Delights of Dredging. 131 



fathoms or from many, we may have been trawling 

 with great vigour and speed, or we may have been 

 slowly floating before the tide, and under these 

 circumstances we may have had rare things or 

 common things or no things, but these uncertainties 

 in no way lessen the pleasure, but rather warm and 

 increase our enthusiasm. 



" No picture is so indelible on my mind as the start 

 for a dredging excursion one fine summer morning, 

 when the sun was just making his appearance over 

 the hilltops and tingeing their sides with his golden 

 beams, the straggling clouds floating midway from 

 the lofty peaks, the air pleasantly cool and balmy, 

 and the sea smooth as glass, mirroring the sun in her 

 bosom, and only ruffled by the splashing of sea-birds 

 chasing one another and squabbling in the exuberance 

 of their joy. Two or three kindred spirits had met 

 and were at their posts at the appointed time. The 

 boat being launched, the traps and provisions stowed 

 safely away, and all seated, when the first splash of 

 the oars in the silvery flood set us in motion, how 

 lovely it was to look over the boat-side and see the 

 beautiful forest of sea-weed, clumps of Halidrys 

 siliquosa majestically grouped here and there, and 

 echinoderms and star-fishes spangling as it were the 

 firmament below ! " 



For a time Mr. Robertson turned his attention very 

 eagerly to sea-weeds, and was assisted by his wife in 

 making a collection of them mounted in the usual 

 way upon paper. 



As the smaller plants could not well be made out 

 by the unaided eye, at first he procured a simple 



