BTIITTANY. 215 



broiled upon wood ashes, and served with a little fresh 

 butter andfins herbes, before my departure from the country. 



This excellent hors d'ceuvre, which is now as well known 

 and appreciated, in its preserved state, by the backwoodsman 

 in Canada, and the Australian or Californian gold-digger in 

 the wildest parts of the bush, as it was at this time by the 

 Parisian gourmand, is far more delicious when eaten fresh on 

 its native shores. It must now form a most important 

 article of commerce amongst French exports, and no doubt 

 many imitations of the original article, in the shape of 

 small roach, dace, bleak, and other white fish, even including 

 the sprat, find their way into the neat little tin boxes which 

 represent Sardines a Vhuile, over every part of the civilized 

 and some portions of the uncivilized globe. 



They are caught in immense quantities along the whole 

 coast of Brittany, as far north as Brest, but are not found 

 any farther to the northward. The mode of catching them 

 is very similar to the pilchard fishery in Cornwall, except 

 that the nets are larger and the meshes smaller, being from 

 ten to twenty feet deep, and five or 'six hundred feet in 

 length. Boats and nets are generally the property of indi- 

 viduals who let them out to the fishermen, on condition of 

 receiving a certain proportion of the profits either in kind 

 or in money. 



When on a clear day, and with a smooth sea, the shoals of 

 sardines are seen entering the different bays of the coast, and 

 glistening like silver on the surface of the water, nothing can 

 be more animated than to see the fleets of boats in hot pur- 

 suit, in all directions, and the rapidity and skill with which 

 the enormous nets are handled. All this I saw to perfection 

 at the little town and bay of Concarneau, about ten miles 

 from Quimperle. The preserving the fish in tin boxes is 

 chiefly done at Nantes and Lorient. 



Before concluding my chapter on Brittany, and in corrobo- 



