r in which that milk and honey
are to be got out of so inaccessible a Canaan. I will, therefore,
endeavour to give some answer to these questions in an order the reverse
of that in which I have stated them.

Apart from hooks, and lines, and ordinary nets, fishermen have, from time
immemorial, made use of two kinds of implements for getting at sea-
creatures which live beyond tide-marks--these are the "dredge" and the
"trawl." The dredge is used by oyster-fishermen. Imagine a large bag, the
mouth of which has the shape of an elongated parallelogram, and is
fastened to an iron frame of the same shape, the two long sides of this
rim being fashioned into scrapers. Chains attach the ends of the frame to
a stout rope, so that when the bag is dragged along by the rope the edge
of one of the scrapers rests on the ground, and scrapes whatever it
touches into the bag. The oyster-dredger takes one of these machines in
his boat, and when he has reached the oyster-bed the dredge is tossed
overboard; as soon as it has sunk to the bottom the rope is paid out
sufficiently to prevent it from pulling the dredge directly upwards, and
is then made fast while the boat goes ahead. The dredge is thus dragged
along and scrapes oysters and other sea-animals and plants, stones, and
mud into the bag. When the dredger judges it to be full he hauls it up,
picks out the oysters, throws the rest overboard, and begins again.

Dredging in shallow water, say ten to twenty fathoms, is an easy
operation enough; but the deeper the dredger goes, the heavier must be
his vessel, and the stouter his tackle, while the operation of hauling up
becomes more and more laborious. Dredging in 150 fathoms is very hard
work, if it has to be carried on by manual labour; but by the use of the
donkey-engine to supply power,[2] and of the contrivances known as
"accumulators," to diminish the risk of snapping the dredge rope by the
rolling and pitching of the vessel, the dredge has been worked deeper and
deeper, until at last, on the 22nd of July, 1869, H.M.S. _Porcupine_
being in the Bay of Biscay, Captain Calver, her commander, performed the
unprecedented feat of dredging in 2,435 fathoms, or 14,610 feet, a depth
nearly equal to the height of Mont Blanc. The dredge "was rapidly hauled
on deck at one o'clock in the morning of the 23rd, after an absence of
7-1/4 hours, and a journey of upwards of eight statute miles," with a
hundred weight and a half of solid contents.

[F