102 
HERRING. 
this more rapidly than the Herring. When alarmed the rush 
of the Mackarel is much further than either of these fishes. 
There is proof that this fish was from the earliest times in 
estimation as food by the highest orders of society, as well as 
by the lowest; while in its salted or smoked condition it was 
among the principal of the stores which necessity compelled 
them to lay in for their winter stock of provisions; and the 
smoke of their dwellings, before the common use of chimneys, 
however irksome in other respects, afforded an important conve- 
niency for the last-named process of preserving the fish. There 
were not only religious considerations that demanded the frequent 
use of fish as food, but it was also a variation from the diet 
of salted flesh, in times when the scarcity of fodder compelled 
even the richest persons to kill and salt their cattle at the 
approach of winter; at which season, from defective cultivation, 
they were only able to keep alive so many as would secure 
the stock for the succeeding year. As an instance of the ordinary 
use of the Herring in a noble family, we are told in the 
Northumberland Family Book, that there was appointed for the 
breakfast for the Earl and his Lady, besides other things, as a 
quart of beer and a quart of wine, two pieces of salt fish, six 
baconed Herrings, four White Herrings, or a dish of Sproits; 
these baconed Herrings, no doubt, being what we now know 
as smoked or red Herring. And in the time of Henry the 
Third, when the Princess Margaret was married to the Duke 
of Brabant, and the royal couple were about to sail to that 
country, among the other provisions furnished to the ships were 
ten thousand six hundred and fifty-two Herrings, with two 
hundred and ninety-two Cods and two barrels of Sturgeon. 
Again, in the year 1429, the Duke of Bedford sent five hundred 
carts loaded with Herrings to victual the army which was 
besieging Orleans and the neighbouring towns; and when the 
French attacked this convoy they were defeated. 
In Ochlanschloeger’s poem, “The Gods of the North,” the 
following reward is offered by Skerner to the ferryman to cai-ry 
him across a river: — 
‘•If thou wilt ferry me o’er the wave. 
I’ll give thee oat-cakes and Herrings beside.” 
