SALMON-NETTING AT CHRISTCHURCH 49 



and been even more closely united. The life on the 

 spit, between the inland lake and the sea, seems to 

 have cut them off from the rather demoralizing 

 influence which the proximity of shore life always 

 has on fishermen, and at the same time made them 

 great sportsmen and fowlers as well as fishermen. 

 Hence they are often in request to manage fowling- 

 yachts, punts, and apparatus for that kind of sport. 

 There is a kind of double harvest going on all the 

 year round, of fish and fowl, and as the men draw 

 their nets their big guns are seldom far off. In 

 summer, when the fowl are protected, they keep up 

 a constant warfare on the cormorants. The pro- 

 ceedings seem quite well understood both by birds 

 and men. The cormorant colony is on the Needles 

 and the Freshwater cliffs, many miles across the 

 Solent. The birds fly over, and rising high over the 

 lurking guns, go up the harbour and there catch 

 trout and eels till their crops are full. They then 

 fly back, and over to the Needles, to feed their 

 young. The burden of fish makes it more difficult 

 for the cormorants to rise clear of gunshot, and each 

 as it passes is saluted with a discharge of swan-shot. 

 But very few seem to be killed, though the men 

 declare that every cormorant robs the harbour of 

 fourteen pounds weight of fish per diem. As they 

 approach the sand-hills near the " Run," they rise 

 gradually in the air, and then fly at full speed, with 

 necks stretched, out to sea, saluted by the roar of 

 the big guns discharged after them by the fisherlads. 



