er than that. It was to be of man's estate,
broad-shouldered and heavy-bearded; to wear huge black boots up to his
thighs, and a blue flannel jersey; to have a peaked cap (not forgetting
a brass button on each side by way of smartness); and then to come
along, in the afternoon, with a yellow oilskin tied up in a bundle, to
the wharf where the herring fleet lay, the admiration and the envy of
all the miserable creatures condemned to stay ashore.

In the meantime--in these days of joyous idleness, while as yet the
cares and troubles which this history will have to chronicle were far
away from him and his simply because they were unknown--Rob MacNicol,
if he could not be a fisherman, could be an imaginary chieftain, and in
that capacity he gave his orders as one who knew how to make himself
obeyed. As soon as they had shoved the boat clear of the smacks, the
jib was promptly set; the big lumps of stone that served for ballast
were duly shifted; the lug-sail, as black as pitch and full of holes,
was hoisted, and the halyards made fast; then the sheet was hauled in
by Nicol MacNicol, who had been ordered to the helm; and finally the
shaky old nondescript craft began to creep through the blue waters of
Erisaig Bay. It was a lovely morning; the light breeze from the land
seemed steady enough; altogether, nothing could have been more
auspicious for the setting out of the great chieftain and his kinsmen.

But great as he is, he is not above fearing the criticism of people
ashore on his method of handling a boat. Rob, from his proud position
at the bow, darted an angry glance at his helmsman.

'Keep her full, will ye?' he growled in an undertone. 'Do ye call that
steering, ye gomeril? Run her by Daft Sandy's boat? It is no better
than a cowherd you are at the steering.'

This Daft Sandy, who will turn up in our history by-and-by, was a
half-witted old man, who spent his life in fishing for flounders from a
rotten old punt he had become possessed of. He earned a sort of living
that way; and seldom went near the shore during the day except to beg
for a herring or two for bait, when the boats came in. He got the
bait, but in an ignominious way; for the boys, stripping the nets,
generally saved up the 'broken' herring in order to pelt Daft Sandy
with the fragments when he came near. That is to say, they indulged in
this amiable sport except when Rob MacNicol happened to be about. That
youth had been heard to remark that