Fisheries.

Fisheries. In almost every part of the world fishes form some portion of the food of mankind, but they form a much more important part of the food-supply in the northern temperate regions than in the tropics or the southern hemisphere, and they are obtained in enormously greater abundance from the sea than from inland fresh waters. Hence it has become customary by a metaphor to speak of the 'harvest of the sea.' It is only within the last century, if we except the fish-ponds of the medieval monasteries and the culture of fresh-water fishes in China, that attempts have been made to control the conditions under which valuable fishes live and multiply. It is impossible in most cases to feed and protect aquatic animals with the same completeness as domesticated land animals. The cultivation of the former consists chiefly in artificially securing the production of large numbers of young, then setting them at liberty, and endeavouring to promote an abundant supply of their natural food, to destroy their enemies, and remove all unfavourable conditions. In this way the supply of salmon and some other fish and of oysters has been in some places largely increased—oysters especially in France and Holland, salmon and other fish chiefly in the United States. But no exclusively marine species has yet been successfully cultivated on a scale large enough to be of practical importance, and it is still an open question whether scientific methods can be applied to increase the supply of valuable marine fish diminished by excessive fishing. See PISCICULTURE.

But although marine fishes are produced in enormous abundance without human aid or foresight, the amount of labour and capital required to capture them is very large. Sea-going vessels and boats are themselves costly machines, and other elaborate and expensive machinery has to be carried and worked on board of them; the vessels and gear have to sustain very hard wear; both are frequently damaged, the gear being often, and the vessels sometimes, lost altogether. The capture of fish and their consumption have enormously increased in Europe and North America since the beginning of the age of steam. This increase is due to the great increase of population, and the consequently increased demand for cheap and palatable food, and to the facility afforded by the railways for conveying fresh fish to the large inland towns.

Nearly all the most abundant marine fish on the coasts of Europe and North America are valuable as food, some being held in great estimation as delicacies by the rich, others forming a staple food of the poor. The chief exceptions are the dog-fishes, which are extremely abundant and at the same time of no value as food, although they are occasionally eaten in some places on the coast. The other most valuable marine animals on the European coasts are the lobster, crab, crayfish, shrimps, and prawns among Crustacea, and certain molluscs, chiefly the oyster, though mussels, clams or scallops, and whelks are of some value. Except in extensive fresh-water lakes, true fresh-water fishes are of minor importance, but there are several valuable 'anadromous' fish which ascend rivers to a greater or less distance. The most important of these are the salmon and sea-trout, but the smelt and shad are abundant in some estuaries of Europe, and another species of shad (Clupea sapidissima) is abundant and highly valued in America. Eels also are largely eaten in Europe, and the sturgeon, though rare in Britain, is abundant in some large rivers of the Continent.

The following are the principal different kinds of sea-fishing carried on in the United Kingdom: (1) trawling, (2) line fishing, (3) drift-net fishing, (4) seine-net fishing, (5) moored-net fishing, (6) crab and lobster fishing, (7) oyster-dredging.

(1) Trawling here means fishing with the beam-trawl, which is a triangular bag-like net towed along the sea-bottom. The mouth of the trawl-net is attached to a frame, consisting of a long wooden beam supported by a triangular hoop of iron at each end. These trawl-heads, or runners, glide along the ground, and raise the beam three to four feet above it. The upper side of the net is attached to the beam, the sides to the trawl-heads, while the lower edge of the mouth of the net is formed by a thick and heavy rope which is a great deal longer than the beam, and thus lies on the bottom between the irons in a deep curve or bight. As the net is towed along, the ground-fish are disturbed, and rise above the foot-robe, and, being prevented from escaping by the upper side of the net, they are swept into its narrow end, where their escape is made still more difficult by a constriction of the cavity of the net somewhat in front of its closed end. The size of the trawl varies according to the size of the vessel working it, but for deep-sea fishing the beam is 36 to 50 feet long, and the mesh of the net is always about 4 inches at the mouth to 1½ inch at the 'cod' end. The trawl is towed by means of two 'bridles,' which are long ropes of equal length attached one to each trawl-head, and a very strong, thick rope, the 'warp' or 'rode,' the end of which is fastened by a shackle to the two bridles.

