grit plenti of tak of herring, howbeit they be now 

 evanist for offens that is maid against some sanct ; " * 

 or that the people of St Monance, on the Fifeshire 

 coast, were wont to tie up the parish church-bell during 

 the herring season. If the theory at Inverness as to 

 wrath of " sum sanct " be admissible as an explanation 

 why herrings did not appear as expected, we must say 

 the men at St Monance, by tying up the bell which 

 summoned them to do him honour, exhibited a love of 

 herrings which must have been offensive to his holiness. 

 The theory of steamboats having something to do with 

 the herring deserting their haunts, is falsified by the fact 

 of herring preferring Loch Fyne since steamships have 

 sailed to and from Inverary. 



* Bellenden's 'Bcece's Cosmographie of Albion,' xxiii. 



