THE HERRING. 285 



in bulk was lost. In the bays or " lochs," on the west 

 coast of Scotland, where the shoals of herrings are 

 very abundant, and apt to be driven ashore and stranded 

 by heavy gales from the north-west, these casualties 

 often occur. But though these occurrences are a great 

 and obvious loss, they do not appear to have any effect 

 upon the supply of herrings, whose numbers do not 

 seem capable of apparent diminution, either by the 

 casualties of nature or the schemes of art. 



The habits of this most abundant, and, perhaps, all 

 things considered, most valuable fish, are but imper- 

 fectly known ; and they have been a good deal mis- 

 represented. Their apparently capricious visits to 

 particular parts of the .coast, which did not seem 

 to depend upon any known law, naturally enough led 

 the inhabitants of the places which they thus periodi- 

 cally, but irregularly, visited, to impute to them certain 

 superstitious likes and dislikes. The naturalists, too, 

 or those who took upon themselves that character, 

 publishing their opinions from little observation and 

 less reflection, rendered the delusion more extensive 

 and inveterate ; till those who had never seen a live 

 herring, were able to trace its migrations in the deep 

 with as much certainty as they could the motion of 

 the hands upon the dial of the village clock. 



The disposition to endow the other animals with 

 that erratic propensity, that aimless wandering which 

 idle men display, has been a stumbling-block in 

 the path of natural history. The powers of man are 

 placed under his own management, and when he does 

 not manage them properly, he becomes an idler, and 

 wanders or talks, as it may be, without an aim. But 



