328 WILD LIFE ON A NORFOLK ESTUARY 



yellow. The under side was milk - white, with the 

 " splashiness " characterising the holibut, the fin rays look- 

 ing as if they had been daubed with lime-white. I pur- 

 chased the fish, which was, without the shadow of a doubt, 

 a cross between the holibut and plaice, for a few pence. This 

 fish, with several other interesting specimens, is in the 

 Tolhouse Museum. 



AN OBSTINATE SKATE 



A Breydoner named Thacker, when rowing up the 

 Duffell's drain on Breydon, was struck by a curious flapping 

 movement on a flat as he passed by. It suggested to him 

 the struggles of a wounded bird making ineffectual efforts 

 to fly. He accordingly pushed as close to the flat as possible, 

 and at once saw that a large skate, left stranded by the ebb 

 tide, was flapping its great finny disc in vain endeavour to 

 reach water, or to realise its situation. Fastening his boat, 

 he went on the flat with a bit of rope, which he hitched 

 round the skate's tail, the fish remaining somewhat passive 

 until he dragged it into the drain. The moment the monster 

 it was a good-sized fish felt itself in its native element, 

 it grounded, and resisted all Thacker's efforts to pull it into 

 the boat ; in fact, it very nearly dragged him in too. It was 

 only by patiently waiting until he could take the fish off its 

 guard that he got its " nose " uppermost, and so brought it 

 into a position where he could belabour it until it was too 

 feeble to resist being dragged into the punt. 



SHARK INCIDENT 



When recently recalling our experiences of sharks, my 

 shrimper factotum, Colby, informed me that, late in the 

 6o's, when he was engaged in midsummer fishing for mackerel 

 in the Wold, they got a large shark, "over 12 ft. long," in 

 the nets, " makin' a nice old mess " of some fifteen of them 

 (a "fleet" of mackerel nets then comprised eight-score 

 sections, or nets). The shark (a " bottle-nosed J un ") was 

 landed on the beach by one of the ferry-boats, and one or 



