WHALING AND BEAR-HUNTING 61 



water was clear as glass above white sand, and against the 

 low stone quay or sea face were driven, by cormorants, shoals 

 of fish, dark, velvety-green compact masses, of saith or coal- 

 fish, actually as thick as fish in a barrel. These ugly dusky 

 divers paid little heed to people on shore, but in regular order 

 circled round the shoals, coming to within eight yards of us, 

 and every now and then one would dive under the mass of 

 fish and fill itself as it went, and an opening through the mass 

 would show its horrid procedure as it straddled across white 

 sand under the fish, till it came up with a bounce at our feet, 

 shaking its bill with satisfaction and then go back to do its 

 turn at rounding up, whilst another of its kind took its turn 

 at eating the piltoch. 



No wonder, with this wealth of fish and fowl round the 

 shore, that the Norsemen rather hanker after their old 

 islands ; they cure these saith and eat them through winter, 

 and very good they are, and they also eat the cormorants (I 

 give you my word, they are bad ; I've eaten many kinds of 

 sea-fowl and the cormorant is the worst). The reader may 

 have heard that Norwegians claim the Shetlands, for they 

 say Scotland only holds them in pawn, for the dowry of 

 Margaret Princess of Denmark, wife of King James III., 

 estimated at 50,000 florins, which has not yet been paid. 

 So when Norway offers the equivalent, plus interest, which 

 now amounts to several million pounds sterling, the islands 

 may be returned to Norway. Possibly international law, 

 recognising the amalgamation of the two companies, Scotland 

 & Co. and England & Co., into Great Britain & Co., may 

 not now admit the claim. 



A specimen of a really stout Shetlander came on board 

 with the Customs House men, Magnus Andersen, a burly, 

 ruddy type, not so intellectual or finely drawn as the typical 

 Shetlander a pilot by profession what seamen call a real 

 old shell-back, with grizzled beard and ruddy cheeks about 

 a hundred years old and straight as a dart, stark and strong, 

 with a bull's voice and a child's blue eyes. I said : " Why 

 don't you have an oilskin on ? " It was raining a little and 

 blowing. " I've been at sea all my days," he said, smiling, 

 " and never wore an oilskin " ; one of the old hardy school, 



