"As we drew a little nearer, and saw the whole adjacent prospect lying a straight low line under the sky, I hinted to Peggotty that a mound or so might have improved it; and also that if the land had been a little more separated from the sea, and the town and the tide had not been quite so much mixed up, like toast and water, it would have been nicer. But Peggotty said, with greater emphasis than usual, that we must take things as we found them, and that, for her part, she was proud to call herself a Yarmouth Bloater."

I didn't know there was such a range of quality in herring in UK,depending on the time they are caught. Here's a URL about it:
http://www.falmouth.packet.archives.dial.pipex.com/id185.htm

In reply to:

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if the land had been a little more separated from the sea, and the town and the tide had not been quite so much mixed up, like toast and water, it would have been nicer

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That image in itself is worth one more repetition.

This bloater was a fish, wwh? Peggotty was proud to call herself a fish? A herring?

Yarmouth was famous for its bloaters, and the name came to be used of the inhabitants.

Bingley