The majority of trawling vessels are sailing boats, but recently steamers have been used in several places, especially in Scotland. The sailing boats range from 30 to 80 or even 100 tons register. Both on the east and south coast they were formerly all cutter-rigged; but this was when the maximum size did not exceed 50 tons. The larger vessels on the east coast are now ketch-rigged, carrying two masts each with gaff sails. On the south-west coast there are very few vessels over 50 tons. Most are cutter-rigged; though some have been converted to the other rig, which is much more economical in working, and safer in bad weather. The trawl is always carried along the rail or bulwarks on the port quarter, extending from the main rigging or a little behind it to the taffrail. When the trawl is 'shot,' it is towed from either the port or starboard quarter, according to the wind and tide. On the south coast the trawling rope is usually hauled in over the bows by a hand-winch, the after-bridle being finally wound in by a smaller winch aft. But on the east coast the boats are fitted with patent capstans by which the rope can be hauled in amidships, and these capstans are now almost always worked by steam.

On the east coast the greater number of trawlers belong to Hull, Grimsby, Yarmouth, Lowestoft, and Ramsgate. The grounds fished by these are chiefly the Dogger Bank in winter, and the banks off the Danish, German, and Dutch coasts in summer. In winter each smack usually carries ice and takes home her own fish; but in summer the vessels fish in fleets, and steam-carriers are employed which collect the fish and take it to London or the east coast ports. The principal trawling ports in the south-west are Brixham and Plymouth. The trawlers here fish not in a fleet, but independently of one another. The autumn and winter fishing is carried on off the respective ports, but in spring and early summer nearly all the boats fish south of the Wolf Rock off Mount's Bay, or off the north coast of Cornwall, which grounds have also been visited in spring by a large number of North Sea boats. In many places steam-tugs combine trawling with their ordinary work, shooting their trawls when on the lookout for ships. This is the custom with the steam-tugs of Falmouth and Cardiff, the boats from the latter place fishing west of Lundy Island. There are a few trawlers at Tenby, and this kind of fishing is also carried on from Whitehaven, Fleetwood, Blackpool, Southport, and Liverpool, the trawling grounds on the north-west coast lying between the Isle of Man and the mainland, and off the Welsh coast.

There are no sailing trawlers of large size at any of the Scottish fishing ports; but some smaller boats with smaller trawls fish from St Andrews and one or two other places. Steam-trawling, however, is carried on both by tugs and by screw-steamers entirely devoted to the industry at Granton and Leith, and at Aberdeen. The grounds fished by the Firth of Forth boats extend from the outer part of the Firth to 30 or 40 miles east of the Isle of May, while the Aberdeen boats fish off the coast of Aberdeenshire and in the Moray Firth. The Firth of Forth, St Andrews Bay, and the territorial water from Kinnaid Head to the Ord of Caithness were in 1887 closed against trawling by the Scottish Fishery Board. In Ireland, Dublin is the centre of a large and important trawling fishery, and possesses a fleet of about 50 smacks, which are from 30 to 50 tons measurement, and cutter-rigged. These boats work between the Isle of Man and the Irish coast. Trawling is also carried on to some extent in Dingle and Galway bays, but not on an extensive scale. Most of the grounds mentioned as fished by trawlers are between 30 and 40 fathoms in depth. Occasionally trawling is carried on in deeper water, even up to 70 fathoms, but the labour of hauling in is then considerably increased. Trawling can only be carried on over ground which is fairly level and free from obstructions; over a rough, rocky bottom it is, of course, impossible to work a trawl. In fact, one of the principal expenses in this kind of fishing is the cost of new trawl-nets, beams, irons, and rope to replace those worn out or lost. Even without accidents the net soon wears out, and on the most favourable ground the trawl not uncommonly catches fast in a sunken wreck, an isolated rock, or a lost anchor, and is either lost or considerably damaged.

