CHAPTER IX 



WITH A LOWESTOFT DRIFTER 



SCARBOROUGH CASTLE, grim and ruined, tops the hill 

 which overlooks the grey North Sea between Flam- 

 borough Head and Whitby Abbey, where Csedmon, 

 founder of English poetry, was a monk, and not far from 

 which was the monastic home of the Venerable Bede, 

 father of English learning. When Baeda and Csedmon 

 were alive they watched the early fishers sail away to 

 catch and bring ashore that marvellously prolific creature 

 which was and is of all fish the unchallenged king. 

 They went and came, these small crude craft, when wind 

 and sea permitted, and to-day, twelve centuries later, 

 the men of the east coast put to sea, also at the will of 

 wind and wave, to gather some of its abundant harvest. 



The Lowestoft drifter, sail and steam, have come 

 south after their voyage north to accompany the herring 

 in that mysterious migration which begins at the Shet- 

 lands, the unnumbered living mass advancing almost as 

 the Gulf Stream goes on its appointed way. 



We sailed from Scarborough on a Sunday as the 

 bells were chiming for the morning service, knowing that 

 when they rang for evensong we should have shot our 

 nets and be drifting at them. 



These Lowestoft vessels are only part of that vast 



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