270 THE HISTORY OF DUTCH SEA FISHERIES. 



to choose a fishing place, a fishing gear, and a curing pro- 

 cess according to the state of the season and the market, 

 amply made up for increased competition. 



The brand, and the more and more apparent impossibi- 

 lity of preventing abuse of it, still continued to thwart 

 progress. I shall conclude this account of Dutch herring- 

 fishery by briefly relating how this last monument of 

 Government interference with it came to be abolished like 

 the rest. 



From lugger fishery, as stated just now, there ensued a 

 promiscuousness of the herring-fishery's produce. Besides 

 deep-sea herring as of old, luggers in 1867, and subse- 

 quently, brought home fish caught off the continental coasts, 

 which in quality was decidedly inferior. Now, the branding 

 regulations of 1860 and 1861 had ordained distinct brands, 

 certifying herring to have been caught either in the high 

 seas (V. Z. V., or high-sea catch brand), under the coast 

 (K. V., or coast-catch brand) or in the Zuider Zee. The 

 latter brand was never or very seldom given, as Zuider Zee 

 herring of late years has ultimately proved unfit for curage ; 

 but lugger skippers were in the habit, although they often 

 fished under the coast, of declaring all their cured-herring 

 as high-sea catch. They generally obtained the V. Z. V. 

 brand for inferior fish, as an efficient control never could be 

 carried into execution. Bumboat owners, on the other 

 hand, not only cured herring on a large scale, but actually 

 sometimes cured it ashore, contrary to all ancient notions 

 and prescriptions ; and fish thus cured, though certainly 

 much inferior to fish cured on the day of the capture, ob- 

 tained the same brand as the latter. It became, in short, 

 an impossibility under the new fishery regimen to certify 

 where herring had been caught ; and a new regulation 

 approved by Royal Decree of May nth, 1868 (Staatsblad 



