October 28. 
THE COTTAGE GAEDENER. 
71 
the other corner of the coast, will foUow. Were I only hom 
to a thousand acres of salt-marsh, half of it should be de¬ 
voted to the preservation of unpreserved game. But the 
local papers already display a long advertisement headed, 
Beclamation oe Land, and concluding with a signature, 
“ Solicitor to the Bill.” Farewell to the salt-marsh of olden 
time. Farewell to wild swans, ruffs, and reeves, and 
sheldrakes. 
The circumvallating ridge makes a bend, and we now have 
a tine view of what, were we out at sea, would be called the 
line of coast, for the sandy flats and marshes ai'e thence 
invisible. The parish church, standing on elevated ground, 
is the central object, with its curious supplemental beacon- 
tower, and the low sunlight gleaming through its windows. 
On the left are the pudding-shaped hills of Sheringham and 
Weyboui'n; behind that broad and lofty knoll on the right, 
dwell the cockle-gatherers of Stififkey. Yes; take care of 
your hat: till to-day you hardly knew what “an airy situa¬ 
tion ” meant. Other breezes may waft the luxurious odours 
of the spices of Arabia ; this bears something better on its 
wings,—a healthy, hungry appetite. This chestful of air, at 
least, has not passed through a thousand pair of lungs 
before entering mine. If one had but in one’s frame-work 
a reservoir for fresh air, as the camel has for holding a store 
of fre.sh water, it would be worth coming hero to breathe 
once or twice a week. Talk about plants and shrubs purify¬ 
ing the atmosphere, and throwing off oxygen ! give me this, 
fresh from the north sea, for the gale to blow in my vdnter- 
garden. How delighted the little wavelets are, jumping in 
the harbour, rminiug races to the shore, and friskly display¬ 
ing their white shirt-frills! Give them a little more room, 
and they would soon grow into sturdy full-sized breakers. 
'Tis a comfort to know that we could not lose our way wan¬ 
dering along this bank, even if we were caught in a fog, or 
had lingered after dark. 
« 
The tide is ebbing, and the boat awaits us. To get to it, 
we must pass—what were under water when w’e mounted the 
bank—the small pits, or depots, where shell fish are kept 
for daily use,—shallow hollows, dug out on the shore, ten 
or twelve feet, more or less, square; for the squareness is 
as uncertain as the size, Parcs aux huitres, or oyster-parks, 
the French would call them. Each pit seems to contain a 
small collection of mussels at one end, and of oysters at the 
other. See that rougli-looking fellow with his mussel-rake, 
of eight or nine flat iron teeth, through holes in which a 
coarse net is laced. In fact, the implement is at once a 
rake and a landing-net; with it, he first collects his treasures 
in a heap, and then ladles them out to the dry land, to be 
picked and cleansed, and packed in hampers. Mark tlie 
oysters, too, mostly lying with the hollow shell upwards, 
their natural position in the sea, instead of, as we have seen 
them packed in barrels, with the flat side uppermost. 
Oysters in the sea, laid wrong, will contrive to move till 
they get themselves right. People who doubt the vivacity of 
the oyster should visit these pits on a hot summer’s day; 
the spitting, and spurting, and rattling of the assembly, will 
astonish them. The wdiole bed of the channel, or “ cut ” 
whereon we are about to embark, is covered -with oysters 
and mussels, belonging to different proprietors. 'These 
chain cables, reaching across the bottom from shore to 
shore, mark the limits of each. Great part of our way down 
to the cockle-grounds will be over oyster and mussel pits or 
“ lays,” as they are called, stored with growing or fattening 
fish: oyster-parks, also, on a larger scale ; for the oysters are 
dredged along the coast, and brought hither; and the mus¬ 
sels, too, are fetched principally from Lynn Deeps and the 
Wash. Those musselmen who are not pressed for ready 
money, find that it pays to let these mussels remain livo 
years in Blakeney “lays ;” they grow and improve so much by 
the change of water. A mussel, when it comes to table, 
can hardly be less than four years old ; a periwinkle, five or 
six. Cockles attain an indefinite age; in proof whereof the 
best and finest samples are only to be had from newly- 
discovered beds. You will note in returning, when many of 
these pits will be left by the tide, that the mussels are laid 
in deeper water, and much less exposed to be deserted by 
the tide than oysters. The smaller mussels, that have not 
thus been put up to fatten, ai’e, in England, used rather for 
bait than for human food. The fisherman scoops out the 
mollusc with his knife, and attaches it to the hook, raw. 