The principal fish caught in the trawl are all kinds of flat-fishes—viz. halibut, turbot, brill, soles, plaice, flounders, dabs, and other less familiar forms called by different names in different places, such as lemon soles or merrym soles, negrimms, witches; also skates and rays, which are bottom-fish of a flattened shape but of a different class; and all kinds of round-fish, or, as they are sometimes called, white fish, which feed to a great extent on the sea-bottom, such as cod, haddock, whiting, pouting, pollack, coal-fish, hake, ling; and also other miscellaneous species, as gurnards, red mullet, bass, sea-breams, dorys, and conger.

(2) Hook and line fishing is of two kinds—that carried on by hand-lines, and that by long lines. Long lines, again, vary in length and the size of the hooks, according to the fish sought. Thus, off the east coast of Scotland large-sized boats go long distances from land to 'shoot' lines of very great length with hooks of large size, and catch cod, ling, halibut, skates and rays, turbot and coal-fish (Gadus carbonarius). Smaller boats fish at shorter distances, with similar lines and smaller hooks, for haddock. This latter fishery is regularly carried on all along the east coast of Scotland, and forms the principal occupation of the smaller boats. The lines are always baited with mussel, and the hooks are always baited on shore by the wives and children of the fishermen. The baiting is done in a very careful and skilful manner. Each man of a crew contributes a certain number of lines of his own; each line when ready to go to sea is coiled up in a separate basket, made of wickerwork and very shallow—a creel. All the hooks are laid in the centre of the coil, and as they are baited and placed in position fresh grass is scattered over them and among them, so that the bait remains moist until the line is shot. When the ground is reached the boat is allowed to sail (or in some cases steam) steadily and gently along. A heavy stone attached to one end of a line is thrown overboard first, and attached to this stone is another line, long enough to reach to the surface, and fastened at its upper end to a flagstaff, buoyed and weighted so as to float upright in the water. The line is then taken overboard from the boat as she moves along. To prevent the hooks catching in the rail of the boat the line is made to pass over a thick metal cylinder which one of the crew holds in his hand. Before the whole of a line is run out another is fastened (bent on) to its end, so that all the lines are joined together, and stretch for two miles or so along the bottom of the sea. The line is always shot across the tide—i.e. transverse to the direction in which the tide is flowing, so that the short lines which fasten the hooks to the main line, at intervals of one fathom, are kept extended perpendicular to the main line. When the last line is shot another buoyed flagstaff is attached to the end of it, and the whole is left at the bottom for half an hour to an hour. Then the flagstaff last thrown overboard is picked up again, and the line is hauled in in the opposite direction to that in which it was shot. An occasional plaice or gurnard is caught on these lines, but the majority of the fish taken are haddocks. Many of the baits are taken by starfishes, whelks, crabs, &c., and a large number of the hooks in certain localities bring up specimens of the hag-fish, or borer, which has no jaws, but takes the hook down into its stomach.

On the east coast of England the largest kinds of long lines are extensively used. They are worked by vessels of about the same size as deep-sea trawlers, but having a compartment of the hold to which the sea-water has access, and in which the cod, the principal fish caught, are kept alive. These lines are each usually about 7000 fathoms long altogether when shot, or about 8 ordinary miles, and carry 4680 hooks. The bait most used consists of whelks. The fishing is principally carried on in winter over the Dogger Bank and Cromer Knoll. The long lines used on the south coast, locally called 'bulters,' are not so long, and are worked usually from smaller, generally open, boats. The bait mostly used is squid (Loligo vulgaris), which is obtained from the trawlers, and the principal fish caught are conger, cod, ling, hake, skates, and rays. Hand-lines are single lines with one or more hooks, of which one end is kept in the hand, the hooks being drawn up and re-baited whenever a fish is caught. This kind of fishing is largely carried on on the east coast for cod, and on the south coast with smaller hooks for whiting. It is carried on always at a short distance from the land.

