CHAPTER VI.

THE NATURAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY OF THE HERRING.

Description of the Herring—The Old Theory of Migration—Geographical

Distribution of the Herring—Mr. John Cleghorn’s Ideas on the Natural

History of the Herring—Mr. Mitchell on the National Importance of

that Fish—Commission of Inquiry into the Herring-Fishery—Growth of

the Herring—The Sprat—Should there be a Close-time?—Caprice of the

Herring—The Fisheries—The Lochfyne Fishery—The Pilchard—Herring

Commerce—Mr. Methuen—The Brand—The Herring Harvest—All Night at the

Fishing—The Cure—The Curers—Herring Boats—Increase of Netting—Are we

Overfishing?—Proposal for more Statistics.

The common herring is one of our most beautiful and abundant fishes,

and is so well known as scarcely to require description; but it has

one or two peculiarities of structure that may be briefly alluded to.

Its belly, for instance, is keeled (as the Scotch fisher folk call

carinated), and is well protected by strong scales, giving us reason

to suppose that it is therefore a ground-feeder; and having a very

large pectoral fin, and an air-bag of more than usual dimensions, it

is thus endowed with a very rapid moving power. I gather from personal

observation of many herring stomachs—and the stomach of the herring is

unusually large—that this fish is a devouring feeder, that it preys

upon its own young or upon the roe of its congeners when other food is

scarce. Its lobes of roe or milt are larger in proportion to its body

than those of any other fish. The herring has a fine instinct for

selecting a nursery for its young, contriving, when not obstructed, to

deposit its ova on such bottoms as will ensure the adherence of its

eggs and the favourable nourishment of the young fish.

The herring is taken throughout the year in vast quantities, thus

affording a plentiful supply of cheap and wholesome food to the poorer

classes, whilst its capture and cure afford remunerative employment

to a large body of industrious people. It is greatly to be regretted,

therefore, that recent fluctuations in the quantity caught have given

occasion for well-grounded fears of an ultimate exhaustion of some of

our largest shoals, or at all events of so great a diminution of their

producing power as probably to render one or two of the best fisheries

unproductive. This is nothing new, however, in the history of the

herring-fishery: various places can be pointed out, which, although now

barren of herrings, were formerly frequented by large shoals, that,

from overfishing or other causes, have been dispersed.

This supposed overfishing of the herring has resulted chiefly from our

ignorance of the natural history of that fish—ignorance which has long

prevailed, and which we are only now beginning to overcome. Indeed,

much as the subject has been discussed during the last ten years, and

great as the light is that has been thrown on the natural and economic

history of our fish, considering the elemental difficulty which stands

in the way of perfect observation, there are yet persons who insist

upon believing all the old theories and romances pertaining to the

lives of sea animals. We occasionally hear of the great sea-serpent;

the impression of St. Peter’s thumb is still to be seen on the haddock;

“Moby Dick,” a Tom Sayers among fighting whales, still ranges through

the squid fields of the Pacific Ocean; and I know an old fisherman who

once borrowed a comb from a polite mermaid!

Not very long ago, for instance, the old theory of the migration

of the herring to and from the Arctic Regions was gravely revived

in an unexpected quarter, as if that romance of fish-life was still

believed by modern naturalists to be the chief episode in the natural

history of _Clupea harengus_; indeed in the present edition of the

_Encyclopædia Britannica_ this migratory theory is still sustained

(see article “Ichthyology”). The original migration story—which was

invented by Pennant, or rather was constructed by him from the theories

of fishermen—old as it is, is worthy of being briefly recapitulated,

as affording a good point of view for a consideration of the natural

and economic history of the herring as now ascertained: it was to the

effect that in the inaccessible seas of the high northern latitudes

herrings were found in overwhelming abundance, securing within the

icy Arctic Circle a bounteous feeding-ground, and at the same time

a quiet and safe retreat from their numerous enemies. At the proper

season, inspired by some commanding impulse, vast bodies of this fish

gathered themselves together into one great army, and in numbers far

exceeding the power of imagination to picture departed for the waters

of Europe and America. The particular division of this great _heer_,

which was destined annually to repopulate the British seas, and afford

a plenteous food-store for the people, was said to arrive at Iceland

about March, and to be of such amazing extent as to occupy a surface

more than equal to the dimensions of Great Britain and Ireland, but

subdivided, by a happy instinct, into battalions five or six miles in

length and three or four in breadth, each line or column being led,

according to the ideas of fishermen, by herrings (probably the _Allis_

and _Twaite shad_) of more than ordinary size and sagacity. These

heaven-directed strangers were next supposed to strike on the Shetland

Islands, where they divided of themselves, as we are told; one division

taking along the west side of Britain, whilst the other took the east

side, the result being an adequate and well-divided supply of this

fine fish in all our larger seas and rivers, as the herrings penetrated

into every bay, and filled all our inland lochs from Wick to Yarmouth.

Mr. Pennant was not contented with the development of this myth, but

evidently felt constrained to give _éclat_ to his invention by inditing

a few moral remarks just by way of a _tag_. “Were we,” he says,

“inclined to consider this migration of the herring in a moral light,

we might reflect with veneration and awe on the mighty power which

originally impressed on this useful body of His creatures the instinct

that directs and points out the course that blesses and enriches these

islands, which causes them at certain and invariable times to quit

the vast polar depths, and offer themselves to our expectant fleets.

This impression was given them that they might remove for the sake of

depositing their spawn in warmer seas, that would mature and vivify it

more assuredly than those of the frigid zone. It is not from defect of

food that they set themselves in motion, for they come to us full and

fat, and on their return are almost universally observed to be lean and

miserable.”

Happily, the naturalists of the present day know a vast deal more of

the natural history of the herring than Mr. Pennant ever knew, and, on

the authority of the most able inquirers, it may be taken for granted

that the herring is a local and not a migratory fish. It has been

repeatedly demonstrated that the herring is a native of our immediate

seas, and can be caught all the year round on the coasts of the three

kingdoms. The fishing begins at the island of Lewis, in the Hebrides,

in the month of May, and goes on as the year advances, till in July it

is being prosecuted off the coast of Caithness; while in autumn and

winter we find large supplies of herrings at Yarmouth; and there is a

winter fishery in the Firth of Forth: moreover, this fish is found in

the south long before it ought to be there, if we were to believe in

Pennant’s theory. It has been deduced, from a consideration of the

figures of the annual takes of many years, that the herring exists in

distinct races, which arrive at maturity month after month; and it is

well known that the herrings taken at Wick in July are quite different

from those caught at Dunbar in August or September: indeed I would go

further and say that even at Wick each month has its changing shoal,

and that as one race ripens for capture another disappears, having

fulfilled its mission of procreation. It is certain that the herrings

of these different seasons vary considerably in size and appearance;

and it is very well known that the herrings of different localities

are marked by distinctive features. Thus, the well-known Lochfyne

herring is essentially different in its flavour from that of the Firth

of Forth, and those taken in the Firth of Forth differ again in many

particulars from those caught off Yarmouth.

In fact, the herring never ventures far from the shore where it is

taken, and its condition, when it is caught, is just an index of the

feeding it has enjoyed in its particular locality. The superiority

in flavour of the herring taken in our great land-locked salt-water

lochs is undoubted. Whether or not it results from the depth and body

of water, from more plentiful marine vegetation, or from the greater

variety of land food likely to be washed into these inland seas, has

not yet been determined; but it is certain that the herrings of our

western sea-lochs are infinitely superior to those captured in the

more open sea. It is natural that the animals of one feeding locality

should differ from those of another: land animals, it is well known,

are easily affected by change of food and place; and fish, I have no

doubt, are governed by the same laws. But on this part of the herring

question I need scarcely waste any argument, as there is but one writer

who still persists in the old “theory” of migration. He is the same

gentleman who has doubts about a grilse becoming a salmon!

Moreover, it is now known, from the inquiries of the late Mr. Mitchell

and other authorities on the geographical distribution of the herring,

that that fish has never been noticed as being at all abundant

in the Arctic Regions; and the knowledge accumulated from recent

investigations has dispelled many of what may be termed the minor

illusions once so prevalent about the life of the herring and other

fish. People, however, have been very slow to believe that fish were

subject to the same natural laws as other animals. In short, seeing

that the natural history of all kinds of fish has been largely mixed

up with tradition or romance, it is no wonder that many have been slow

to discard Pennant’s pretty story about the migratory instinct of the

herring, and the wonderful power of sustained and rapid travelling by

which it reached and returned from our coasts. Even Yarrell, as will by

and by be shown, wrote in a weak uncertain tone about this fish; indeed

his account of it is not entitled to very much consideration, being a

mere compilation, or rather a series of extracts, from other writers.

It was not till the year 1854 that anything like an authentic

contradiction to Pennant’s theory was obtained. Before that time one

or two bold people asserted that they had doubts about the migration

story, and thought that the herring must be a local animal, from the

fact of its being found on the British coasts all the year round;

while one daring man said authoritatively, from personal knowledge,

that there were no herrings in the Arctic seas. During the year I have

mentioned, a paper, which was communicated to the Liverpool Meeting of

the British Association by Mr. Cleghorn of Wick, directed an amount

of public attention to the herring-fishery, which still continues,

and which, at the time, was thought sure ultimately to result in

an authentic inquiry into the natural and economic history of that

fish. Such an investigation has now been made by persons qualified to

undertake the task, and the result of their inquiries has been summed

up in a most interesting report, which, along with the evidence taken

by the commissioners, I shall have occasion to refer to in another

part of the present chapter; the labours of Cleghorn, Mitchell, and

others, claiming priority of notice, as the ideas promulgated by these

gentlemen, although often hotly opposed and combated, have gone a great

way to guide public opinion on the subject, and have evidently helped

to influence recent investigators.

In his paper communicated to the British Association at Liverpool,

Mr. Cleghorn stated that, living at Wick, the chief seat of the

fishery—“the Amsterdam of Scotland” in fact—his attention had been

directed to the herring-fishery by the fluctuations in the annual

take. That season (_i.e._ 1854) there were 920 boats engaged in the

fishing, and the produce was 95,680 barrels. On comparing the fishing

of 1854 with that of 1825, it was found to be 14,000 barrels short;

and as compared with 1830, 57,000 barrels less. It was found to be

the smallest fishing since 1840, and 61,000 barrels short of the

previous year. Various surmises were hazarded as to the cause of the

deficiency, but the generally-received opinion was, that the falling

off was attributable to the two rough nights on which the boats did

not put to sea, while great shoals of herrings were on the coast. That

this is an erroneous and very partial view of the matter Mr. Cleghorn

infers, because at all the stations between Noss Head and Cape Wrath

the fishing was a complete failure; and the same may be said of Orkney

and Shetland; while for the whole of Scotland the shortcoming, perhaps,

was one-third of the previous year.

Mr. Cleghorn—of whom it is proper to state that while in business in

Wick he suffered much local persecution for his views of the herring

question—says that he believes the fluctuations in the capture to be

caused by “overfishing,” as in the case of the salmon, the haddock,

and other fish. The points brought forward by Mr. Cleghorn in order

to prove his case were as follow:—1. That the herring is a native of

waters in which it is found, and never migrates. 2. That distinct

races of it exist at different places. 3. That twenty-seven years ago

the extent of netting employed in the capture of the fish was much

less than what is now used, while the quantity of herrings caught

was, generally speaking, much greater. 4. There were fishing stations

extant some years ago which are now exhausted; a steady increase having

taken place in their produce up to a certain point, then violent

fluctuations, and _then_ final extinction. 5. The races of herrings

nearest our large cities have disappeared first; and in districts where

the tides are rapid, as among islands and in lochs, where the fishing

grounds are circumscribed, the fishings are precarious and brief;

while on the other hand, extensive seabords having slack tides, with

little accommodation for boats, are surer and of longer continuance as

fishing stations. 6. From these premises it follows that the extinction

of districts, and the fluctuations in the fisheries generally, are

attributable to overfishing. In the commercial portion of this chapter

I shall again have occasion to refer to Mr. Cleghorn’s investigations

on the subject of the netting employed, but it occurred to me to state

Mr. Cleghorn’s theory at this place, as it has been the key-note to

much of the recent discussion on the subject of the natural history of

the herring.

