THE HISTORY OF DUTCH SEA FISHERIES. 277 



cod to be salted. Its actual importance can, like that of 

 the latter, best be shown by export figures ; which have 

 been collected in Appendix M. The reasons why exports 

 of fresh fish should have increased at the very fast rate 

 shown by this table, may be evident to any one upon the 

 very slightest reflection. It is, simply, the increase of 

 railway traffic, and the care now taken by continental 

 railway directors to provide cheap and fast conveyance for 

 fish. Fresh fish caught by Dutch vessels may, owing to 

 the said circumstance, any day be eaten all over Belgium ; 

 and the importance of the German market on this score is 

 being keenly realised by Dutch dealers. Packing in ice 

 is of course increasing at the same rate, as exports of 

 fresh fish ; and companies exclusively destined to work 

 this new mine have sprung up of late years, and are in 

 a flourishing condition. Nieuwediep, particularly well 

 situated in the centre of the North Sea and Zuider Zee 

 fresh fisheries, and for years past directly connected with all 

 Europe by rail, is fast increasing in importance as a fresh 

 fish market. Ymuiden, the new North Sea port of Amster- 

 dam, seems by its geographical position to be destined to a 

 similar importance ; and fresh fishery may be susceptible 

 of any degree of increase in the towns of Vlaardingen and 

 Maassluis, when the plan for giving them a direct communi- 

 cation by rail with Rotterdam, and the rest of the world, 

 shall have been fully carried out, as it will be soon. Rapid 

 conveyance is of course the mainspring of the fresh-fish 

 business ; and it cannot be denied that in this respect, as 

 applied to the fishery interest, Holland has much to learn 

 from foreign countries. Still we are now very far from the 

 days of yore when " de neeringhe van den versche >: was a 

 despised business, fit for small men without capital, and 

 yielding a pittance. A shadow, however, seems to impend 