Thus a great many fish are caught in almost equal numbers by hook and by the trawl; but each kind of instrument has its limitations. Soles, for instance, are scarcely ever caught by the hook, though turbot, brill, and halibut are; the conger, on the other hand, is only occasionally taken in the trawl. Long lines can be shot on any kind of ground, and rough, rocky ground, where the trawl cannot be worked, is usually the most productive for long-line fishing. All the fishes caught by these methods are predaceous forms, with large mouths, which feed either on the invertebrata of the sea-bottom, or on the migratory fish which swim in shoals, such as the herring and pilchard. The trawl can only catch those which are feeding on smooth ground, while the baited hook secures them on rough ground and in mid-water.

(3) Drift-nets are oblong nets fastened together in a long series, buoyed above so as to float vertically in the sea. The series of nets, or 'fleet,' as it is called, is fastened at one end by a rope to the boat from which it is worked, and nets and boat 'drift' or 'drive' with the tide. The nets are shot at right angles to the current of the tide, and those fish which swim in shoals in the upper waters of the sea strike against them in their course, or when carried along by the tide; and, their heads passing through the meshes, the fish can neither swim forwards, because their bodies are too large to pass through the meshes, nor backwards, because their gill-covers are then caught by the string of the net. These nets are used to capture herring, mackerel, and pilchard. The herring-fishery is principally pursued on the east coast of Great Britain, especially on the east coast of Scotland; the mackerel is most abundant on the south coast of England and Ireland, while the pilchard is almost entirely confined to the south-west coast of England. The nets as used for herrings and pilchards only differ in the size of the mesh. For herrings the mesh is about 1½ inch square, or 30 to 32 meshes to the yard. The nets are supported by a rope along the upper edge, and when shot are connected by tying the ends of these ropes together, and along this rope pieces of cork are attached to keep it uppermost. To the same rope, at each end of each net, are attached bladders of considerable size by means of a few fathoms of strong line. As these buoys float on the surface of the water, the nets are suspended below at a distance depending on the length of the buoy-lines, and varying according to the depth at which the fish are expected to occur. For pilchards the nets have a mesh of 36 to 38 to the yard.

Mackerel-nets have a larger mesh—viz. only 25 or 26 meshes to the yard, and also are worked differently. The 'back' of the nets is kept at the surface of the sea, floats being fastened directly on to it, and a separate rope, called the 'foot-line,' is connected to the 'back' of each net by a long connecting-line. The foot-line therefore sinks to some distance below the bottom of the nets. The reason for this is that mackerel usually swim quite near to the surface of the water, and, as the line running along the 'back' of the nets, being kept at the surface, is liable to be broken by passing vessels, it is necessary that the nets should be attached to the foot-rope, which sinks to a safe distance, and by which the nets are hauled in.

Drift-nets in Scotland and in the south-west of England are worked from lugger-rigged boats, fitted with foremast and mizzen. The foremast is the larger, and is lowered when the nets are all shot. The mast is stepped in a kind of socket, to admit of its being lowered. When a boat is 'riding to her nets,' if there is any wind, even when the sails are lowered, a considerable strain is put upon the rope by which she is fastened to the nets. The latter, being in the water, are not affected by the wind. It is to reduce this strain and obviate the danger of breaking the rope that it is necessary to lower the mast. On the east coast of England luggers are chiefly used for the herring-fishery; but for mackerel-fishing large boats, often clinker-built, fitted with two masts, fore and aft rigged, are mostly employed.

(4) The seine is a single, continuous net, attached to a cork-line above and a leaded line below, and attached at each end by means of these lines to a long rope. In Britain the seine is always worked from the shore. It is shot from a rowing-boat in a large semicircle, and then by means of the two end ropes is hauled on shore, or the ends are brought together so as to inclose the fish. For catching pilchards on the coast of Cornwall very large seines are used, about 200 fathoms long and 10 fathoms deep at the deepest part. These nets are too large to be drawn on to the shore when they inclose a large number of fish; the ends are therefore brought together close to the shore and moored, and smaller seines are shot within the larger net to take out the fish as they are required. This kind of fishing is principally pursued at St Ives. Smaller seines, called ground-seines, are used on the south coast for catching sprats and gray mullet, and are mostly worked in estuaries. The net used in England, Wales, and Ireland for catching salmon and sea-trout in public waters is a kind of seine, and is worked by a boat called a coble.