Before the reading of Mr. Cleghorn’s statistics, the natural history

of the herring was not well understood even by naturalists; so

difficult is it to make observations in the laboratories of the sea.

Only a few persons, till recently, were intimate with the history of

this fish, and knew that, instead of being a migratory animal, as had

been asserted by Anderson and Pennant, the herring was as local to

particular coasts as the salmon to particular rivers.

The late Mr. J. M. Mitchell, the Belgian Consul at Leith (who published

a work on the _National Importance of the Herring_), in a paper which

he read before the British Association at Oxford, three years ago,

settled with much care and very effectually the geographical part of

the herring question. His idea also is that the herring is a native of

the coast on which it is found, and that immediately after spawning

the full-sized herrings make at once for the deep waters of their own

neighbourhood, where they feed till the spawning season again induces

them to seek the shallow water. Mr. Mitchell gives his reasons, and

states that the herrings resorting to the various localities have

marked differences in size, shape, or quality; those of each particular

coast having a distinct and specific character which cannot be

mistaken; and so well determined are those particulars that practical

men, on seeing the herrings, can at once pronounce the locality from

whence they come; as, indeed, is the case with salmon, turbot, and many

other fishes and crustaceans.

On the southern coast of Greenland the herring is a rare fish; and,

according to Crantz, only a small variety is found on the northern

shore, nor has it been observed in any number in the proper icy

seas—as it would undoubtedly have been had it resorted thither in

such innumerable quantities as was imagined by the naturalists of the

last century. Another proof that the herring is local to the coasts

of Britain lies in the fact of the different varieties brought to our

own markets. As expert fishers know the salmon of particular rivers,

so do some men know the different localities of our herring from

merely glancing at the fish. A Lochfyne fish differs in appearance

from a herring taken off the coast of Caithness, while the latter

again differs from those taken by the Dunbar boats off the Isle of

May. Experienced fishmongers know the different localities of the same

kinds of fish as easily as a farmer will separate a Cheviot sheep from

a Southdown. Thus they can at once distinguish a Severn salmon from

one caught in the Tweed or the Spey, and they can tell at a glance a

Lochfyne _matie_ from a Firth of Forth one.

Turning now to the report of the commissioners appointed to inquire

into the operation of the Acts relating to trawling for herring on

the west coast of Scotland, we obtain some interesting information as

to the spawning and growth of the herring. Upon these branches of the

subject the public have hitherto been very ill informed. As has been

already stated, Yarrell’s account of this particular fish is a mere

compilation from Dr. M’Culloch, W. H. Maxwell, Dr. Parnell, and others,

and is thus very disappointing. Again, the account in the _Naturalist’s

Library_ is compressed into five small pages, referring chiefly to

authorities on the subject, with quotations from Yarrell! It is only

by searching in Blue Books, by perusing much newspaper writing of a

controversial kind, and by arduous personal inquiry, that I have been

able to complete anything like an accurate _precis_ of the natural and

economic history of this very plentiful fish.

As to the periods at which herrings spawn, the commissioners appointed

to conduct the latest inquiry that has been made inform us that they

met with “singularly contradictory” statements, and after having

collected a large amount of valuable evidence, _they_ arrived at the

conclusion that herrings spawn at two seasons of the year—viz. in the

spring and autumn. They have no evidence of a spawning during the

solstitial months—viz. June and December; but in nearly all the other

months gravid herrings are found, and the commissioners assert that a

spring spawning certainly occurs in the latter part of January, as also

in the three following months, and the autumn spawning in the latter

end of July, and likewise in the following months up to November:

“Taking all parts of the British coast together, February and March

are the great months for the spring spawning, and August and September

for the autumn spawning.” The spawn, it may be stated in passing, is

deposited on the surface of the stones, shingle, and gravel, and on old

shells, at the various spawning places, and it adheres tenaciously

to whatever it happens to fall upon. This, as will be seen, brings us

exactly back to Mr. Cleghorn’s ideas of the herring existing in races

at different places and in separate bodies, and thereby rendering

the fluctuations of the great series of shoals at Wick more and more

intelligible, especially when we take into account the fact that winter

shoals have recently been found at that place, giving rise to what may

ultimately prove a considerable addition to the great autumn fishery

yet carried on there. Indeed I consider this point proved, and having

taken great pains in sifting the evidence (of different spawning

seasons) given on the question, both oral and written, I feel entitled

to say so much.

As to the question of how long herrings take to grow, from the period

of the deposition of the egg, there are various opinions, for no

naturalist or practical fisherman has been able definitely to fix the

time. There is reason to believe, we are told in the report, that the

eggs of herrings are hatched in, at most, from two to three weeks after

deposition. This is very rapid work when we consider that the eggs

of the salmon require to be left for a period of ninety or a hundred

days, even in favourable seasons, before they quicken into life, and

that the eggs of a considerable number of fish are known to take a much

longer period than three weeks to ripen. The rate of growth of the

herring, and the tie at which it begins to reproduce itself, are not

yet well understood; indeed, it seems particularly difficult to fix

the period at which it reaches the reproductive stage.[8] I have had

young herrings of all sizes in my possession, from those of an inch

long upwards. The following are the measurements of a few specimens

which were procured about the end of February 1861, and not one of

which had any appearance of either roe or milt, while some (the smaller

fish) were strongly serrated in the abdominal line, and others, as they

advanced in size, lost this distinguishing mark, and were only very

slightly serrated. The largest of these fish—and they must all have

been caught at one time—was eight inches long, nearly four inches in

circumference at the thickest part of the body, and weighed a little

over two ounces. The smallest of these herring-fry did not weigh a

quarter of an ounce, and was not quite three inches in length. One of

them, again, that was six inches long, only weighed three-quarters of

an ounce; whilst another of the same lot, four and a half inches long,

weighed a quarter of an ounce exactly. I do not propose at present to

enter at great length into the sprat controversy; but, if the sprat

be the young of some one of the different species of herring, as I

take leave to think it is, then the question of its growth and natural

economy will become highly important. Some people say that the herring

must have attained the age of seven years before it can yield milt or

roe, whilst a period of three years has been also named as the ultimate

time of this event; but there are persons who think that the herring

attains its reproductive power in eighteen months, while others affirm

that the fish grows to maturity in little more than half that time.

If the average size of a herring may be stated as eleven and a half

inches, individual fish of _Clupea harengus_ have been found measuring

seventeen inches, and full fish have been taken only ten inches in

length, when should the example, noted above as being eight inches

long, reach its full growth? and how old was it at the time of its

capture? And, again, were the fish—all taken out of the same boat, be

it observed, and caught in the same shoal—all of one particular year’s

hatching? Is this the story of the parr over again, or is it the case

that the fishermen had found a shoal of mixed herrings—some being of

one year’s spawning, some of another? I confess to being puzzled, and

may again remind the reader that my largest fish had never spawned, and

had not the faintest trace of milt or roe within it. Then, again, as to

the time when herrings spawn, I have over and over again asserted in

various quarters that they spawn in nearly every month of the year—an

assertion, as I have just shown, which has been proved by the recent

inquiry.

As to the place of spawning, development of the ova, and other

circumstances attendant on the increase of the herring, I promulgated

the following opinions some years ago, and I see no reason to alter

them:—The herring shoal keeps well together till the time of spawning,

whatever the fish may do after that event. Some naturalists think that

the shoal breaks up after it spawns, and that the herring then live

an individual life, till again instinctively moved together for the

grand purpose of procreating their kind. It is quite clear, I think,

that the herring moves into the shallow water because of its increased

temperature, and its being more fitted in consequence for the speedy

vivifying of the spawn. The same shoal will always gather over the same

spawning ground, and the fish will keep their position till they fulfil

the grand object of their life. The herrings will rise buoyantly to

the top water after they have spawned; before that they swim deep and

hug the ground. The herring, in my opinion, must have a rocky place

to spawn upon, with a vegetable growth of some kind to receive the

roe; shoals may of course accidentally spawn on soft ground. It is not

accurately known how long a period elapses till the spawn ripens into

life. I think, however, that herring spawn requires a period of about

six weeks to ripen. It is known that young herrings have appeared on a

spawning ground in myriads within fifty days after the departure of a

shoal, and fishermen say that no spawn can be found on the ground after

the lapse of a few weeks from the visit of the gravid shoal—that the

eggs in fact have come to life, and that the fish are swimming about;

and some fishermen assert that the little whitebait is the herring in

its first stage.

It is generally known that the sprat (_Clupea sprattus_) is a most

abundant fish, so plentiful as to have been used at times for manure.

The fact of its great abundance has induced a belief that it is not a

distinct species of fish, but is, in reality, the young of the herring.

It is true that many distinguishing marks are pointed out as belonging

only to the sprat—such as its serrated belly, the relative position of

the fins, etc. But there remains, on the other side, the very striking

fact of the sprat being rarely found with either milt or roe; indeed,

the only case I _know_ of this fish having been found in a condition to

perpetuate its species was detailed by the late Mr. Mitchell, Belgian

Consul at Leith, who exhibited before one of the learned societies of

Edinburgh a pair of sprats having the roe and milt fully developed.

Dr. Dod, an ancient anatomist, says: “It is evident that sprats are

young herrings. They appear immediately after the herrings are gone,

and seem to be the spawn just vivified, if I may use the expression.

A more undeniable proof of their being so is in their anatomy; since,

on the closest search, no difference but size can be found between

them.” After the nonsense which was at one time written about the parr,

and considering the anomalies of salmon growth, it would be unsafe to

dogmatise on the sprat question. As to the serrated belly, we might

look upon it as we do the tucks of a child’s frock—viz. as a provision

for growth. The fin-rays of this fish have also been cited in evidence

as not being the same in number as those of the herring, but as I can

testify, from actual counting, the fin-rays of the latter fish vary

considerably, therefore the number of fin-rays is not evidence in the

case. The slaughter of sprats which is annually carried on in our seas

is, I suspect, as decided a killing of the goose for the sake of the

golden eggs as the grilse-slaughter which is annually carried on in our

salmon rivers.

The herring is found under four different conditions:—1st, Fry or

sill; 2d, _Maties_ or fat herring; 3d, Full herring; 4th, Shotten or

spent herring. All herrings under five or six inches in length come

under the first denomination. The _matie_ is the finest condition in

which a herring can be used for food purposes; and if the fishery

could be so arranged, that is the time at which it should be caught

for consumption. At that period it is very fat, its feeding-power

being all developed on its body; the spawn is small, the growth of

the roe or milt not having yet demanded the whole of the nutriment

taken by the fish. A full herring is one in which the milt or roe is

fully developed. The _maties_ develop into spawning herring with great

rapidity—in the course of three months, it is said. The herrings at the

spawning season come together in vast numbers, and proceed to their

spawning places in the shallower and consequently warmer parts of the

sea. As Gilbert White says, “the two great motives which regulate the

brute creation are love and hunger; the one incites them to perpetuate

their kind, the latter induces them to preserve individuals.” In

obedience to these laws the herring congregate on our coast, for there

only they find an abundant supply of food to mature with the necessary

rapidity their milt and roe, as well as a sea-bottom fitted to receive

their spawn; and they are thus brought within the reach of man at what

many persons consider the wrong time of their life.

As to this division of the question, it has been said that it matters

not at what period you take a herring, whether it be old or young,

without or with spawn; that fish cannot again be caught, and will never

spawn again; and it is argued, therefore, that the taking of fish in

“the family way” no more prevents it from reproducing than if it had

been killed in the condition of a _matie_. The same argument was used

in the case of the young salmon; and it was asked: If you kill all your

grilse, where are you to find your salmon? but I shall have more to say

on this part of my topic by and by.

