THE BOKE OF ST. ALBANS—THE CELTS 57 
or Scotland. A passage in Bede (probably used by Henry of 
Huntingdon), which has, I think, escaped the many-eyed net 
of our fishing authors, testifies to its absence in the former. 
St. Wilfrid (born 634) on his return from Friesland, where 
fishing yielded the staple of food, met with such success in his 
mission to the South Saxons that he not only converted them, 
“with all the priests of the Idols,’’ but also—‘‘ which was a 
great relief unto them ”’—taught them the craft of fishing, of 
which, save eeling, they wotted naught. Collecting under the 
Saint’s order eel-nets where they could, the first adventurers 
meritis sui patris Divina largitate adjuti 1 enmeshed three hundred 
fishes, which they equally divided between the poor, the net- 
owners, and themselves. 
The Celta, with some exceptions such as the scomber- 
catching Celtiberi, eschewed fish, probably from religious 
prejudices, which owing to their adoration of the springs, 
rivers, and waters prevented the eating of their denizens. 
Whatever the cause, Dion Cassius expressly comments on 
the abstinence of the Caledonians, although their seas and 
rivers abounded with food.2 In time the example of the 
clergy and the ordinance of fast days gradually overcame— 
save in the case of Eels, which still remain to the Highlander 
an abomination—their obstinate antipathy. Across St. George’s 
Channel the Irish two centuries ago “had little skill in 
catching fish.”’ 3 
But when the Western Highlanders did go a-fishing, their 
prayers and promises—prompted by the same principle of 
gratitude being a sense of favours to come—echo the prayers 
and promises, Dis mutatis, of the Anthologia Palatina. 
The seas differ, but the gods precated are the same. If in 
the following verses you substitute for ‘‘ Christ, King of the 
Elements ’’ Poseidon, King of the Waters, for ‘‘ brave Peter ”’ 
ruseful Hermes, and for “‘ Mary fair’’ Aphrodite, you have the 
tutelary deities of fishing. The spirit of the prayer and promise 
of the firstling remain unchanged. 
1 In Bede, ‘‘ Et divina se innante gratia,” 
276,12. Tay yap ixdtwv, dmelpwy nal awrérwy dvTwy, ob yetovTat. 
% James Logan, The Scottish Gael (Inverness, 1876), vol. ii. p. 130 f. 