(5) Moored-nets are of various kinds. Herring-nets, similar to those used in drifting, are moored in some places across the tide, the fish caught being taken out by means of boats every morning. A kind of moored bean-trawl, called a stow-net or bag-net, is used in estuaries—e.g. in the upper parts of the Firth of Forth; the flowing or ebbing tide carries fish of various kinds into its mouth. The mouth of the net is attached by means of bridles to the same anchor which moors the boat from which the net is worked.

(6) Crabs and lobsters are taken in traps, which are usually dome-shaped cages made of wickerwork or netting stretched on a frame. Openings, in the form of funnels projecting into the interior of the trap, are situated either at its top or sides. The trap is baited with pieces of fish, and sunk by means of heavy stones attached to its bottom. These traps are called crab or lobster pots, and usually several of them are put down in a series attached to one another. Their position is marked by cork floats connected to the pots by a line long enough to reach to the surface, and by this line the pots are recovered.

(7) The oyster-dredge is like a small trawl, but the mouth is made by a rectangle of iron bands, and the net is usually made of iron rings linked together.

Next in importance after the sea-fisheries in the United Kingdom is the salmon-fishery, which is subject to a number of legal restrictions; for, while the fish in the sea are not private property until captured, the salmon in fresh water is nowhere in the United Kingdom considered as public property. In England and in Ireland, in common law, the salmon in rivers which are not navigable belong to the riparian owner, while every one has a right to fish in the tidal part of navigable rivers and in the sea. But in Scotland all the salmon-fishings in the country, not only in rivers but also in estuaries and on the sea-shore, to one mile beyond low-water mark, belong to the crown, or the grantees of the crown. It is an historical consequence of this difference that salmon and sea-trout are taken in English and Irish public waters—i.e. on the coast and in estuaries—by net and coble, while in private waters they are usually taken by rod and line. There are some 'fixed engines,' which, having been in existence for some time, have not been made illegal, but no new cruises or stake-nets are allowed by law. In Scotland stake-nets are the usual means of capture on the coast and in estuaries, and there are several cruises on the unnavigable rivers.

The whale-fisheries of the Arctic Ocean are not so important as they were at one time, the invention of gas and the discovery of other lubricants having rendered us independent of whale-oil. The success of the whale-fisheries has also fluctuated so much as to prevent modern capitalists from embarking very largely in the trade. The only novelties that distinguish the whale-fishery of the present day are the introduction of steam-whalers, and, in some instances, the practice of vessels wintering in Greenland; but, even with these advantages, British whalers barely pay their expenses, and the fishery, as compared with former years, exhibits a considerable falling-off. The total whaling fleet numbered at one time 159 ships, but to-day it barely amounts to a tenth of that number. The seal is now largely captured for the purpose of obtaining its oil; many thousands annually are killed by British sealers, as many as 15,000 being taken by the men of a single ship. Norway also fits out a number of steamers for the Arctic seal and whale fisheries. See WHALE, SEAL, GREENLAND, &c. The South Sea or sperm-whale fishery is principally in the hands of the Americans, who pursue this branch of commerce most successfully.

The other European countries bordering the North Sea and the Channel practise all the various methods of fishing pursued by British boats, and occasionally a certain amount of jealousy and friction arises between the men of different nationalities. Of extensive fisheries off the coast of Norway the most important are the cod-fishery of the Loffoden Islands (which is carried on both by hand-lines and by gill-nets like our drift-nets), and the herring drift-net fishery. Lobsters and mackerel are also taken by the Norwegians in considerable numbers, but their coasts are not adapted for trawling. The sardine-fishery, carried on by seines, occupies a large number of people on the south and west coasts of France, as well as on the west coast of Italy. See also TUNNY.

France and Holland both possess oyster-fisheries which are far more productive than those of Great Britain, and this is due in great measure to the science and care with which the oysters are cultivated. The principal seats of this industry in France are at the bays of Arcachon and Concarneau; in Holland, at the mouth of the Scheldt. See OYSTER.

