This floating was Archie’s favourite amusement, in the interval between the departure of the gannets in the morning and their return from the south at eve. There was a strong current round the Storr, from an eddy below the hole he called his cave quite round the point to a ledge of rocks on the other side of the promontory; which ledge being a favourable spot for embarkation, was called the quay. Archie’s delight was to drop feathers, straws, weed, or eggshells, into the eddy, to watch them come up again after they had disappeared, and float round the point, and to find them again collected at the quay. Nobody could please him so well as by giving him a new substance to float; and he brought home many a gannet for the sake of the feathers, more than for the kind smile and stroke of the head with which Ella rewarded such enterprises. She was proud of Archie’s feats in bird-catching; and if ever she spoke to a stranger on her domestic affairs, represented Archie as adding to the resources of the household, in no small degree. He seldom exerted himself to hunt the puffins out of their burrows in the rock, and had not sense or patience to manage snares; but such birds as were stupid enough to go on laying their eggs where they were taken away as soon as they appeared, and such as were tame enough to sit still and be taken by the hand, were Archie’s prey. He twisted their necks as he had seen his brothers do, and pouched them in his plaid, and still conceived himself to be on terms of close friendship with the species, fancying that their morning screams were cries of invitation to him, and returning the compliment at eve, by singing southwards from the highest point he could reach, if he thought them late in coming home.
Ella was not mistaken in thinking the herrings were come. There were so many stragglers ready to be caught with newly-tinned hooks, that it was evident a shoal was at hand, and that her nets might be brought into use within a few days.
“See there!” said Ella, when late in the afternoon she and her brother suspended their labour to eat and rest; “it brightens one’s eyes to see such a spoil for one day.”
“And such fine fish too,” replied Ronald. “My heart misgave me this morning lest we should find them like what they were last year. It would be a good thing for such as we if we could judge of herring like cod, and know when we should find them well-fed and most fit to be eaten. Last year they were as lean as a moor, and now they are as plump as a barley-field.”
“Thanks be to Him that guides them in the deep waters,” said Ella; “there will be joy under many a roof this season.”
Ronald reverently uncovered his head. “I wonder,” said he, “that we see no more boats. Yon sloop is from Greenock, I wager; come to take up herrings and kelp. She may keep her anchor down long; for not a hook has been thrown in the Sound till ours, that I could see, and yonder is the first kelp fire within sight this season.”
“Ye’ll have one of your own, next season, Ronald, and, I doubt not, it will show light betimes. So willing as ye are to help in the field and on the water, we owe ye our toil when the storms come. The field once laid out, and the profits of the fish safe pouched, and Fergus’s peat stored, he and I will be your servants in our turn, Ronald, and cut and cull weed as fast as ye can draw it in. The rope is begun already.”
“Is it? How thoughtful ye are, Ella! When could ye find time to think of my rope?”
“O, there’s ever time for what ought to be provided. I have thinned the pony’s tail now and then for a long time, so that I have near hair enough; and when Archie was heavy one day, I thought I could work for you and sing to him at one time; and in the storm yesterday I twisted more. We shall have a long stout rope before the first large drift of weed, and if ye crop the ledges as plentifully as they promise, we shall have a grand fire, one of the first of the season. How proud it will make me, Ronald, to help to row over your first venture of kelp!”
“Not so proud as it will make me to put the money into the pouch, Ella. To think that I help to pay the laird!”