272 BIRD-LIFE OF THE BORDERS. 



A gunning-punt, to be of any real service, must necessarily 

 be a very low and shallow craft. Her "depth of hold" is 

 only some nine or ten inches, and her freeboard perhaps four 

 or five. In such a vessel it is obviously the height of 

 recklessness and folly to venture into rough water. The 

 slightest sea is liable, and certain, to break on board, placing 

 her crew in the utmost discomfort, to say nothing of danger. 

 Even with the most cautious, however, it will sometimes 

 occur that, from a sudden change of wind or other cause, 

 a puntsman will be placed in a position, if not of actual 

 danger, at least of very great discomfort and difficulty. As 

 an example of this, the author well remembers one January 

 day when, on the wind suddenly shifting from W. to N.E., 

 with furious squalls and driving snow, he was placed on a 

 lee shore, where the rotten mud prevented a landing, and 

 with some six miles of rough water to face ere shelter could 

 be hoped for. We had hardly time to unship the gun and 

 bring her inboard, so as to trim the punt by the stern, ere 

 the change was complete. It then only remained to sit low 

 and pole like a bargee, using special care to keep the small 

 craft head to sea. Once let her fall off, and the rush of a 

 sea take her in flank, and it is all up : 



.... turn prora avertit : et undis 

 Dat latus : insequitur cumulo prseruptus aquae mons. 



At intervals one of us had to take a turn with the bailing- 

 scoop to keep us from swamping through the seas that 

 broke inboard. In the centre of the slakes, where the 

 water was deep, it sometimes looked as though we were not 

 going to get through ; but at that point we luckily began to 

 meet the drift ice which had been accumulated by the tide 

 and W. wind along the eastern shores. This circumstance 

 perhaps saved us, for though the ice added greatly to the 

 labour, it had the effect of "flattening" the sea, which no 

 longer broke into us ; and we eventually reached the shore 

 safe, but not very comfortable. 



This incident, however, is mere child's play as compared 

 with the narrow escape of my brother Alfred in the Holy 

 Island slakes on that fearfully memorable day, the 14th 



