FISHES IN FABLE AND FAIRY-TALE. 59 



in love, a ring that had been presented to her by her con- 

 sort ; but the king discovered the intrigue, and having 

 obtained the ring, threw it into the Clyde, and then de- 

 manded it of his disloyal lady. In her alarm she sought 

 help from the holy Kentigern, and the saint, proceed- 

 ing to the river, forthwith caught a salmon which, on being 

 opened, was found to have swallowed the all-important 

 jewel. So the queen regained the good graces of the king, 

 and, it is satisfactory to be able to add, lived a better life 

 ever afterwards.* A Tyne salmon caught in its mouth as 

 it fell, and was the means of restoring to its owner, a ring 

 that had dropped off a bridge at Newcastle ; and a Thames 

 pike has been known to be equally opportune and useful. 

 The best known of all such narratives is, of course, that of 

 Polycrates' signet-ring, which was thrown into the sea and 

 recovered from the body of a fish presented to the king by 

 a fisherman. But this is by no means the original of the 

 episode, for Solomon recovered his throne by a fish restor- 

 ing him the talisman ring by virtue of which he held 

 dominion over all the devils ; f and more ancient still is the 



* A variation is to be found in the following : " The legend o 

 the fish and the ring," says the Rev. Dr. Dibdin in his ' Northern 

 Tour,' " is extant in well-nigh every class-book in Scotland ; old Spots- 

 wood is among the earliest historians who garnished the dish from the 

 Latin monastic legends, and Messrs. Smith, M'Lellan, and Cleland 

 have not failed to quote his words. They report of St. Kentigern, that 

 a lady of good place in the country having lost her ring as she crossed 

 the river Clyde, and her husband waxing jealous, as if she had be- 

 stowed the same on one of her lovers, she did mean herself unto 

 Kentigern, entreating his help for the safety of her honour, and that he 

 going to the river after he had used his devotion, willed one who was 

 making to fish to bring the first that he caught, which was done. In 

 the mouth of the fish he found the ring, and sending it to the lady, she 

 was thereby freed of her husband's suspicion." 



t Sale gives the following version : " Solomon entrusted his signet 

 with one of his concubines, which the devil obtained from her and 



