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page 124
large bay under Place Fell, three fishermen were dragging a
net, - a picturesque group beneath the high and bare crags!
A raven was seen aloft; not hovering like the kite, for that
is not the habit of the bird; but passing on with a
straight-forward perseverance, and timing the motion of its
wings to its own croaking. The waters were agitated; and the
iron tone of the raven's voice, which strikes upon the ear
at all times as the more dolorous from its regularity, was
in fine keeping with the wild scene before our eyes. This
carnivorous fowl is a great enemy to the lambs of these
solitudes; I recollect frequently seeing, when a boy,
bunches of unfledged ravens suspended from the church-yard
gates of H___, for which a reward of so much a head
was given to the adventurous destroyer. - The fishermen drew
their net ashore, and hundreds of fish were leaping in their
prison. They were all of the kind called skellies, a sort of
fresh-water herring, shoals of which may sometimes be seen
dimpling or rippling the surface of the lake in calm
weather. This species is not found, I believe, in any other
of these lakes; nor, as far as I know, is the chevin, that
spiritless fish, (though I am loth to call it so, for
it was a prime favourite with Isaac Walton,) which must
frequent Ullswater, as I have seen a large shoal passing
into the lake from the river Eamont. Here are no
pike, and the char are smaller than those of the other
lakes, and of inferior quality; but the grey trout attains a
very large size, sometimes weighing above twenty pounds.
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