tag bearing in large black lettering the number of the stall place. Independent and friendly, for the most part with the high cheek bones and ruddy color of the Scotch, the Manx woman hails market day as a joyous event in her monotonous life. One of the pleasant faced assemblage of sellers will perhaps have only hares over which to traffic. Another, several nicely plucked goslins or a pair of ducks. Others, again, have brought to market appetizing pats of butter and the whitest of fresh eggs. But whatsoever is exposed for sale, daintiness is the keynote to all, one basket vieing with another in exquisite spotlessness of the linen cloth, which lining the basket covers as well as the outlay, on its way to market. Where posies tempt the eye, the flowers are bunched without touch of green other than the wide feathery fringe of fresh bracken flaunting over the rims of the large, flat, round baskets in which all such blooms are for the skill displayed. No fishwife heaped. wears a hat. Unlike her sisters in the general market, she stands bonnetless, a sturdy descendant of the early Norseman freebooter. Large and strongly built, with hands that give an idea of sufficient strength to tear an ox asunder, to see one intent on the ever-recurring task of preparing fish for a purchaser, is a liberal education to an inland-town bred person. Sometimes down the line the eye will be caught at sight of one of the gay, laughing women displaying with evident pride an assortment of hand-woven linen, fine embroidery or voluminous yards of cotton lace, carefully knitted by the fireside during long hours of the previous winter. The fish market, while under the same cover, is distinctly a place to itself, wherein by some odd ruling the Manxwoman reigns supreme. Apparently no man so much as idly dreams of taking part in the retail traffic of fish. Theirs the duty to catch, that of the wives to find customers in open market for the scaly wares. To behold a Manxwoman handle fish is something to be remembered with genuine admiration. Grasping a formidable pair of rude iron shears, rusty and grim with many such slaughterings, the adept gives an incisive clip along the back of the fish firmly grasped in her left hand. In a twinkling, off fall all bristling finny appurtenances. This accomplished, with lightning snip the belly is rent lengthwise. Another dexterous side-wise flip of the scissor blades and the disem boweling process is complete. Quick as a flash, before one has time to gasp, off the head is cut, to fall beside other refuse into a basket behind the counter. A swift flash of the shears in the air and away goes the tail, as with ingenuity born. of long practice, the fish is bent into a perfect bow, slipped into a bit of paper, and smilingly thrust. into the outstretched hand of the purchaser. All this has been accomplished in two minutes at longest. C |
0 Reviews Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identified Write review |