In other parts of the world the largest fisheries are those of Canada and the United States. In the latter there is a very important seine-fishery for the shad, a species different from the European shad, which ascends the Hudson, Delaware, and Susquehanna in order to spawn. Soles and turbot do not exist on the American side of the Atlantic; but black-fish, weak-fish, blue-fish, porpoises, the herring, the common mackerel, and another species, the Spanish mackerel, are very largely fished. There is also another valuable elupeoid, called the menhaden, much larger than the herring. The mackerel is captured by means of large seines worked out at sea from a large boat. The vessels engaged in this fishery are schooners of 60 to 80 tons, and the seine boat is launched from the vessel when a school of fish is sighted. A large number of mackerel are also taken in drift-nets, similar to those of Europe. The Newfoundland cod-fishery is extremely productive, and is prosecuted both by hook and line, and by seines worked at sea; on the Grand Banks the fishermen are mostly French, the inhabitants of Newfoundland, as of Canada generally, carrying on the more convenient and less risky inshore fishery. Both Canada and the United States possess valuable oyster-fisheries, and the oyster 'farms' of New York state—notably, since 1888, along the floor of Long Island Sound—are especially extensive; but the European oyster does not occur in America. See OYSTER.

The most important fishery on the Pacific coast is that for the Pacific salmon, large quantities of which are preserved in tins for export to Europe. On the Atlantic side, also, the rivers of Maine and farther north abound in salmon. For the American seal-fishery, see ALASKA, SEAL.

The Canadian fisheries dispute dates from the close of the war of 1812. Under the treaty of 1783, at the close of the war of independence, the fishing-banks, coasts, bays, and creeks of Canada had been thrown open to United States fishermen; but the British commissioners in 1814 held that the second war had destroyed the earlier treaty, whereas the American representatives claimed that the rights guaranteed by the treaty were inalienable and irrevocable. The matter was left open, no reference to the fisheries appearing in the treaty of Ghent. An attempt to settle the dispute in 1818, by granting to Americans the right to fish outside the limit of three marine miles from the Canadian coast, failed to allay the controversy, which was now embittered by the 'headland question' and others, involving the right of Americans to fish in the Gulf of St Lawrence, the Bay of Fundy, and the Bay of Chaleurs. Following on the seizure of the Washington, this dispute, so far as it related to the Bay of Fundy, was submitted to arbitration, and decided in favour of the United States. Except during the years 1854-66, when a reciprocity treaty was in vogue, matters remained unsettled until 1871, when by the treaty of Washington the fisheries of both countries were thrown open reciprocally. Britain, however, asserted that, the privilege of fishing in American waters being practically worthless, she accorded more than she received; and from a commission organised nearly six years later she claimed an award of 14,280,000 for the use of the Newfoundland and inshore fisheries for twelve years—the period of treaty. The sum awarded was 5,500,000. For the further history of the dispute, see CANADA.

Within the last century a great many legislative enactments concerning the fisheries have been passed in the United Kingdom. Legislation concerning the salmon-fisheries has a different character from that applied to the sea-fisheries. The former consists in restrictions upon the rights of private property in salmon, or upon the public right of fishing, enforced for the sake of preventing the diminution of the natural supply of the fish. The latter, up to the present time, consists chiefly in regulations of navigation and marine police, the object of which is to maintain order and justice among different classes of fishermen, and to prevent fishing-vessels endangering the safety of one another, or of other vessels, at sea. For the laws in force for salmon-fisheries, see SALMON.

By the Sea-fisheries Acts of 1868 and 1883, and the conventions between Britain and other European countries, the right of fishing within three miles of the coast of any country is exclusively reserved to the subjects of that country. All regulations concerning the size of the mesh of net or the character of fishing apparatus are now abolished. All British sea-fishing boats must be numbered and registered, and the enforcement of this regulation is intrusted to the customs officers, who are assisted by the coastguard, each boat carrying letters showing the customs district to which it belongs. Stringent regulations are enforced as to the lights to be carried by fishing-boats, and the protection of drift-nets and lines from injury by trawlers. No trawler is allowed to shoot his trawl within three miles of any boat which has drift-nets in the water.

