canoe inside and out, making her heavier,
but thoroughly water-tight--the end compartments being even air-tight. I
raised the combing of the well to six inches in height, put on a deeper
keel, shortened my mast, and added an outrigger. What more _could_ I do?
The outrigger I made of a bundle of bamboos lashed firmly together, like
the pictures one sees of the old Roman Fascines, or Rods of Authority,
and this I fastened about five feet from the side by means of a couple
of stout ash saplings. I found these improvements so admirable, that I
was not afraid in light winds (having gained a knowledge of the tides
and currents) of venturing anywhere either around Jethou or Herm.

Immense quantities of fish are found all round Jethou, the principal
being lobsters, crabs, crayfish, spider crabs, plaice, John Dorey,
soles, ormers, pollock, bass, gurnard, skate, cod, long-nose, rock fish,
turbot, brill, whiting, and conger.

Several of the fish I had never seen before, as they are rarely if ever
caught off the Norfolk coast; thus John Dorey, spiders, ormers, rock
fish, and pollock were all new to me, and gave me great enjoyment in
their capture, beside which I was greatly taken with the flavour of both
the Dorey and pollock, scores of which I caught in the Percee.

The ormer, rarely seen in England, is, I believe, sometimes called the
Sea Ear. It is somewhat the shape and size of a half cocoa nut (divided
lengthwise). The outside of the shell is of a rough texture, and of a
dull red colour, while the inside is beautifully coloured with an
iridescent mother o' pearl coating. (Why do we never hear anything of
the father o' pearl?) The ormer adheres to the rocks like the limpet
tribe, but is seldom seen above _low_ water-mark, like the limpet, who
loves to be exposed to the sun and air twice a day.

The flesh of the ormer, when grilled, is something like a veal cutlet
cooked in a fishy frying-pan, and I cannot say I was greatly enraptured
with the uncommon univalve.

My first meeting with the ormer was by accident. I was having an _al
fresco_ lunch of bread and raw limpets which I was detaching from the
rocks, eating them with a seasoning of vinegar and pepper which I had
brought with me when, being close down to the water among some outlying
rocks (as it was a very low neap tide), I saw something just under the
surface of a pool, of a dull red colour, which I perceived to be a
shell-fish of some kind. Stooping down, with a rap