142 EEPOET OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHEPJES. 



Fjellbacka and Gullkoliaen regarding herring " resembling " the " old ' r 

 herring, which were taken from the stomachs of cod-fish, 1 with the an- 

 swers received at Grebbestad, where herring found under the same cir- 

 cumstances were described in such a manner as to leave no doubt that 

 coast-herring were meant, 2 (which is also confirmed by W. von Wright's 

 report on the herring-fisheries in Bohus-liin during the winter 1842-'43, 3 ) 

 and with the answers received at Kiiidesholmen and Kalfsund, (where 

 herriug obtained under such circumstances were declared to have been 

 of different size 4 or altogether sea-herring, 5 ) and if we take into consid- 

 eration the fact that it is always more or less difficult to ascertain to 

 what kiud of herring a badly-preserved specimen belongs, such accounts 

 can scarcely be considered as of any great importance. Still less weight 

 can be attached to the accounts received at Fjellbacka, that herring re- 

 sembling the " old " herring had been seen in the Kattegat, 6 as the fish- 

 ermen on the northern coast, neither at that time nor later, have carried 

 on any great fisheries, and as entirely different accounts were received 

 from the central and southern coasts, 7 where such fisheries were carried 

 on. It must also be remembered that although the correctness of the 

 minutes of these meetings was certified, still there might have been 

 expressions used which might have been misunderstood by a clerk not 

 entirely familiar with the coast population, a case which seems still 

 more probable, as the questions were, perhaps, not always propounded 

 in a form most intelligible to the fishermen. During the more produc- 

 tive sea-herring-fisheries it happens not unfrequently that some old per- 

 son who either remembered the " great n fisheries, or has, in his youth, 

 heard some lively traditions regarding them — and who, consequently, 

 is considered more knowing in such questions than other persons — 

 asserts that herring of the old kind have been caught, 8 which joyful 

 news then goes the round of the papers, awakening anew among a por- 

 tion of the coast-population the hope that another great herring-fishery 

 is near at hand. 9 Thus it happened last winter that an old woman, who 

 could well remember the former fisheries, declared most emphatically 

 that she recognized " great " herring among the larger herring caught 

 with the sea-herring. The mackerel-fishers occasionally observe schools 



1 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 107 fr. 22, p. 108 fr. 31, p. 117 fr. 13. 

 3 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 100 fr. 15. 



3 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 106. 



4 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 119 fr. 8.— Nilsson, Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 46. 

 6 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 126 fr. 15. 



6 Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 107 fr. 22, p. 108 fr. 31. 



* Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 116 fr. 13, p. 119 fr. 8, p. 126 fr. 15. 



8 Wright, W. von, Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 172.— Ekstrom, Ofvers. af Kgl. Vet. Akad:s F6r- 

 handl. f. 1848, p. 84. 



9 Lundbeck, Antekningar, p. 24, 25. — Edenhielm, G., Utlatande till Commerce-Collegium 

 af d. 2 Mars 1840.— Ekstrom, Ofvers. af Kgl. Vet. Akadrs Forhandl. f. 1844, p. 26.— 

 Yhlen, G. von : Goteborgs. ocli Bohusliins. Husuallnings-Sullskaps. Qvartalskrift Juli 

 1870, p. 16.— Nya Handl. ror. Sillf., p. 11. 



