86 . PILCHARD. 



sometimes happens that immense multitudes of fish will collect 

 far from land, with an evident intention to proceed towards 

 the shallower water. An instance of this was met with in 

 the month of July, at forty leagues in a south-west direction 

 from the Scilly Islands; and so large and dense was the 

 assemblage that the course of the ship was supposed to have 

 been obstructed by them, and some were taken up by merely 

 dipping a bucket among them. More usually, however, thev 

 do not assemble in large bodies until they have been for a 

 time in the neighbourhood of the coast, and it is then that 

 they assume the arrangement of a mighty army, with its 

 wings stretched out parallel to the land; while the numberless 

 smaller bodies of which it is composed are continually shifting 

 their position, joining together and separating again. There 

 are three stations occupied by this body which have great 

 influence on the success of the fishery; one of which is 

 eastward of the Lizard Point, and reaches to the Bay of 

 Bigbury, near the Bolthead, in Devonshire, beyond which 

 little success attends the fishery, although at Dartmouth some 

 efforts are made towards it. A second station is from the 

 Lizard to the Land's End; and the third is on the north 

 coast, where the principal station is at St. Ives. It is common 

 for one of these districts to be full of fish while few are to 

 be seen in cither of the others; but late in the season the 

 schools often change from one district to another, or pass in 

 succession along all the shores of a county. It is at this late 

 season especially that they shew themselves at St. Ives, where, 

 therefore, they are not usually expected until October or 

 November; but when they come it is in immense multitudes, 

 and usually from the eastward; a circumstance which is ac- 

 counted for by the supposition that from the west they have 

 been influenced by the course of a current that has taken a 

 circuit of the coast bounded by the shores of Ireland, Wales, 

 and the north of Devonshire. 



In the ordinary season of the fishery the subordinate move- 

 ments of the smaller bodies are much influenced by the tide, 

 directly against the current of which they do not proceed; 

 and the large extended body will sometimes remain at a 

 distance from the land, although parallel with it, for several 

 weeks, and then suddenly, as if by general consent, approach 