The herring breeds, then, and is caught in greater or lesser

quantities, during every month of the year. There is no general

close-time for the herring in Scotland. On one or two parts of the west

coast it has hitherto been illegal to capture this fish at certain

seasons, although the restrictions are not general. How is it that the

time selected by fishermen for the capture of this fish corresponds

with the period when it is a crime to take a salmon? If a gravid

salmon be unwholesome, is a gravid herring good for food? Do not the

same physical laws affect both of these fish? There cannot be a doubt

but that at the period of spawning, this fish, as well as all other

fish, is in its worst condition so far as its food-yielding qualities

are concerned, because at that time of its life its whole nutritive

power is exerted on behalf of its seed, and its flesh is consequently

lean and unpalatable. Yet it is a great fact that the time which the

herring selects in order to fulfil the grandest instinct of its nature

is the very time appointed by man for its capture! In fact, that is

the period when herrings are at a premium; they must be “full fish,”

or they cannot obtain the official brand; in other words, _shotten_

herrings—_i.e._ fish that have spawned—are not of much more than half

the value of the others. When it is taken into account that each pair

of full fish (male and female) are killed just as they are about to

give us the chance of obtaining an increase of the stock to the extent

say of thirty thousand, the ultimate effect must be to disturb and

cripple the producing powers of the shoal to such a degree that it will

break up and find a new breeding-ground, safe for a time perhaps from

the spoliation of the greedy fishermen. The Lochfyne commissioners give

as a reason for their non-recommendation of a close-time the fact, that

were there to be a cessation from labour, the enemies of the herring

would so increase, that the jubilee given would be nugatory. But surely

there is a great want of logic in this argument! How is it that a

close-time operates so favourably in the case of the salmon—not only a

seasonal close-time, but a weekly one as well? Would not the herring,

with its almost miraculous breeding-power, increase in the same ratio,

or even in a greater ratio than its enemies, especially if, as the

commissioners tell us and we believe, it is engaged in multiplying its

kind during ten months of the year? Are not the enemies of the herring

at work during the fishing season as well as at other periods? I could

understand the logic of denying a close-time on the ground that, as

the herring never ceases breeding, it is impossible to fix a correct

period. But, according to the deliverance made by the commissioners in

the natural history portion of their inquiry, a close-time is quite

possible. I have ever been of opinion, notwithstanding the practical

difficulties that would have to be encountered in carrying it out, that

the want of a close-time, especially for the larger kinds of sea-fish,

is one of the causes which are so obviously affecting the supplies. It

is certain also, from chemical and sanitary investigation, that all

fish are unwholesome at the period of spawning; the salmon at that

time of its life is looked upon as being little better than carrion.

But, without dwelling on this phase of the question, or considering

the effect of unwholesome fish on the public health, I must point out

most strongly that the want of a well-defined close-time is one of

the greatest and severest of our fish-destroying agencies. We give

our grouse a breathing space; nay, we sometimes afford to that bird a

whole jubilee year; we do not shoot our hares during certain months of

the year, nor do we select their breeding season as the proper time

to kill our oxen or our sheep; but we do not at dinner-time object to

an _entrée_ composed of cod-roe, and we evidently rather believe in

the propriety of killing only our seed-laden herrings! This lavish

destruction of fish-life has arisen in great part from the well-known

fecundity of all kinds of sea-fish, some of which yield their eggs by

the million, and this has given rise to the idea that it is impossible

to exhaust the shoals. But when it is considered that this wonderful

fecundity is met by an unparalleled destruction of the seed and also

of the young fish, we need not be astonished at the ever-recurring

complaint of scarcity. A recent, but no doubt exaggerated complaint,

sets forth that the beam-trawl is one of the most destructive engines

employed in the sea, five hundred tons of spawn being said to be

destroyed by the trawlers in twenty-four hours. It is well known also

that tons of broken fish and spawn are sold in the south as manure for

the land at threepence per bushel! There can be no doubt that there

is annually an enormous waste of fish-life, through the accidental

destruction of very large quantities of spawn, herring-spawn as well as

all other kinds.

As to the food of the herring, the report already alluded to tells

us that it “consists of crustacea, varying in size from microscopic

dimensions to those of a shrimp, and of small fish, particularly

sandeels. While in the _matie_ condition, they feed voraciously, and

not unfrequently their stomachs are found immensely distended with

crustacea and sandeels, in a more or less digested condition.” I have

personally examined the stomachs of many herrings, and have found

in them the remains of all kinds of food procurable in the place

frequented by the particular animal examined—including herring-roe,

young herrings, sprats, etc.; but the sandeel seems to be its favourite

food.

One of the wonders connected with the natural history of the herring is

the capricious nature of the fish. It is always changing its _habitat_,

and, according to vulgar belief, from the most curious circumstances. I

need not add to the necessary length of this chapter by giving a great

number of instances of the capricious nature of the herring; but I must

cite a few, in order to make my recapitulation of herring history as

complete as possible, and at the same time it is proper to mention that

superstition is brought to bear on this point. The fishermen of St.

Monance, in Fife, used to remove their church-bell during the fishing

season, as they affirmed that its ringing scared away the shoals of

herring from the bay! It has long been a favourite and popular idea

that they were driven away by the noise of gun-firing. The Swedes say

that the frequent firings of the British ships in the neighbourhood of

Gothenburg frightened the fish away from the place. In a similar manner

and with equal truth it was said that they had been driven away from

the Baltic by the firing of guns at the battle of Copenhagen! “Ordinary

philosophy is never satisfied,” says Dr. M’Culloch, “unless it can

find a solution for everything; and it is satisfied for this reason

with imaginary ones.” Thus in Long Island, one of the Hebrides, it was

asserted that the fish had been driven away by the kelp-manufacture,

some imaginary coincidence having been found between their

disappearance and the establishment of that business. But the kelp

fires did not drive them away from other shores, which they frequent

and abandon indifferently, without regard to that work. A member of the

House of Commons, in a debate on a Tithe Bill in 1835, stated that a

clergyman, having obtained a living on the coast of Ireland, signified

his intention of taking the tithe of fish, which was, however,

considered to be so utterly repugnant to their privileges and feelings,

that not a single herring had ever since visited that part of the shore!

[Illustration: MEMBERS OF THE HERRING FAMILY.

1. Herring.

2. Sprat.

3. Pilchard.

]

The most prominent members of the _Clupediæ_ are the common herring

(_Clupea harengus_); the sprat, or garvie (_Clupea sprattus_); and the

pilchard, or gipsy herring (_Clupea pilchardus_). The other members

of this family are the whitebait, the anchovy, and the Alice and

Twaite shad; but these, although affording material for speculation to

naturalists (see chapter on “Fish Growth”), are not of any commercial

importance.

The fisheries for the common herring, the pilchard, and the sprat,

are carried on, with a brief interval, all the year round; but the

great herring season is during the autumn—from August to October—when

the sea is covered with boats in pursuit of that fine fish, and in

some of its phases the herring-fishery assumes an aspect that is

decidedly picturesque. Every little bay all round the island has its

tiny fleet; the mountain closed lochs of the Western Highlands have

each a fishery; while at some of the more important fishing-stations

there are very large fleets assembled—as at Wick, Dunbar, Ardrishaig,

Stornoway, Peterhead, and Anstruther. The chief curers have places

of business in these towns, where they keep a large store of curing

materials and a competent staff of coopers and others to aid them in

their business. Such boats as do not carry on a local fishery proceed

from the smaller fishing-villages to one or other of the centres of

the herring trade. In fact, wherever an enterprising curer sets up

his stand, there the boats will gather round him; and beside him will

collect a mob of all kinds of miscellaneous people—dealers in salt,

sellers of barrel-staves, vendors of “cutch,” Prussian herring-buyers,

comely girls from the inland districts to gut, and men from the

Highlands anxious to officiate as “hired hands.” Itinerant ministers

and revivalists also come on the scene and preach occasional sermons

to the hundreds of devout Scotch people who are assembled; and thus

arises many a prosperous little town, or at least towns that might

be prosperous were the finny treasures of the sea always plentiful.

As the chief herring season comes on a kind of madness seizes on all

engaged, ever so remotely, in the trade; as for those more immediately

concerned, they seem to go completely “daft,” especially the younger

hands. The old men, too, come outside to view the annual preparations,

and talk, with revived enthusiasm, to their sons and grandsons about

what they did twenty years agone; the young men spread out the

shoulder-of-mutton sails of their boats to view and repair defects; and

the wives and sweethearts, by patching and darning, contrive to make

old nets “look amaist as weel as new;” boilers bubble with the brown

_catechu_, locally called “cutch,” which is used as a preservative for

the nets and sails; while all along the coasts old boats are being

cobbled up and new ones are being built and launched.

The scene along the seabord from Buckhaven on the Firth of Forth to

Buckie on the Firth of Moray is one of active preparation, and all

concerned are hoping for a “lucky” fishing; “winsome” young lassies

are praying for the success of their sweethearts’ boats, because if

the season turns out well they will be married women at its close.

Curers look sanguine, and the owners of free boats seem happy. The

little children too—those wonderful little children one always finds

in a fishing village, striving so manfully to fill up “daddy’s” old

clothes—participate in the excitement: they have their winter’s “shoon”

and “Sunday breeks” in perspective. At the quaint village of Gamrie,

at Macduff, or Buckie, the talk of old and young, on coach or rail,

from morning to night, is of herrings. There are comparisons and

calculations about “crans” and barrels, and “broke” and “splitbellies,”

and “full fish” and “lanks,” and reminiscences of great hauls of former

years, and much figurative talk about prices and freights, and the

cost of telegraphic messages. Then, if the present fishery be dull,

hopes are expressed that the next one may be better. “Ony fish this

mornin’?” is the first salutation of one neighbour to another: the very

infants talk about “herrin’;” schoolboys steal them from the boats for

the purpose of aiding their negotiations with the gooseberry woman:

while wandering paupers are rewarded with one or two broken fish by

good-natured sailors, when “the take” has been so satisfactory as to

warrant such largess. At Wick the native population, augmented by four

thousand strangers, wakens into renewed life; it is like Doncaster on

the approach of the St. Leger. The summer-time of Wick’s existence

begins with the fishery: the shops are painted on their outsides and

are replenished within; the milliner and the tailor exhibit their

newest fashions; the hardware merchant flourishes his most attractive

frying-pans; the grocer amplifies his stock; and so for a brief period

all is _couleur de rose_.

They are not all practical fishermen who go down to the sea for herring

during the great autumnal fishing season. By far the larger portion of

those engaged in the capture of this fish—particularly at the chief

stations—are what are called “hired hands,” a mixture of the farmer,

the mechanic, and the sailor; and this fact may account in some degree

for a portion of the accidents which are sure to occur in stormy

seasons. Many of these men are mere labourers at the herring-fishery,

and have little skill in handling a boat; they are many of them farmers

in the Lewis, or small crofters in the Isle of Skye. The real orthodox

fisherman is a different being, and he is the same everywhere. If you

travel from Banff to Bayonne you find that fishermen are unchangeable.

The men’s work is all performed at sea, and, so far as the capture

of the herring is concerned, there is no display of either skill or

cunning. The legal mode of capturing the herring is to take it by

means of what is called a drift-net. The herring-fishery, it must be

borne in mind, is regulated by Act of Parliament, by which the exact

means and mode of capture are explicitly laid down. A drift-net is an

instrument made of fine twine worked into a series of squares, each

of which is an inch, so as to allow plenty of room for the escape of

young herrings. Nets for herring are measured by the barrel-bulk, and

each barrel will hold two nets, each net being fifty yards long and

thirty-two feet deep. The larger fishing-boats carry something like

a mile of these nets; some, at any rate, carry a drift which will

extend two thousand yards in length. These drifts are composed of

many separate nets, fastened together by means of what is called a

back-rope, and each separate net of the series is marked off by a buoy

or bladder which is attached to it, the whole being sunk in the sea by

means of a leaden or other weight, and fastened to the boat by a longer

or shorter trail-rope, according to the depth in the water at which it

is expected to find the herrings. This formidable apparatus, which

forms a great perforated wall, being let into the sea immediately after

sunset, floats or drifts with the tide, so as to afford the herring

an opportunity of striking against it, and so becoming captured—in

fact they are drowned in the nets. The boats engaged in the drift-net

fishing are of various sizes, and are strongly and carefully built: the

largest, being upwards of thirty-five feet keel, with a large drift of

nets and good sail and mast, will cost something like a sum of £200.