It is only within the last few years that steps have been taken to organise the administration of the powers of the government over the fisheries of the United Kingdom in such a way as to provide the public annually with statistical and comparative information of a complete and systematic kind upon these industries. This is especially true with respect to England and Wales. Up till the year 1886 jurisdiction over the fisheries of these countries was vested partly in the Home Office and partly in the Board of Trade. The former department included two fishery inspectors, who made an annual report on the salmon and fresh-water fisheries, but did not regularly report on the marine fisheries. In 1886 this jurisdiction was transferred to the Board of Trade, a sub-department being organised under that board to transact fisheries business. Since then there have been three inspectors—two for fresh-water, and one for marine fisheries. These issue two separate annual reports, addressed to the secretary of the Board of Trade; and in the year 1888 the Twenty-seventh Annual Report on Salmon and Fresh-water Fisheries and the Second Annual Report on Sea-fisheries were published. The Board of Trade also publishes monthly returns, and an annual abstract of the quantity and value of fish landed on all the coasts of the United Kingdom. These statistics are collected in England and Wales by the officers of the coastguard, by direction of the Fisheries Sub-department, while the statistics of Scotland and Ireland are furnished to the Board of Trade by the Scottish Fishery Board and the inspectors of Irish Fisheries respectively. Complete returns were obtained for the first time for England and Wales at the end of 1886; for Scotland at the end of 1887; for Ireland at the end of 1888. In Ireland the returns are collected, as in England, by the coastguard; in Scotland by the local officers of the Fishery Board.

Jurisdiction over the Scottish fisheries is vested in the Fishery Board for Scotland, whose offices are in Edinburgh. This board makes an annual report to the government of the United Kingdom, addressed to Her Majesty's Secretary for Scotland for the time being. The board, as at present constituted, was established by act of parliament in 1882; before that time a board existed which regulated the inspection and branding of cured herrings, but the present board was instituted with revised and extended powers. For the purposes of administration the coasts of Scotland are divided into districts, each of which has one or more fishery officers. The number of these districts is twenty-six—seventeen on the east coast, and nine on the west. It must be borne in mind that the elaborate and thorough character of this administrative organisation in Scotland has been developed in consequence of the peculiarities of the Scottish herring trade. The supply of herrings on the coasts of Scotland, especially on the east coast, is enormous, and the demand for these herrings as food has always been very large, and has increased with the increase of population in Europe. Fresh herrings, of course, cannot be exported abroad in very large quantities, but they are acceptable and cheap food when salted, and great quantities are annually exported in this condition to Denmark, Germany, Russia, and Scandinavia, where they form a regular part of the diet of the mass of the people, especially in winter.

To encourage the industry of herring-curing the British government from 1809 to 1826 paid a bounty of 4s. on each barrel properly cured. The original Scottish Fishery Board was instituted principally to organise the official inspection of the cured herrings, and its officers branded every barrel whose contents came up to the required standard, and on which therefore the bounty could be claimed. Between 1826 and 1830 the bounty was gradually reduced, and finally abolished. But the brand still continued in demand among the foreign buyers, and the Scottish curers therefore continued to apply for it. Thus it came about that in 1859 a fee was demanded by the Fishery Board for the same brand which originally conveyed the right to a bounty. The branding is not in the least compulsory, and some curers rely on their own trade-mark as a sufficient guarantee of quality. But a large proportion of the curers are willing to pay the fee charged for the official brand, which is now 4d. a barrel. In 1886 the income received from these fees by the board was £8649; in 1887, £8166. Thus the board is provided at once with an income and an organisation which naturally come to be employed in collecting information of all kinds concerning all the sea-fisheries, and in fostering and developing the whole industry.

