For the rest of the
day there was a pretty kind of straggling procession of those
who went and came between the beach and the village - men in
blue cotton shirts, blue jerseys, blue jackets, and women in
grey gowns and big white sun-bonnets.
During the latter part
of the day the proceedings were peculiarly interesting to me,
a looker-on with no share in any one of the boats, owing to
the catches being composed chiefly of jelly-fish. Some
sympathy was felt for the toilers who strained their muscles
again and again only to be mocked in the end; still, a draught
of jelly-fish was more to my taste than one of mackerel. The
great weight of a catch of this kind when the net was full was
almost too much for the ten or twelve men engaged in drawing
it up; then (to the sound of deep curses from those of the men
who were not religious) the net would be opened and the great
crystalline hemispheres, hyaline blue and delicate salmon-pink
in colour, would slide back into the water. Such rare and
exquisite colours have these great glassy flowers of ocean
that to see them was a feast; and every time a net was hauled
up my prayer - which I was careful not to repeat aloud - was,
Heaven send another big draught of jelly-fish!
The sun, sinking over the hills towards Swyre and Bridport,
turned crimson before it touched the horizon.
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