[Illustration: VIEW OF LOCHFYNE.]

The other mode of fishing for herrings, which has existed for about a

quarter of a century, is illegal, although it is as nearly as possible

the same as is legally used to capture the pilchard on the coast of

Cornwall. In the west of Scotland, on Lochfyne in particular, where

it is still to some extent practised, it is called “trawling;” but

the instrument of capture is in reality a “seine” net; and, so far

as the size of the mesh is concerned, is all right. The mode of using

this net I shall presently describe; in the meantime I may state that

the practice of “seining” has given cause to much disputation and

many quarrels, some of them resulting in violence and bloodshed; the

whole dispute having given rise to the recent Commission of Inquiry.

It is worth while, I think, to abridge the commissioners’ account of

the cause of quarrel, and the arguments used on both sides of the

question. The drift-net men assert that immature herrings are caught

by the trawl, and that that mode of fishing breaks up the shoals, and

that these scatter and do not again unite, as also that the seine

destroys the spawn. A graver assertion is, that the trawled herrings

are not fit for curing in consequence of their being injured in the

capture; likewise that the seine-net fishers are given to brawling

and mischief. The assertion is also made that it is quite impossible

for the two kinds of fishing to be carried on together, especially in

confined places like Lochfyne. The real reason is, I think, brought in

last—viz. that the great quantities of fish taken on a sudden by the

trawlers affect the markets and derange the prices—all to the great

detriment of the drift-net men. The trawlers are quite able to answer

all these questions both individually and by a general denial. They

say that it is not their interest to contract the width of the mesh,

and that, in fact, the trawl-net mesh is quite as large as the other.

They assert that a seine-net is not so much calculated to disturb a

shoal of herrings as the drift-net, which is of great length and at

once obstructs the shoal. They deny that they have interfered with the

spawning-beds, and also state that they have no particular interest

in catching foul fish, as they sell their herrings chiefly in a fresh

state, and say that their fish are most adapted for the fresh market,

likewise that they can be cured as easily as herrings caught by the

drift-nets. They emphatically deny being brawlers, or that they

wilfully injure the drift-nets; and they assert that both kinds of

fishing can perfectly well be carried on simultaneously on the same

fishing-ground. In fact the trawlers, in my opinion, have thoroughly

made out their case; and the commissioners, I am very glad to record,

have decided in their favour.

The pilchard is generally captured by means of the seine-net, and we

never hear of its being injured thereby. It is also cured in large

quantities, the same as the herring, although the _modus operandi_ is

somewhat different.

The pilchard was at one time, like the herring, thought to be a

migratory fish, but it has been found, as in the case of the common

herring, to be a native of our own seas. In some years the pilchard has

been known to shed its spawn in May, but the usual time is October,

and Mr. Couch thinks that fish do not breed twice in the same year.

Their food, we are told by Mr. Couch, is small crustaceous animals, as

their stomachs are frequently crammed with a small kind of shrimp, and

the supply of this kind of food is thought to be enormous. When on the

coast, the assemblage of pilchards assumes an arrangement like that of

a great army, and the vast shoal is known to be made up by the coming

together of smaller bodies of that fish, and these frequently separate

and rejoin, and are constantly shifting their position. The pilchard

is not now so numerous as it was a few years ago, but very large hauls

are still occasionally obtained. According to a recent statement in

the _Times_, the present pilchard season (1865) seems to have been a

very bad one—“the worst that has been experienced for upwards of twenty

years. The great majority of the boats have not nearly cleared their

expenses.”

Great excitement prevails on the coast of Cornwall during the pilchard

season. Persons watch the water from the coast and signal to those

who are in search of the fish the moment they perceive indications

of a shoal. These watchers are locally called “huers,” and they are

provided with signals of white calico or branches of trees, with which

to direct the course of the boat, and to inform those in charge when

they are upon the fish—the shoal being best seen from the cliffs. The

pilchards are captured by the seine-net—that is, the shoal, or spot of

a shoal, that has risen, is completely surrounded by a wall of netting,

the principal boat and its satellites the volyer and the lurker, with

the “stop-nets,” having so worked as quite to overlap each other’s wall

of canvas. The place where the joining of the two nets is formed is

carefully watched, to see that none of the fish escape at that place,

and if it be too open, the fish are beaten back with the oars of some

of the persons attending—about eighteen in all. In due time the seine

is worked or hauled into shallow water for the convenience of getting

out the fish, and it may perhaps contain pilchards sufficient to fill

two thousand hogsheads. Generally speaking, four or five seines will be

at work together, giving employment to a great number of the people,

who may have been watching for the chance during many days. When the

tide falls the men commence to bring ashore the fish, a tuck-net worked

inside of the seine being used for safety; and the large shallow dipper

boats required for bringing the fish to the beach may be seen sunk to

the water’s edge with their burden, as successive bucketfuls are taken

out of the nets and emptied into these conveyance vessels. To give the

reader an idea of quantity, as connected with pilchard-fishing, I may

state that it takes nearly three thousand fish to fill a hogshead. I

have heard of a shoal being captured that took a fortnight to bring

ashore. Ten thousand hogsheads of pilchards have been known to be taken

in one port in a day’s time. The convenience of keeping the shoal in

the water is obvious, as the fish need not be withdrawn from it till

it is convenient to salt them. The fish are salted in curing-houses,

great quantities of them being piled up into huge stacks, alternate

layers of salt and fish. During the process of curing a large quantity

of useful oil exudes from the heaps. The salting process is called

“bulking,” and the fish are built up into stacks with great regularity,

where they are allowed to remain for four weeks, after which they are

washed and freed from the oil, then packed into hogsheads, and sent to

Spain and Italy, to be extensively consumed during Lent, as well as at

other fasting times. The hurry and bustle at any of the little Cornwall

ports during the manipulation of a few shoals of pilchards must be

seen, the excitement cannot be very well described.

The pilchard is, or rather it ought to be, the _Sardinia_ of commerce,

but its place is usurped by the sprat, or garvie as we call it in

Scotland, and thousands of tin boxes of that fish are annually made up

and sold as sardines. I have already alluded to the sprat, so far as

its natural history is concerned. It is a fish that is very abundant

in Scotland, especially in the Firth of Forth, where for many years

there has been a good sprat-fishery. We do not now require to go to

France for our sardines, as we can cure them at home in the French

style. The sprat-fishery for sardine-making is still, however, a

considerable maritime industry on the coast of France. In 1864 about

75,000 barrels of sprats were taken on the coast of Brittany, besides

those sold fresh and the quantities done up in oil as sardines. The

process of curing with oil is as follows:—The fish must be well washed

in sea-water, after which they are sprinkled with clean salt. The

next process is to cut off the heads of the fish, and take away the

intestines, etc., after which they are again rinsed in the sea-water,

and hung up or laid out to dry in order to beautify. After this they

are placed for a very brief period in a pan of boiling oil, which

completes the cure. Before being packed in the neat little tin boxes in

which we find them, the sardines are laid down on a grating, in order

to let the oil drain off—the finishing process being the exposure

of the box in a steam-chest for such a period as the curer deems

necessary. According to my informant, a thorough cure is effected when

the box appears convex on the two sides, only it is necessary that this

convexity should disappear as the box becomes cool. Ten millions of

boxes are annually sent away from the coast of Brittany, and these are

widely distributed, not only in Europe, but in Australia and America

as well. I have elsewhere mentioned the use of cod-roe in the French

sprat-fishery. The quantity used costs about £80,000 annually, and

is brought from Norway. Each boat engaged in the sprat-fishery will

use from twelve to twenty barrels! Will not the consumption of such a

quantity of roe tell by and by on the cod-fishery?

Sprats, whether they be young herrings or no, are very plentiful in

the winter months, and afford a supply of wholesome food of the fish

kind to many who are unable to procure more expensive kinds. When the

fishing for garvies (sprats) was stopped a few years ago by order of

the Board of White Fisheries, there was quite a sensation in Edinburgh;

and an agitation was got up that has resulted in a partial resumption

of the fishing, which is of considerable value—about £50,000 in the

Firth of Forth alone.

Commerce in herring is entirely different from commerce in any other

article, particularly in Scotland. In fact the fishery, as at present

conducted, is just another way of gambling. The home “curers” and

foreign buyers are the persons who at present keep the herring-fishery

from stagnating, and the goods (_i.e._ the fish) are generally all

bought and sold long before they are captured. The way of dealing in

herring is pretty much as follows:—Owners of boats are engaged to fish

by curers, the bargains being usually that the curer will take two

hundred crans of herring—and a cran, it may be stated, is forty-five

gallons of ungutted fish; for these two hundred crans a certain sum per

cran is paid according to arrangement, the bargain including as well a

definite sum of ready money by way of bounty, perhaps also an allowance

of spirits, and the use of ground for the drying of the nets. On the

other hand, the boat-owner provides a boat, nets, buoys, and all the

apparatus of the fishery, and engages a crew to fish; his crew may,

perhaps, be relatives and part-owners sharing the venture with him, but

usually the crew consists of hired men who get so much wages at the end

of the season, and have no risk or profit. This is the plan followed

by free and independent fishermen who are really owners of their own

boats and apparatus. It will thus be seen that the curer is bargaining

for two hundred crans of fish months before he knows that a single

herring will be captured; for the bargain of next season is always made

at the close of the present one, and he has to pay out at once a large

sum by way of bounty, and provide barrels, salt, and other necessaries

for the cure before he knows even if the catch of the season just

expiring will all be sold, or how the markets will pulsate next year.

On the other hand, the fisherman has received his pay for his season’s

fish, and very likely pocketed a sum of from ten to thirty pounds as

earnest-money for next year’s work. Then, again, a certain number of

curers who are men of capital will advance money to young fishermen

in order that they may purchase a boat and the necessary quantity of

netting to enable them to engage in the fishery—thus thirling the boat

to their service, very probably fixing an advantageous price per cran

for the herrings to be fished and supplied. Curers, again, who are

not capitalists, have to borrow from the buyers, because to compete

with their fellows they must be able to lend money for the purchase

of boats and nets, or to advance sums by way of bounty to the free

boats; and thus a rotten unwholesome system goes the round—fishermen,

boat-builders, curers, and merchants all hanging on each other, and

evidencing that there is as much gambling in herring-fishing as in

horse-racing. The whole system of commerce connected with this

trade is decidedly unhealthy, and ought at once to be checked and

reconstructed if there be any logical method of doing it. At a port of

three hundred boats a sum of £145 was paid by the curers for “arles,”

and spent in the public-houses! More than £4000 was paid in bounties,

and an advance of nearly £7000 made on the various contracts, and all

this money was paid eight months before the fishing began. When the

season is a favourable one and plenty of fish are taken, then all goes

well, and the evil day is postponed; but if, as in one or two recent

seasons, the take is poor, then there comes a crash. One falls, and,

like a row of bricks, the others all follow. At the large fishing

stations there are comparatively few of the boats that are thoroughly

free: they are tied up in some way between the buyers and curers, or

they are in pawn to some merchant who “backs” the nominal owner. The

principal, or at least the immediate sufferers by these arrangements

are the hired men.

This “bounty,” as it is called, is a most reprehensible feature of

herring commerce, and although still the prevalent mode of doing

business, has been loudly declaimed against by all who have the real

good of the fishermen at heart. Often enough men who have obtained

boats and nets on credit, and hired persons to assist them during the

fishery, are so unfortunate as not to catch enough of herrings to

pay their expenses. The curers for whom they engaged to fish having

retained most of the bounty money on account of boats and nets,

consequently the hired servants have frequently in such cases to go

home—sometimes to a great distance—penniless. It would be much better

if the old system of a share were re-introduced: in that case the hired

men would at least participate to the extent of the fishing, whether

it were good or bad. Boat-owners try of course to get as good terms as

possible, as well in the shape of price for herrings as in bounty and

perquisites. For an example of an engagement I may cite the case of

a Burghhead boat, which bargained for 15s. per cran, 20s. of engaging

money (arles), ten gallons of whisky, net-ground, net-driving—_i.e._

from the boat to the ground and back again—and £20 of cash in the

shape of a bounty.[9] At some places even larger sums are asked for

and obtained—as much as £54 in bounty and perquisites. My idea is that

there ought to be no “engagements,” no bounty, and no perquisites. As

each fishing comes round let the boats catch, and the curers buy day by

day as the fish arrive at the quay. This plan has already been adopted

at some fishing-towns, and is an obvious improvement on the prevailing

plan of gambling by means of “engagements” in advance.

