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But there was a kindly man called Jamieson, who kept the grocery shop, and he called Rob in as the boys passed home.

‘Rob,’ said he, ‘ye maun be doing something now. There’s a cousin of mine has a whisky shop in the Saltmarket in Glasgow, and I could get ye a place there.’

Rob’s very gorge rose at the notion of his having to serve in a whisky shop in Glasgow. That would be to abandon all the proud ambitions of his life. Nevertheless, he had been thinking seriously about the duty he owed to these lads, his companions, who were now dependent on him. So he swallowed his pride and said,

‘How much would he give me?’

‘I think I could get him to give ye four shillings a week. That would keep ye very well.’

‘Keep me?’ said Rob. ‘Ay, but what’s to become o’ Duncan and Neil and Nicol?’

‘They must shift for themselves,’ the grocer answered.

‘That winna do,’ said Rob, and he left the shop.

He overtook his companions and asked them to go along to some rocks overlooking the harbour. They sat down there–the harbour below them with all its picturesque boats, and masses of drying nets, and what not.

‘Neil,’ said Rob to his cousin, ‘we’ll have to think about things now. There will be no more Eilean-na-Rona for us. We have just about as much left as will pay the lodgings this week, and Nicol must go three nights a week to the night school. What we get for stripping the nets ‘ll no do now.’

‘It will not,’ said Neil.

‘Mr. Jamieson was offering me a place in Glasgow, but it is not very good, and I think we will do better if we keep together. Neil,’ said he, ‘if we had only a net, do ye not think we could trawl for cuddies?’ [1]

[1] ‘Cuddies’ is the familiar name in those parts for young saithe. ‘Trawling,’ again, means there the use of an ordinary seine.

And again he said, ‘Neil, do ye not think we could make a net for ourselves out of the old rags lying at the shed?’

And again he said, ‘Do ye think that Peter, the tailor, would lend us his old boat for a shilling a week?’

It was clear that Rob had been carefully considering the details of this scheme of co-operation. And it was eagerly welcomed, not only by Neil, but also by the brothers Duncan and Nicol, who had been frightened by the thought of Rob going away to Glasgow. The youngest of all, Nicol, boldly declared that he could mend nets as well as any man in Erisaig.

No sooner was the scheme thoroughly discussed, than it was determined, under Rob’s direction, to set to work at once. The woman who kept the lodgings and cooked their food for them had intimated to them that they need be in no hurry to pay her for a week or two until they should find some employment; but they had need of money, or the equivalent of money, in other directions. Might not old Peter, who was a grumbling and ill-tempered person, insist on being paid in advance? Then, before they could begin to make a net out of the torn and rejected pieces lying about the shed, they must needs have a ball of twine. So Rob bade his brothers and cousin go away and get their rude fishing-rods and betake themselves to the rocks at the mouth of the harbour, and see what fish they could get for him during the afternoon.

Meanwhile he himself went along to the shed which was used as a sort of storage-house by some of the fishermen; and here he found lying about plenty of pieces of net that had been cast aside in the process of mending. This business of mending the nets is the last straw on the back of the tired-out fisherman. When he has met with an accident to his nets during the night, when he has fouled on some rocks in dragging them in for example, it is a desperately fatiguing affair to set to work to mend them when he gets ashore, dead beat with the labours of the morning. The fishermen, for what reason I do not know, will not entrust this work to their wives; they will rather, after having been out all night, keep at it themselves, though they drop off to sleep every few minutes. It is not to be wondered at, then, that often, instead of trying to laboriously mend holes here or there, they should cut out a large piece of torn net bodily and tack on a fresh piece. The consequence is, that in a place like Erisaig there is generally plenty of netting to be got for the asking; which is a good thing for gardeners who want to protect currant bushes from the blackbirds, and who will take the trouble to patch the pieces together.