Hate to say it, but we covered this before. Herring scaled, split, salted and dried turns red. Keeps forever, so available for such wasteful practices as dragging on ground to divert the hound. I used to enjoy chomping small ones vigorously with lots of beer many long years ago.

Red Herring.

Drawing a red herring across the path. Trying to divert attention from the main question by
some side-issue. A red herring drawn across a fox’s path destroys the scent and sets the dogs at
fault.
1
Neither fish, flesh, nor good red herring. Something insipid and not good eating. Neither one
thing nor another.

A bit of trivia: what is commonly called herring in New England is actually an alewife.

Further trivia: The fact that the King of England issued a charter for some of his subjects to form the Massachusetts Bay Colony accounts for the fact that the stream running through Cambridge is The Alewife Brook, and the road alongside it is the Alewife Brook Parkway. Thanks for letting me know what an 'alewife' really is. I knew it was a fish, but never realized it was a herring.

Dear drowser: a slight correction, because I did not make it clear. An alewife has a fat tummy, which to some indelicate colonist looked like a pregnant woman's abdomen. It is not a true herring, apparently.
A bit more trivia. Gov. Bradford in his history told of the Indians teaching the colonists to plant maize in hills, in which were buried one of more alewives to provide nutrients. He also instructed them not to plant the maize seed until the leaves on the white oak trees were the size of a mouse's ear, which coincided with desirable soil temperatures.

Would that be the same Governor Bradford who, on the trip across the Atlantic to the New World, studied Hebrew so he could talk to God in his own tongue?

studied Hebrew so he could talk to God in his own tongue?

Cramming for the final exam?

there was a surge of interest in learning hebrew by many of the puritans, and other religious group that settled in NA at that time. Remember, they were trying to "Purify" christianity from "Papist" influences. english still had formal and inforal means of address (thee and thou, and others.. (not good on details here)).

Not thinking it right to have every day language for religous services, but wanting to get rid of latin, hebrew became a popular alternative.

and there was a increase in the use of old testiment names-- good old english ann, gave way to Hannah. --jack was surplanted by Jacob..

I suspect he was prepping for his weekly encounter with the almighty. The expression, 'talking to God in his own tongue', probably related to his manner of praying, something the early settlers of Massachusetts took quite seriously.

Dear of troy - thanks for the insight into what, at first blush, seemed a strange thing for an English person preparing to settle in the New World to do. But where did 'good old english' ann and jack come from? Was it good old Hebrew Hannah and Jacob in the first [or at least, predecessor] case?