In fact, this fishery is best described when it is called a lottery.

No person knows what the yield will be till the last moment: it may

be abundant, or it may be a total failure. Agriculturists are aware

long before the reaping season whether their crops are light or heavy,

and they arrange accordingly; but if we are to believe the fisherman,

his harvest is entirely a matter of “luck.” It is this belief in

“luck” which is, in a great degree, the cause of our fisher-folk not

keeping pace with the times: they are greatly behind in all matters

of progress; our fishing towns look as if they were, so to speak,

stereotyped. It is a woeful time for the fisher-folk when the herrings

fail them; for this great harvest of the sea, which needs no tillage

of the husbandman, the fruits of which are reaped without either

sowing seed or paying rent, is the chief industry that the bulk of

the coast population depend upon for a good sum of money. The fishing

is the bank, in which they have opened, and perhaps exhausted, a

cash-credit; for often enough the balance is on the wrong side of the

ledger, even after the fishing season has come and gone. In other

words, new boats have to be paid for out of the fishing; new clothes,

new houses, additional nets, and even weddings, are all dependent on

the herring-fishery. It is notable that after a favourable season the

weddings among the fishing populations are very numerous. The anxiety

for a good season may be noted all along the British coasts, from

Newhaven to Yarmouth, or from Crail to Wick.

The highest prices are paid for the early fish, contracts for these in

a cured state being sometimes fixed as high as forty-five shillings

per barrel. These are at once despatched to Germany, in the inland

towns of which a prime salt herring of the early cure is considered a

great luxury, fetching sometimes the handsome price of one shilling!

Great quantities of cured herrings are sent to Stettin or other German

ports, and so eager are some of the merchants for an early supply that

in the beginning of the season they purchase quantities unbranded,

through the agency of the telegraph. On those parts of the coast where

the communication with large towns is easy, considerable quantities

of herring are purchased fresh, for transmission to Birmingham,

Manchester, and other inland cities. Buyers attend for that purpose,

and send them off frequently in an open truck, with only a slight

covering to protect them from the sun. It is needless to say that a

fresh herring is looked upon as a luxury in such places, and a demand

exists that would exhaust any supply that could be sent. During one day

in last September what was thought to be a hopeless glut of herrings

arrived at Billingsgate; the consignment was so vast as quite to alarm

the salesmen of that market; but their fears were groundless, as before

noon every herring was sold. From ten to twelve thousand tons of fresh

herrings are sent from Dunbar alone, during the season, into inland

districts, being distributed by means of the railway, and also by

cadgers.

Many of the Scottish herring-curers are men of enterprise and

intelligence. The late Mr. Methuen of Leith may be cited as an example

of the class: he was of humble parentage, but had the good fortune,

by perseverance and industry, to become the greatest herring-curer

in the world. He raised his gigantic business on a small foundation,

which his father and he laid at Burntisland in Fife. His business grew

apace; his yards overflowed into the streets, and his piles of barrels

soon blocked up the passages. He gathered knowledge of his business

from all who could give it him; and in after years, when his trade had

grown to be the greatest of its kind, he found this knowledge of great

service to him. He was soon compelled, however, by the extension of

his connection, to seek larger head-quarters than he could obtain at

Burntisland. In 1833, therefore, he removed to Leith, the seaport of

Edinburgh, where he continued to carry on his business till the time of

his death. For thirty years he was at the head of the herring-trade in

Britain, and was so energetic and reputable in his dealings as really

to command success, in which, of course, he was materially aided by

his rapidly-increasing capital. He created curing-stations, and so

forced business. Wherever he saw an eligible spot, he marked it out as

a place to cure in. His business widened and widened, till thousands

of the Scottish fishing-boats were ready to obey his behests; and, not

contented with what he had achieved in his own country, he invaded

England, and commenced stations along the east coast and on the Isle

of Man, having some time before established business relations on the

coast of Norway. Mr. Methuen took a warm interest in all questions

connected with the herring-fishery, and may be said to have carried

on business during the period when these fisheries were in their

most prosperous condition; in fact, he may be said to have seen the

culmination of the trade. He was foremost in action when an attempt

was made to abolish the Fishery Board for Scotland. His accurate

acquaintance with the trade, and his knowledge of the natural history

of the fish, and the precise nature of his statements as to the value

of the Board, were the means of converting the Government of his time,

so that the Board was maintained in its integrity. Mr. Methuen’s powers

of observation were considerable; he once reasoned out by a reference

to some old letters the precise spot where a local shoal of herrings

was to be found. I have alluded to his plan of gathering knowledge

from all with whom he come in contact; he stored up such letters of

his agents as contained facts for future use, and often found them

of service. At one of his stations in the far North the fishing had

been unsuccessful for the greater part of the season, and there was no

prospect of improvement, when he gave it his consideration. Looking

over his agent’s letters at said place for some years back, he found,

by a comparison of dates, that at a certain spot herrings were to be

found. He accordingly instructed his agent to send his boats to that

spot. The fishermen simply laughed at the idea of an individual sitting

some hundreds of miles away and telling _them_ where to get fish. But

as his orders were positive, they had to obey, and the consequence was

that they returned the next morning loaded with herrings.

[Illustration: VIEW OF A CURING YARD.]

Having explained the relation of the curers to the trade, I must now

speak of the cure—the greater number of the herrings caught on the

coast of Scotland being pickled in salt; a result originally, no doubt,

of the want of speedy modes of transit to large seats of population,

where herrings would be largely consumed if they could arrive in a

sufficiently fresh state to be palatable. At stations about Wick the

quantity of herrings disposed of fresh is comparatively small, so

that by far the larger portion of the daily catch has to be salted.

This process during a good season employs a very large number of

persons, chiefly as coopers and gutters; and, as the barrels have to

be branded, by way of certificate of the quality of their contents, it

is necessary that the salting should be carefully done. As soon as the

boats reach the harbour—and as the fishing is appointed to be carried

on after sunset they arrive very early in the morning—the various

crews commence to carry their fish to the reception-troughs of the

curers by whom they have been engaged. A person in the interest of the

curer checks the number of crans brought in, and sprinkles the fish

from time to time with considerable quantities of salt. As soon as a

score or two of baskets have been emptied, the gutters set earnestly

to do their portion of the work, which is dirty and disagreeable in

the extreme. The gutters usually work in companies of about five—one

or two gutting, one or two carrying, and another packing. Basketfuls

of the fish, so soon as they are gutted, are carried to the back of

the yard, and plunged into a large tub, there to be roused and mixed

up with salt; then the adroit and active packer seizes a handful and

arranges them with the greatest precision in a barrel, a handful of

salt being thrown over each layer as it is put in, so that, in the

short space of a few minutes, the large barrel is crammed full with

many hundred fish, all gutted, roused, and packed in a period of not

more than ten minutes. As the fish settle down in the barrel, more are

added from day to day, till it is thoroughly full and ready for the

brand. On the proper performance of these parts of the business, the

quality of the cured fish very much depends. The late Sir Thomas Dick

Lauder, who was at one time secretary to the Fishing Board, published

plain instructions for taking and curing herrings; he gives minute

directions in all departments, and thus speaks of the important duties

of the coopers:—“During the period of the curing, the cooper’s first

employment in the morning should be to examine every barrel packed on

the previous day, in order to discover if any of them have lost the

pickle, so that he may have all such barrels immediately repacked,

salted, and pickled.... As already stated, the cooper in charge should

see that the gutters are furnished every morning with sharp knives. He

should be careful to strew salt among the herrings as they are turned

into the gutting-boxes; give a general but strict attention to the

gutters, in order to insure that they do their work properly; see that

the herrings are properly sorted, and that all the broken and injured

fish are removed; and take care that the fish are sufficiently and

effectually roused. Then he should see that every barrel is seasoned

with water, and the hoops properly driven, before they are given to the

packers. He should likewise keep his eyes over the packers, to see that

the tiers of herrings are regularly laid and salted, and that a cover

is placed on every barrel immediately after it has been completely

packed.”

I have a very few words to say about the _brand_: whether or not each

barrel of herrings should have stamped upon it a government mark

indicative of its quality has been one of the most fertile subjects of

controversy in connection with herring commerce. _Now_ the brand—which

was devised during the time the British government paid a bounty to the

curer as an encouragement to fish for herrings—is voluntary, and has to

be paid for, and in time, there can be no doubt, it will be altogether

discontinued; and it would have been better perhaps had it never

existed, although its continuance has been advocated by many excellent

persons on the ground of its service to the fisheries. Other kinds

of goods have been able to command a market without the interference

of government—such as cotton and other textile fabrics, cheese, etc.

Why then could not we sell our herrings on the faith of the curer?

Government is not asked to brand our broadcloths, or our blankets,

nor yet our steam-engines; and I hope soon to see a total abolition

of the brand on our herring-barrels; but although I am an advocate

for the total abolition of the brand I wish the present Fishery Board

continued: there is ample employment for all the officers of that

Board in acting as statisticians and police; we can never obtain

sufficient information about the capture and disposal of the fish, the

fluctuations of the fishery, etc. etc.

The following detailed description of the “herring-harvest,” as

gathered in the Moray Frith, may be of interest to the general reader.

It is reprinted, by permission, from a paper contributed by the author

to the _Cornhill Magazine_:—

The boats usually start for the fishing-ground an hour or two before

sunset, and are generally manned by four men and a boy, in addition

to the owner or skipper. The nets, which have been carried inland in

the morning, in order that they might be thoroughly dried, have been

brought to the boat in a cart or waggon. On board there is a keg of

water and a bag of bread or hard biscuit; and in addition to these

simple necessaries, our boat contains a bottle of whisky which we have

presented by way of paying our footing. The name of our skipper is

Francis Sinclair, and a very gallant-looking fellow he is; and as to

his dress—why, his boots alone would ensure the success of a Surrey

melodrama; and neither Truefit nor Ross could satisfactorily imitate

his beard and whiskers. Having got safely on board—a rather difficult

matter in a crowded harbour, where the boats are elbowing each other

for room—we contrive, with some labour, to work our way out of the

narrow-necked harbour into the bay, along with the nine hundred and

ninety-nine boats that are to accompany us in our night’s avocation.

The heights of Pulteneytown, which command the quays, are covered with

spectators admiring the pour-out of the herring fleet and wishing with

all their hearts “God speed” to the venturers: old salts who have long

retired from active seamanship are counting their “takes” over again;

and the curer is mentally reckoning up the morrow’s catch. Janet and

Jeanie are smiling a kindly good-bye to “faither,” and hoping for the

safe return of Donald or Murdoch; and crowds of people are scattered on

the heights, all taking various degrees of interest in the scene, which

is stirringly picturesque to the eye of the tourist, and suggestive to

the thoughtful observer.

Bounding gaily over the waves, which are crisping and curling their

crests under the influence of the land-breeze, our shoulder-of-mutton

sail filled with a good capful of wind, we hug the rocky coast,

passing the ruined tower known as “the Old Man of Wick,” which serves

as a capital landmark for the fleet. Soon the red sun begins to dip

into the golden west, burnishing the waves with lustrous crimson and

silver, and against the darkening eastern sky the thousand sails

of the herring-fleet blaze like sheets of flame. The shore becomes

more and more indistinct, and the beetling cliffs assume fantastic

and weird shapes, whilst the moaning waters rush into deep cavernous

recesses with a wild and monotonous sough, that falls on the ear with

a deeper and a deeper melancholy, broken only by the shrill wail of

the herring-gull. A dull hot haze settles on the scene, through which

the coppery rays of the sun penetrate, powerless to cast a shadow. The

scene grows more and more picturesque as the glowing sails of the fleet

fade into grey specks dimly seen. Anon the breeze freshens and our boat

cleaves the water with redoubled speed: we seem to sail farther and

farther into the gloom, until the boundary-line between sea and shore

becomes lost to the sight.