The board also exercises a superintendence of the fisheries, and maintains order at sea by means of a number of vessels which are now manned and managed by the admiral-superintendent of Naval Reserves, but whose movements are directed by the board. Two of these vessels, a screw-steamer and a sailing schooner, are permanently in the service of the board, but in the herring season additional tenders and cutters are commissioned to assist in the work.

In Ireland the superintendence of the fisheries is entrusted to three inspectors, who constitute the Fisheries Department of the government offices at Dublin Castle. These officials act together as a body, and have jurisdiction over both sea and inland fisheries, upon which they make a single joint report annually to the lord-lieutenant of Ireland.

According to the annual returns of the Board of Trade, the total value of the fish landed on the coasts of the United Kingdom in 1895 was £7,536,570, made up as follows :

The value of the salmon of Scotland varies from £200,000 to £300,000 annually; that of Ireland from £300,000 to £400,000. The total weight of the fish thus valued, exclusive of shell-fish, was :

In the Scottish Fishery Board Report for 1894 we find that the number of persons employed in fishing that year in Scotland was 47,933. If we add other numbers of persons who gain their livelihood through the Scottish fisheries — fishmongers, hawkers, coopers, &c.—the total is increased to 117,529. The number of fishermen and boys in 1894 in England is given in the report of the Inspector of Sea-fisheries as 33,651, besides 9043 persons occasionally employed. The Irish report for the same year states the number of persons totally or partially engaged in fishing at 24,843, of whom only 8346 were exclusively occupied in the fisheries. If we take the larger numbers for England and Ireland and add the totals of the three countries together, the total number of fishermen and boys for the United Kingdom amounts to 115,480. The total number of boats employed in England and Wales was 7935 (excluding small fishing boats). The Scottish Fishery Board gives the number of boats belonging to Scotland in 1894 as 13,059. The total number of boats employed in Ireland in the same year was 6579.

The herring-fishery is by far the most productive and valuable of all the sea-fisheries of Scotland.

The largest herring-fishing on the Scottish coasts ever known was in 1884, when 1,697,077 barrels were cured. The number cured in 1894 was 1,518,077. The value (very different from that on landing) runs to a sum well over £1,000,000.

The statistical tables of the Board of Trade give the following statistics of foreign countries :

Of men reckoned in France, 61,352 fish on foot—oyster-fishers, &c. Holland employed in the sea-fisheries 5151 vessels with 17,286 men. The United States figures for an average year between 1890 and 1894 give 6400 vessels, 192,000 men, and produce to the value of £9,100,000.

In the Board of Trade returns it is stated that the sea-fisheries of the United Kingdom appear to be of greater value than those of any other country which publishes tolerably complete records, and probably are of greater value than those of any other country in the world. And this in spite of the fact that the yield of the sea-fisheries of the United States in 1894 is stated to be worth more than nine million pounds. The explanation of this is that the United States figures include more than the mere landing values, and that an exact comparison of British with American fisheries cannot yet be made. A recent comparison of the number of fishermen to the total population gave the proportion in Scotland as about one in 76; in England and Wales, one in 612; in Ireland, one in 216; in the United States, one in 381; in Norway, one in 16; in France, one in 278.

Fisheries exhibitions like that at London in 1883 have been held in various places with much success. On fisheries, see articles PISCICULTURE, ANGLING, COD, HERRING, SALMON, TROUT, &c.; also E. W. Holdsworth, Deep-sea Fishing and Fishing Boats (1874), and his Sea Fisheries of Great Britain and Ireland (1883); P. L. Simmonds, Commercial Products of the Sea (new ed. 1883); The Fisheries and Fishing Industries of the United States by Baird and others (6 vols. 1885-88); Goode, Fisheries of the United States (2 vols. 1886); the manuals prepared in connection with the Fishery Exhibitions; the English, Scottish, and Irish Reports; the Journal of the Marine Biological Association (begun in 1887); and the Annual Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission. Large industries are connected with curing fish by salting, smoking, and otherwise; see PRESERVED PROVISIONS. On sea-fishing as a sport, see works by Wilcocks (4th ed. 1884), Young (1874), Ashe and Aflalo (1892), and Bickerdyke (1895).