THE HERRING FAMILY. 407 



which still continues to the present day, the great objection 

 urged against the indiscriminate use of the trawl was the 

 reckless destruction of fish-spawn involved. With increase 

 of our knowledge it came to be recognised that the spawn of 

 the herring alone of all the food-fishes could lend itself to 

 injury, the eggs of the other fishes being, by virtue of their 

 physical character, safely removed beyond the reach of the 

 trawl. On the other hand, if an injury to the spawn of the 

 herring, sufficiently great to cause a diminution in the ' catch ' 

 of herrings, could be proved scientifically to be inflicted by the 

 trawler in pursuit of his avocation, then, the herring alone 

 is so extremely important to the community at large as a 

 source of food-supply, that prohibitive legislation might well 

 be imposed. It is not within the scope of this work to enter 

 into this difficult question, but it is well to call to mind that 

 the eggs of the herring are as a rule deposited in very definite 

 restricted areas and that they are minute, adhere firmly to 

 foreign bodies and have a tough elastic capsule. In the 

 Report to the Trawling Commission (1884) it was remarked, 

 " The trawlers either do not seem to work on the ground se- 

 lected by the herring for spawning, probably because the latter 

 would prove too rough, or the passage of the trawl over such 



is unattended with the presence of ova in it Even if a 



trawl did pass over masses of herring-ova, it is questionable 

 if injury would always occur." Again, there are millions of 

 herrings caught every year, which are either ripe males or 

 females, and with the death of one of the latter is involved 

 a loss to the species of many .thousands of potential individuals. 

 Under these circumstances, it is not surprising that the in- 

 dictment against trawliug now tends to emphasise the de- 

 struction of young fishes, of the food of the fishes and the 

 actual fishing-gear of the liners. So far as at present known, 

 the herring appears to be able successfully to defy the com- 

 bined exterminating energy of man and of its natural enemies 

 in the sea. 



From another point of view the herring is exceptional, in 

 that it is the historic species upon which the earliest obser- 

 vations on Teleostean development were made. This has been 

 partly caused, or at any rate made possible, by the fact that, 