We ought to have shot our nets before it became so dark, but our

skipper, being anxious to hit upon the right place, so as to save a

second shooting, tacked up and down, uncertain where to take up his

station. We had studied the movements of certain “wise men” of the

fishery—men who are always lucky, and who find out the fish when

others fail; but our crew became impatient when they began to smell

the water, which had an oily gleam upon it indicative of herring, and

sent out from the bows of the boat bright phosphorescent sparkles of

light. The men several times thought they were right over the fish,

but the skipper knew better. At last, after a lengthened cruise, our

commander, who had been silent for half-an-hour, jumped up and called

to action. “Up, men, and at ’em,” was then the order of the night. The

preparations for shooting the nets at once began by our lowering sail.

Surrounding us on all sides was to be seen a moving world of boats;

many with their sails down, their nets floating in the water, and their

crews at rest, indulging in fitful snatches of sleep. Other boats

again were still flitting uneasily about; their skippers, like our

own, anxious to shoot in the best place, but as yet uncertain where

to cast: they wait till they see indications of fish in other nets. By

and by we are ourselves ready, the sinker goes splash into the water,

the “dog” (a large bladder, or inflated skin of some kind, to mark the

far end of the train) is heaved overboard, and the nets, breadth after

breadth, follow as fast as the men can pay them out (each division

being marked by a large painted bladder), till the immense train sinks

into the water, forming a perforated wall a mile long and many feet

in depth; the “dog” and the marking bladders floating and dipping in

a long zigzag line, reminding one of the imaginary coils of the great

sea-serpent.

Wrapped in the folds of a sail and rocked by the heaving waves we tried

in vain to snatch a brief nap, though those who are accustomed to such

beds can sleep well enough in a herring-boat. The skipper, too, slept

with one eye open; for the boat being his property, and the risk all

his, he required to look about him, as the nets are apt to become

entangled with those belonging to other fishermen, or to be torn away

by surrounding boats. After three hours’ quietude, beneath a beautiful

sky, the stars—

“Those eternal orbs that beautify the night”—

began to pale their fires, and the grey dawn appearing indicated

that it was time to take stock. On reckoning up we found that we had

floated gently with the tide till we were a long distance away from

the harbour. The skipper had a presentiment that there were fish in

his nets; indeed the bobbing down of a few of the bladders had made

it almost a certainty; at any rate we resolved to examine the drift,

and see if there were any fish. It was a moment of suspense, while, by

means of the swing-rope, the boat was hauled up to the nets. “Hurrah!”

at last exclaimed Murdoch of the Isle of Skye, “there’s a lot of fish,

skipper, and no mistake.” Murdoch’s news was true; our nets were

silvery with herrings—so laden, in fact, that it took a long time to

haul them in. It was a beautiful sight to see the shimmering fish as

they came up like a sheet of silver from the water, each uttering a

weak death-chirp as it was flung to the bottom of the boat. Formerly

the fish were left in the meshes of the nets till the boat arrived in

the harbour; but now, as the net is hauled on board, they are at once

shaken out. As our silvery treasure showers into the boat we roughly

guess our capture at fifty crans—a capital night’s work.

The herrings being all on board, our duty is now to “up sail” and

get home: the herrings cannot be too soon among the salt. As we make

for the harbour, we discern at once how rightly the term lottery has

been applied to the herring-fishery. Boats which fished quite near

our own were empty; while others again greatly exceeded our catch.

“It is entirely chance work,” said our skipper; “and although there

may sometimes be millions of fish in the bay, the whole fleet may not

divide a hundred crans between them.” On some occasions, however, the

shoal is hit so exactly that the fleet may bring into the harbour a

quantity of fish that in the gross would be an ample fortune. So heavy

are the “takes” occasionally, that we have known the nets of many boats

to be torn away and lost through the sheer weight of the fish which

were enmeshed in them.

The favouring breeze soon carried us to the quay, where the boats were

already arriving in hundreds, and where we were warmly welcomed by the

wife of our skipper, who bestowed on us, as the lucky cause of the

miraculous draught, a very pleasant smile. When we arrived the cure

was going on with startling rapidity. The night had been a golden one

for the fishers—calm and beautiful, the water being merely rippled

by the land-breeze. But it is not always so in the Bay of Wick: the

herring-fleet has been more than once overtaken by a fierce storm,

when valuable lives have been lost, and thousands of pounds’ worth of

netting and boats destroyed. On such occasions the gladdening sights of

the herring-fishery are changed to wailing and sorrow. It is no wonder

that the heavens are eagerly scanned as the boats marshal their way out

of the harbour, and the speck on the distant horizon keenly watched

as it grows into a mass of gloomy clouds. As the song says, “Caller

herrin’” represent the lives of men; and many a despairing wife and

mother can tell a sad tale of the havoc created by the summer gales on

our exposed northern coast.

From the heights of Pulteneytown, overlooking the quays and curers’

stations, one has before him, as it were, an extended plain, covered

with thousands and tens of thousands of barrels, interspersed at short

distances with the busy scene of delivery, of packing, and of salting,

and all the bustle and detail attendant on the cure. It is a scene

difficult to describe, and has ever struck those witnessing it for the

first time with wonder and surprise.

Having visited Wick in the very heat of the season, and for the express

purpose of gaining correct information about this important branch of

our national industry, I am enabled to offer a slight description of

the place and its appurtenances. Travellers by the steamboat usually

arrive at the very time the “herring-drave” is making for the harbour;

and a beautiful sight it is to see the magnificent fleet of boats

belonging to the district, radiant in the light of the rising sun,

all steadily steering to the one point, ready to add a large quota to

the wealth of industrial Scotland. As we wend our way from the little

jagged rock at which we are landed by the small boat attendant on the

steamer, we obtain a glimpse of the one distinguishing feature of the

town—the herring commerce. On all sides we are surrounded by herring.

On our left hand countless basketfuls are being poured into the immense

gutting-troughs, and on the right hand there are countless basketfuls

being carried from the three or four hundred boats which are ranged

on that particular side of the harbour; and behind the troughs more

basketfuls are being carried to the packers. The very infants are

seen studying the “gentle art;” and countless rows of the breechless

_gamins de Wick_ are busy hooking up the silly “poddlies.” All around

the atmosphere is humid; the sailors are dripping, the herring-gutters

and packers are dripping, and every thing and person appears wet

and comfortless; and as you pace along you are nearly ankle-deep in

brine. Meantime the herrings are being shovelled about in the large

shallow troughs with immense wooden spades, and with very little

ceremony. Brawny men pour them from the baskets on their shoulders

into the aforesaid troughs, and other brawny men dash them about with

more wooden spades, and then sprinkle salt over each new parcel as

it is poured in, till there is a sufficient quantity to warrant the

commencement of the important operation of gutting and packing. Men

are rushing wildly about with note-books, making mysterious-looking

entries. Carts are being filled with dripping nets ready to hurry them

off to the fields to dry. The screeching of saws among billet-wood, and

the plashing of the neighbouring water-wheel, add to the great babel of

sound that deafens you on every side. Flying about, blood-bespattered

and hideously picturesque, we observe the gutters; and on all hands

we may note thousands of herring-barrels, and piles of billet-wood

ready to convert into staves. At first sight every person looks

mad—some appear so from their costume, others from their manner—and the

confusion seems inextricable; but there is method in their madness,

and even out of the chaos of Wick harbour comes regularity, as I have

endeavoured to show.

So soon as a sufficient quantity of fish has been brought from the

boats and emptied into the gutting-troughs, another of the great scenes

commences—viz. the process of evisceration. This is performed by

females, hundreds of whom annually find well-paid occupation at the

gutting-troughs. It is a bloody business; and the gaily-dressed and

dashing females whom we had observed lounging about the curing-yards,

waiting for the arrival of the fish, are soon most wonderfully

transmogrified. They of course put on a suit of apparel adapted to the

business they have in hand—generally of oilskin, and often much worn.

Behold them, then, about ten or eleven o’clock in the forenoon, when

the gutting scene is at its height, and after they have been at work

for an hour or so: their hands, their necks, their busts, their

“Dreadful faces throng’d, and fiery arms”—

their every bit about them, fore and aft, are spotted and besprinkled

o’er with little scarlet clots of gills and guts; or as Southey says of

Don Roderick, after the last and fatal fight—

“Their flanks incarnadined,

Their poitral smear’d with blood”—

See yonder trough, surrounded by a score of fierce eviscerators,

two of them wearing the badge of widowhood! How deftly they ply the

knife! It is ever a bob down to seize a herring, and a bob up to throw

it into the basket, and the operation is over. It is performed with

lightning-like rapidity by a mere turn of the hand, and thirty or forty

fish are operated upon before you have time to note sixty ticks of your

watch. These ruthless widows seize upon the dead herrings with such a

fierceness as almost to denote revenge for their husbands’ deaths; for

they, alas! fell victims to the herring lottery, and the widows scatter

about the gills and guts as if they had no bowels of compassion.

In addition to herrings that are pickled and those sold in a fresh

state, great quantities are made into what are called “bloaters,” or

transformed into “reds.” At Yarmouth immense quantities of bloaters

and reds are annually prepared for the English markets. The bloaters

are very slightly cured and as slightly smoked, being prepared

for immediate sale; but the herrings brought into Yarmouth are

cured in various ways: the bloaters are for quick sale and speedy

consumption; then there is a special cure for fish sent to the

Mediterranean—“Straits-men” I think these are called; then there are

the black herrings, which have a really fine flavour. In fact the

Yarmouth herrings are so cured as to be suitable to particular markets.

It may interest the general reader to know that the name of “bloater”

is derived from the herring beginning to swell or bloat during the

process of curing. Small logs of oak are burned to produce the smoke,

and the fish are all put on “spits” which are run through the gills.

The “spitters” of Yarmouth are quite as dexterous as the gutters of

Wick, a woman being able to spit a last per day. Like the gutters and

packers of Wick, the spitters of Yarmouth work in gangs. The fish,

after being hung and smoked, are packed in barrels, each containing

seven hundred and fifty fish.

The Yarmouth boats do not return to harbour every morning, like the

Scotch boats; being decked vessels of some size, from fifty to eighty

tons, costing about £1000, and having stowage for about fifty lasts

of herrings, they are enabled to remain at sea for some days, usually

from three to six, and of course they are able to use their small

boats in the fishery, a man or two being left in charge of the large

vessel, while the majority of the hands are out in the boats fishing.

There has always been a busy herring-fishery at the port of Yarmouth.

A century ago upwards of two hundred vessels were fitted out for the

herring-fishery, and these afforded employment to a large number of

people—as many as six thousand being employed in one way or the other

in connection with the fishery. The Yarmouth boats or busses are

not unlike the boats once used in Scotland, which have been already

described. They carry from fifteen to twenty lasts of herrings (a last,

counted fisherwise, is more than 13,000 herrings, but nominally it is

10,000 fish), and are manned with some fourteen men or boys.

There has been a long-continued controversy in Scotland as to the best

kind of fishing-boats, certain parties arguing that none but decked

vessels ought to be used, which we think would be a great mistake

so long as the fishing is carried on as at present. In the first

place, there is no harbour accommodation for a fleet of large decked

vessels; the present herring-boats, when not in use, are drawn up on

the beach, where they can readily be examined and repaired, and can be

easily pushed into the water when again required. In the second place,

these herring-boats rarely go far from their fishing-port; a voyage

of from one to three hours carries them to the fishing-place which

they have selected—the chief fisheries being just off the coast; and

as they have only to spend a few hours on the fishing-ground before

returning to port, the present size of boat is in every way convenient

for the voyage. And, in the third place, the open boats have this

advantage—viz. that it is easier to fish from one of them than from a

larger vessel—the great length of the present drift of nets involving

very severe labour, both in the letting of the nets out from the boat

and in hauling them in when laden with fish. So long, therefore, as the

herring-fishery is a coast one, the present style of boat is the best

that can be employed. If it were necessary for the boats to go far out

to sea, involving a voyage of days, then it would be proper to have

larger vessels, because it is absolutely necessary that the herrings

should be cured within a few hours of their being captured.

