WHIPPING THE HAKE.
It is not improbable that the saying applied to the people of one of the Cornish fishing-towns, of “Who whipped the hake?” may be explained by the following:—
“Lastly, they are persecuted by the hakes, who (not long sithence) haunted the coast in great abundance; but now being deprived of their wonted bait, are much diminished, verifying the proverb, ‘What we lose in hake we shall have in herring.’”—Carew, Survey, p. 34.
Annoyed with the hakes, the seiners may, in their ignorance, have actually served one of those fish as indicated.