Whelks, which are also used as bait for cod-fish, are cracked 
witli a hammer on a stone, and hooked alive. They are the 
best of bait; so tough that they never drop off, even if they 
are not taken by a fish for a weelc. Whelks are collected on 
several points of our coast, and are eaten largely by the 
children of the natives, althougli not by townspeople here¬ 
abouts. For the youngsters they are simply boiled; when 
adults partake of the mess, they are usually finished off in 
the frying-pan. Neither these, cockles, nor periwinkles, are 
Icept alive in vivaria, or pits, or pares, but are gathered, for 
the occasion, from their native. 
* * * » 
The boat is manned by our polite hosS, who takes the 
helm, and by a second hand—in appearance a round bale of 
blue flannel, standing on two posts, tliat are encased in blue 
worsted stockings, and terminated by a short leather casing, 
to represent shoes. The entire package shall be veiled 
under the assumed name of Mr. Blaekfaced Broadhack, 
if it is possible to conceal anything so bulky. The sail 
is available for this reach. Down we glide. Overhead 
flits a pair of emdews, whistling their measured cry. Tlie 
gun is on board: it would be pleasant to take home a few 
fat specimens of those. The culinary world is scarcely 
aware of their roasting merits. We turn to the left, and 
enter “ the Pit;” the sail must come down. A pair of oars 
with the tide will carry us fast enough. A little flock of 
Stints wheel round us, and alight on the muddy shore that 
has arisen from the waves not ten minutes ago. Paddle 
gently up to them; there they run. Make ready ! Present! 
Bang! There lie some of them; but how to get them'? 
We’ve no dog. The boat is run aground. In jumps Broad- 
back, up to the thickest part of his blue posts. He care for 
wet feet! Well, the game is not much, though some. Off 
quickly, or the tide will leave us stuck fast here. The 
cockle-iferous sands are yet too quick to venture on; what 
shall we do? Here’s the pilots’ house, standing on that 
wonderful tongue of sand and shingle, called “ The Meals,” 
before alluded to. Lot us get out and walk, for we have at 
last arrived at the laud of the Sheldrake. 'This is the iide- 
]}ole belonging to the pilots, reminding me of what I knew 
of Eobinson Crusoe’s almanac in younger days—a northern 
nilometer, measuring (upwards) the depth of the Gennau 
Ocean. “ AVhat water was it at the pole i ” is the twioe-a-day 
question at Blakeney. They ai’e not Trinity-men, but privi- 
ledged denizens. Eight is their number,—four at a watch. 
None are here at this state of the tide, so we must be content 
to peep in at the window. The glass is dull; but the little 
round hole, through which their telescope is thrust, has not 
that defect. See, they have bed and board ; that is to say, 
hammock and bench. In the middle is their stove, to heat 
the kettle and fire the frying-pan. It is placed there to 
economise warmth by its flue. Those square boxes contain 
each its owner’s signal lantern and apparatus. One speci¬ 
men lantern hangs on the hook there. 'The hut is but a dingy 
hole ; still we should think it a paradise, if we were dragged 
into it after having been shipwrecked on the s"rt-.side of the 
Meals. Yesterday I saw a woman (the wife of a master of a 
collier) who last week passed two days and a night lashed 
to the mast of a wreck. She was just beginning to recover 
the shock to body and mind. 
Walking around the hut, one says that the pilots might 
improve their fashions ; they are too Scotch in some matters. 
Proceeding, we find om'selves in a new world. How absurd 
to run over to the continent for novelty alone, till a man 
has ascertained what there is to see in his own country. 
Sand, shingle, and mud, are oiu’ three elements, or rather 
materials here. Wind and water are the two rival auto¬ 
cratic powers. The wind has a powerful ally in the 
Marram grass. Wind steals sand from the beach; Marram 
appropriates it, and keeps it. Mount tliis hillock, and the 
dodge is detected. You will also learn why sheldrakes are 
styled buiTow ducks. Sand-wreaths are formed on the same 
principle as snow-wreaths, and do not melt. In these the 
rabbits burrow, and prepare nesting-places for the shel¬ 
drakes. Our dry sandy shores produce another grass, the 
Poa bulbosa, peculiarly fitted to inhabit such ground. Its 
bulbs grow in clusters, resembling little shallots, and during 
most part of summer remain inactive, blown about at ran¬ 
dom. With the autumnal rains they vegetate, fix themselves 