The following figures as to the catch of 1862 and 1863, and as to the

number of boats and people employed, are from the official returns of

the fishing of these two years; in fact I have made a complete though

brief abridgment of the whole papers, which, at the time I write,

are the latest published. The revenue derived under the Act for the

branding of herrings, passed in 1859, amounted to £5801: 12: 4 in

1862, being an increase of £3157: 0: 4 over that of 1859; and in 1863

the brand fees produced the sum of £4618: 16s. The returns of the

herring-fishing of 1863, as compared with that of 1862, which was,

however, an extraordinarily good year, are as follow:—

Barrels. Barrels. Barrels.

1862. Cured, 830,904 Branded, 346,712 Ex., 494,910

1863. Do. 654,816½ Do. 276,880½ Do. 407,761½

The quantity of herrings branded out of the fishing of 1862 was,

as seen above, 346,712 barrels, a number greatly exceeding that of

any previous year; which shows not only that the fishing was very

productive, but also the great demand for branded herrings, the

reliance of the Continent upon the brand (the chief herring trade there

being in barrels that have been branded), and the steady improvement

in the cure of the fish. The fishing of 1863, when compared with those

of 1860 and 1861—fishings of which the total amounts are nearer to

that of 1863 than that of 1862—also show this in a remarkable degree;

for we find from the returns that out of a cure in 1863 less by 26,377

barrels than the cure of 1860, there were branded 44,967 barrels more

and exported 29,791 barrels more than in 1860; that out of a cure in

1863 less by 14,012 barrels than the cure of 1861, there were branded

11,533 barrels more and exported 17,448 barrels more than in 1861. A

comparison of the rate per cent which the quantity branded forms of the

total quantity cured shows this still more clearly. In 1860 the rate

was 55½ per cent; in 1861 it was 58⅓ per cent; in 1862, 59½;

and in 1863 it was 62¼ per cent.

The quantity cured in 1862 exceeds, by upwards of 50,000 barrels, that

of any previous year’s fishing. The districts in which an increase

of take was chiefly obtained were Buckie, Banff, Fraserburgh, and

Peterhead on the east coast, and Stornoway and Inverary on the west.

The total increase at these districts of the fishing of 1862 over

that of 1861 being 184,023 barrels, and the increase of the whole of

Scotland being 172,076 barrels, it would appear that, although there

was a decided increase in these districts, the other fishing-places

were scarcely up to the mark of the previous year. The fishing at

Fraserburgh was remarkable as having yielded the highest average of any

ever known in that district, being 226½ crans per boat. The season

of 1862 was also remarkable for the decrease in the shoals of dogfish.

This is shown from the entire and perfect condition of the herrings

caught. In 1861, with a cure of 31,631 barrels at Fraserburgh, the

broken fish were more than 4½ per cent; while in 1862, with a cure

of 77,124 barrels, the broken were only a little over 2 per cent.

In 1863 there was an increase over 1862 in the districts of Lybster,

Orkney, and Shetland, and the Isle of Man; but at Wick and some of the

Moray Firth stations the fishing was almost the same; while it was

greatly less at Eyemouth, Anstruther, Peterhead, Fraserburgh, Banff,

Stornoway, and Inverary.

In 1862, at Wick, a fishing for herring with nets in the winter was

tried for the first time, and was so far successful, herrings being

caught having milt and roe, with the appearance that they might

become full fish in three weeks or a month, and averaging 800 to the

cran. This result goes far to prove that the herring is a fish of

local habits, having no great range of emigration, and that it spawns

twice in the course of the year. The winter fishing was repeated and

extended in 1863. Trials were made for herring during the winter all

along the south shores of the Moray Firth, and along the east coast as

far as Montrose; and in some quarters this fishery was so extensively

prosecuted as to lead to the fish being selected and branded for the

Continental market.

The number of vessels fitted out in Scotland and the Isle of Man for

the British herring-fishery 1862 was 281, employing 1149 men. The

quantity of herrings cured in these vessels was 59,934 barrels, being

an average of 213 barrels each vessel, generally made in two or

three voyages. The number of boats in Scotland and the Isle of Man,

whether decked or undecked, irrespective of the places to which they

belong, employed in the herring-fishery of 1862, for one selected week

in each district, was 9067, manned by 43,468 fishermen and boys, and

employing 22,471 persons as coopers, gutters, packers, and labourers,

making a total of persons employed 65,939. Of the total number of

boats, 1122 fished at Wick, 960 at Loch Broom, 900 at Stornoway, 783

at Eyemouth, and 700 at Peterhead. The total number of boats employed

in the shore-curing herring, and cod and ling fisheries in 1862 was

12,545, with an aggregate tonnage of 88,871, and valued at £272,960.

The value of nets and lines belonging to these boats is estimated at

£474,834. The boats are manned by 41,008 fishermen and boys, the curers

and coopers employed amount to 2756, and the number of other persons

employed is estimated at 50,098. In 1863 there was an increase of 47

boats, but a decrease of 150 fishermen and boys, while there was an

increase of £34,369 in the estimated value of boats and nets.[10]

I have placed on the following page a complete journal of the daily

catch of herrings at Wick for the season of 1862, in order to show the

progress of the fishing.

┌───────┬─────┬──────┬──────┬─────┬───────┬─────────┬──────────────┐

│ │ │Ave- │Total │ Gen-│Total │ │ │

│ │Boats│rage. │daily │eral │catch │ │ │

│Date. │out. │crans.│catch.│ Ave-│ for │Quality. │ Weather. │

│ │ │ │ │rage.│season.│ │ │

├───────┼─────┼──────┼──────┼─────┼───────┼─────────┼──────────────┤

│July 3│ 20│ 2│ 40│ 0│ 40│Excellent│Mild. │

│ ” 4│ 30│ 1│ 30│ 0│ 70│ Do. │Wet. │

│ ” 5│ 60│ ½│ 30│ 0│ 100│ Do. │Damp and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ mild. │

│ ” 8│ 50│ ½│ 25│ 0│ 125│ Do. │Mild. │

│ ” 9│ 70│ 0│ 10│ 0│ 135│Good │Gentle breeze.│

│ ” 10│ 70│ 1½│ 105│ 0│ 240│ Do. │Breezy. │

│ ” 11│ 120│ 2│ 60│ ¼│ 300│ Do. │Cold and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ breezy. │

│ ” 12│ 150│ 7│ 1,050│ 1¼│ 1,350│ Do. │Fine. │

│ ” 15│ 180│ 1│ 180│ 1¼│ 1,530│Mixed │Mild. │

│ ” 16│ 170│ 1│ 170│ 1½│ 1,700│Good │Clear—strong │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ tides. │

│ ” 17│ 150│ 1│ 150│ 1¾│ 1,850│ Do. │Wet. │

│ ” 18│ 100│ 1│ 100│ 2│ 1,950│ Do. │Thick and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ wet. │

│ ” 19│ 50│ 1│ 50│ 2│ 2,000│ Do. │Rough. │

│ ” 22│ 300│ 3│ 900│ 3│ 2,900│ Do. │Mild. │

│ ” 23│ 600│ 2│ 1,200│ 4│ 4,100│Excellent│ Do. │

│ ” 24│ 700│ 1│ 700│ 4½│ 4,800│ Do. │Changeable. │

│ ” 25│ 250│ ½│ 125│ 4½│ 4,925│ Do. │Very rough. │

│ ” 26│ 700│ 1│ 700│ 5│ 5,625│ Do. │Mild. │

│ ” 29│ 950│ 0│ 150│ 5│ 5,775│ Do. │Mild and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ wet. │

│ ” 30│ 900│ ½│ 450│ 6│ 6,225│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 31│ 950│ 1│ 950│ 6½│ 7,175│ Do. │Rough. │

│Aug. 1│ 250│ 2│ 500│ 7│ 7,675│ Do. │Mild—heavy │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ sea. │

│ ” 2│ 1000│ 2│ 2,000│ 8½│ 9,675│Mixed │Mild and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ wet. │

│ ” 5│ 150│ 1│ 150│ 9│ 9,825│Good │Rough. │

│ ” 6│ 70│ 3│ 210│ 9│ 10,035│Spent │ Do. │

│ ” 7│ 1100│ 6│ 6,600│ 15│ 16,635│⅓ spent │Mild. │

│ ” 8│ 1100│ 4│ 4,400│ 19│ 21,035│¼ spent │Thick and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │rough. │

│ ” 9│ 700│ 6│ 4,200│ 23│ 25,235│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 12│ 1120│ 3│ 3,360│ 26│ 28,595│Good │Breezy. │

│ ” 13│ 1120│ 8│ 8,960│ 34│ 37,555│Excellent│Thick, wet, │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ and mild. │

│ ” 14│ 1120│ 4│ 4,480│ 38│ 42,035│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 15│ 1100│ 11│12,210│ 48│ 54,245│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 16│ 1000│ 8│ 8,000│ 56│ 62,245│¼ spent│ │o. │

│ ” 19│ 1000│ 0│ 50│ 56│ 62,295│Excellent│Strong gale. │

│ ” 20│ 800│ ½│ 400│ 56½│ 62,695│ Do. │Gentle │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ breeze—cold.│

│ ” 21│ 800│ ¼│ 200│ 57│ 62,895│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 22│ 900│ ½│ 450│ 57│ 63,345│ Do. │Calm and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ clear. │

│ ” 23│ 800│ ¼│ 200│ 57½│ 63,545│ Do. │Very wet │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ and calm. │

│ ” 26│ 1120│ 2│ 2,240│ 59│ 65,785│¼ spent │Mild. │

│ ” 27│ 1120│ 5│ 5,600│ 64│ 71,385│⅓ spent │Breezy. │

│ ” 28│ 1120│ 1│ 1,120│ 65│ 72,505│Good │Clear and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ mild. │

│ ” 29│ 1100│ ¾│ 800│ 65½│ 73,305│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 30│ 1000│ ½│ 500│ 66│ 73,805│ Do. │ Do. │

│Sept. 2│ 1050│ ½│ 525│ 66½│ 74,330│Excellent│Breezy. │

│ ” 3│ 20│ ½│ 10│ 66½│ 74,340│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 4│ 20│ ½│ 10│ 66½│ 74,350│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 5│ 100│ 1│ 100│ 66½│ 74,450│ Do. │Mild. │

│ ” 6│ 600│ ¼│ 150│ 67│ 74,600│ Do. │ Do. │

│ ” 9│ 220│ 4│ 880│ 68│ 75,480│¼ spent │ Do. │

│ ” 10│ 300│ 10│ 3,000│ 71│ 78,480│Good │ Do. │

│ ” 11│ 400│ 20│ 8,000│ 77│ 86,480│⅓ spent │ Do. │

│ ” 12│ 400│ 10│ 4,000│ 81│ 90,480│¼ spent │Breezy. │

│ ” 13│ 3│ 4│ 12│ 81│ 90,492│Good │Wind and │

│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ rain. │

│ ” 16│ 200│ ¾│ 160│ 81│ 90,652│ Do. │Mild. │

└───────┴─────┴──────┴──────┴─────┴───────┴─────────┴──────────────┘

The quantity of netting now employed in the herring-fishery is

enormous, and is increasing from year to year. It has been strongly

represented by Mr. Cleghorn, and others who hold his views, that the

herring-fishery is on the decline; that if the fish were as plentiful

as in former years, the increased amount of netting would capture

an increased number of herrings. It is certain that, with a growing

population and an increasing facility of transport, we are able to use

a far larger quantity of sea produce now than we could do fifty years

ago, when we were in the pre-Stephenson age. If, with our present

facilities for the transport of fish to inland towns, Great Britain had

been a Catholic instead of a Protestant country, having the example of

the French fisheries before us, I have no hesitation in saying that

by this time our fisheries would have been completely exhausted—that

is, supposing no remedial steps had been taken to guard against such a

contingency. Were we compelled to observe Lent with Catholic rigidity,

and had there been numerous fasts or fish-days, as there used to

be in England before the Reformation, the demand, judging from our

present ratio, would have been greater than the sea could have borne.

Interested parties may sneer at these opinions; but, notwithstanding, I

maintain that the pitcher is going too often to the well, and that some

day soon it will come back empty.

I have always been slow to believe in the inexhaustibility of the

shoals, and can easily imagine the overfishing, which some people

pooh-pooh so glibly, to be quite possible, especially when supplemented

by the cod and other cannibals so constantly at work, and so well

described by the Lochfyne Commission; not that I believe it possible to

pick up or kill every fish of a shoal; but, as I have already hinted,

so many are taken, and the economy of the shoal so disturbed, that in

all probability it may change its ground or amalgamate with some other

herring colony. I shall be met here by the old argument, that “the

fecundity of fish is so enormous as to prevent their extinction,” etc.

etc. But the certainty of a fish yielding twenty thousand eggs is no

surety for these being hatched, or if hatched, of their escaping the

dangers of infancy, and reaching the market as table food. I watch the

great shoals at Wick with much interest, and could wish to have been

longer acquainted with them. How long time have the Wick shoals taken

to grow to their present size?—what size were the shoals when the fish

had leave to grow without molestation?—how large were the shoals when

first discovered?—and how long have they been fished? are questions

which I should like to have answered. As it is, I fear the great Wick

fishery must come some day to an end. In the course of twenty-seven

seasons as many as 1,275,027 barrels of herring have been caught off

Wick (each barrel containing 700 fish); and in all probability as many

more fish were killed by the nets, and never taken ashore. When the

Wick fishery first began the fisherman could carry in a creel on his

back the nets he required; now he requires a cart and a good strong

horse! Leaving out one of the twenty-seven seasons (the first), and

dividing the remaining twenty-six into two periods of thirteen each,

we find the aggregate of the boats, the average crans to each, and the

aggregate total for the

Boats. Average Crans. Total Crans.

1st thirteen years, 10,202 941 735,318

2d ” 13,522 519 539,719

During the first of these periods each boat carried about twenty-five

nets, spun and worked in the county in a homely way; during the second

period each had from thirty to thirty-five nets, machine-made, the

twine being very even and fine, and far larger and deeper, a great many

of them being of cotton, and far superior in their catching power to

those of the first period; and yet, with 3320 additional boats carrying

perhaps 200,000 more nets, larger, finer, and deeper than in the first

period, we took 195,609 barrels fewer fish in the second than in the

first thirteen years. During a late Wick fishing, a remarkable feature

was the great disparity in the catch by individual boats. Although the

average per boat over the whole fleet is set down as about eighty-three

crans, yet half the boats do not average forty crans. As a rule, the

boats that take the most fish are those with the longest, finest, and

deepest drifts. In fact, the whole argument just amounts to this—that

if the fish are as plentiful as ever, then double the quantity of

netting _ought_ to take double the quantity of herrings. During a late

Wick season (1863), the entire fleet was only at sea twelve nights, and

the average per night to each boat was only three crans. The _Northern

Ensign_, a local journal, has over and over again asserted that the

fish are as numerous as ever; but that, in consequence of the crowd

of boats, there is not room to capture them. In answer to this I may

note, that on six different evenings of the season, when the boats out

ranged from two to six hundred, the take did not average half a cran

per boat. It may be likewise stated that 604 boats, in the year 1820,

with a greatly less amount of netting, took as many fish as have been

taken this season (1863) although the boats fishing were 480 above the

season of 1820. The average capture per boat in 1820, with the limited

netting, was 148 crans, whilst the average for 1863 was only 85 crans!

How is it possible to reconcile such great differences?

I conclude this part of the herring question by one other illustration.

In 1862 the aggregate sailings—_i.e._ number of voyages—of the Wick

boats for the season was 28,755, and the total catch 92,004 barrels;

while this season (1863) the Wick boats have only taken 89,972 barrels

in 32,630 voyages; and all over the country, so far as I know—and I

have made extensive inquiries—the tale is the same, a failure in

the herring-fishery. Perhaps the best plan is at once to exhaust the

figures of the subject while we are discussing it. As to the Wick

July fishing, the following figures are illustrative of two different

periods of five years each:—

┌───────┬──────────┬┬───────┬──────────┐

│ Year. │ Barrels. ││ Year. │ Barrels. │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ 1843 │ 14,000 ││ 1859 │ 2,500 │

│ 1844 │ 15,615 ││ 1860 │ 12,850 │

│ 1845 │ 22,578 ││ 1861 │ 5,821 │

│ 1846 │ 30,350 ││ 1862 │ 7,173 │

│ 1847 │ 15,442 ││ 1863 │ 8,517 │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ │ 97,985 ││ │ 36,861 │

└───────┴──────────┴┴───────┴──────────┘

The figures of the greatest month of the fishery—viz. August—are as

follow:—

┌───────┬──────────┬┬───────┬──────────┐

│ Year. │ Barrels. ││ Year. │ Barrels. │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ 1843 │ 69,640 ││ 1859 │ 80,853 │

│ 1844 │ 72,585 ││ 1860 │ 86,120 │

│ 1845 │ 66,702 ││ 1861 │ 73,580 │

│ 1846 │ 61,450 ││ 1862 │ 65,321 │

│ 1847 │ 59,528 ││ 1863 │ 46,000 │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ │ 329,905 ││ │ 351,874 │

└───────┴──────────┴┴───────┴──────────┘

It will be seen from these figures that, even in the great herring

month of August, notwithstanding the large increase of boats and nets,

a decreased quantity has been taken during the last two years. To

understand this better, the boats in the first period were 4345, and in

the second period 5489, and in this last period the boats had vastly

increased their netting, as many as 55,775 more nets having been added.

Now, it stands to reason that if the herrings were as numerous as ever

in the second period, the take should have been, through the mere

increase of boats, not counting the addition to the amount of netting,

417,916 barrels.

The September fishing has only been prosecuted of late years, for the

very good reason that in former times all the herring required were

caught in July and August; during the last two years great efforts

have been made to institute a September fishery, and a great force was

brought to bear on the races of herring then coming to maturity, with

what result the following figures will show:—

┌───────┬──────────┬┬───────┬──────────┐

│ Year. │ Barrels. ││ Year. │ Barrels. │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ 1843 │ 4,100 ││ 1859 │ 9,846 │

│ 1844 │ 2,000 ││ 1860 │ 504 │

│ 1845 │ 2,880 ││ 1861 │ 6,194 │

│ 1846 │ 900 ││ 1862 │ 20,000 │

│ 1847 │ 9,100 ││ 1863 │ 30,000 │

├───────┼──────────┼┼───────┼──────────┤

│ │ 18,980 ││ │ 66,544 │

└───────┴──────────┴┴───────┴──────────┘

The September fishery at Wick will have its day like the July and

August fisheries.

One more table will finish these statistics; it represents the averages

of the Wick fishery for two periods—one for seven years, ending in

1824; the other for the seven years ending with the season of 1863:—

┌────────┬────────┬────────────┬┬────────┬────────┬────────────┐

│ Years. │ Boats. │ Crans ││ Years. │ Boats. │ Crans │

│ │ │ per Boat. ││ │ │ per Boat. │

├────────┼────────┼────────────┼┼────────┼────────┼────────────┤

│ 1818 │ 482 │ 136 ││ 1857 │ 1100 │ 73 │

│ 1819 │ 609 │ 133 ││ 1858 │ 1061 │ 80 │

│ 1820 │ 604 │ 148 ││ 1859 │ 1094 │ 79 │

│ 1821 │ 595 │ 123 ││ 1860 │ 1080 │ 92 │

│ 1822 │ 595 │ 91 ││ 1861 │ 1180 │ 87 │

│ 1823 │ 555 │ 123 ││ 1862 │ 1122 │ 82 │

│ 1824 │ 625 │ 123½ ││ 1863 │ 1084 │ 79 │

├────────┼────────┼────────────┼┼────────┼────────┼────────────┤

│ │ 4065 │ 877½ ││ │ 7721 │ 572 │

└────────┴────────┴────────────┴┴────────┴────────┴────────────┘

I shall not expend further argument on these figures, they speak too

plainly to require illustration.

The state of the case as between the supply of fish and the extent of

netting has been focused into the annexed diagram, which shows at a

glance how the question stands.

[Illustration:

1818-1845. The drift of 1857-1863. The drift of

nets per boat contained nets per boat contained

4500 square yards. 16,800 square yards.

1818-1824. The During the 10 years 1857-1863. The average

average per boat 1841-50 the average per boat 82 crans.

125¼ crans. catch per boat was

112 crans.

]

Before concluding this chapter I wish to say a few words about a point

of herring economy, which has been already alluded to in connection

with the special commission appointed to inquire into the trawling

system—viz. as to the natural enemies of the herring, the most ruthless

of which are undoubtedly of the fish kind, and whose destructive power,

some people assert, dwarfs into insignificance all that man can do

against the fish:—“Consider,” say the commissioners, “the destruction

of large herring by cod and ling alone. It is a very common thing to

find a codfish with six or seven large herrings, of which not one has

remained long enough to be digested, in his stomach. If, in order to

be safe, we allow a codfish only two herrings _per diem_, and let him

feed on herrings for only seven months in the year, then we have 420

herring as his allowance during that time; and fifty codfish will equal

one fisherman in destructive power. But the quantity of cod and ling

taken in 1861, and registered by the Fishery Board, was over 80,000

cwts. On an average thirty codfish go to one cwt. of dried fish. Hence,

at least 2,400,000 will equal 48,000 fishermen. In other words, the cod

and ling caught on the Scotch coasts in 1861, if they had been left in

the water, would have caught as many herring as a number of fishermen

_equal to all those in Scotland, and six thousand more_, in the same

year; and as the cod and ling caught were certainly not one tithe part

of those left behind, we may fairly estimate the destruction of herring

by these voracious fish alone as at least ten times as great as that

effected by all the fishermen put together.” As to only one of the

numerous land enemies of the herring, the late Mr. Wilson, in his _Tour

round Scotland_, calculated that the gannets or solan geese frequenting

one island alone—St. Kilda—picked out of the water for their food 214

millions of herrings every summer! The shoals that can withstand these

destructive agencies must indeed be vast, especially when taken in

connection with the millions of herrings that are accidentally killed

by the nets, and never brought ashore for food purposes. The work

accomplished by these natural enemies of the herring, which has been

going on during all time, does not however affect my argument, that by

the concentration on one shoal of a thousand boats per annum, with an

annually-increasing net-power, we both so weaken and frighten the shoal

that it becomes in time unproductive. As the late Mr. Methuen said in

one of his addresses: “We have been told that we are to have dominion

over the fish of the sea, but dominion does not mean extermination.”

Although Scotland is the main seat of the herring-fishery, I should

like to see statistics, similar to those collected in Scotland, taken

at a few English ports for a period of years, in order that we might

obtain additional data from which to arrive at a right conclusion as

to the increase or decrease of the fishery for herring. It is possible

to collect statistics of the cereal and root crops of the country;

it was done for all Scotland during three seasons, and it was well

and quickly accomplished. What can be done for the land may also, I

think, be done for the sea. I believe the present Board for Scotland

to be most useful in aiding the regulation of the fishery, and in

collecting statistics of the catch; their functions, however, might be

considerably extended, and elevated to a higher order of usefulness,

especially as regards the various questions in connection with the

natural history of the fish. The operations of the Board might likewise

be extended for a few seasons to a dozen of the largest English

fishing-ports, in order that we might obtain confirmation of what is

so often rumoured, the falling off of our supplies of sea-food. There

are various obvious abuses also in connection with the economy of our

fisheries that ought to be remedied, and which an active Board could

remedy and keep right; and a body of naturalists and economists might

easily be kept up at a slight toll of say a guinea per boat.