34 



from the Atlantic to the Pacific ; it is believed that hiisi 

 once hatched in a river return there or to the neigh- 

 bourhood to spawn, so that successful transplantation to 

 one or two rivers might populate all of them and the 

 neighbouring sea, as the transplanted shad and bass have 

 populated the Pacific coast. 



'})']. The relations of capital to labour are very various 



Capital and labour: with curious but readily intelligible 



instances of their reia- effccts on the industry. In places, 



e.g., Tellicherry, it may be found that 

 the great bulk of fishermen are under the control of the 

 curers who either own the boats or have control over 

 the owners under the advance system ; the curers may 

 be considerable capitalists, and in one curing yard two 

 persons owned or controlled about two-thirds of the 

 boats. In such cases the fishermen are usually bound 

 to bring direct to the curers the whole of their catches 

 and cannot sell them to others, so that the curers are 

 sure of a continuous supply of fish, large or small accord- 

 ing to the chances of the sea ; they do not require to 

 go to the beach and chafi"er with the fishermen or com- 

 pete with other buyers. Here we have capital directly 

 employing labour and the labourers are practically bound 

 to the capitalist. In other places, e.g., Tanur, the contrary 

 may be the case ; here most fishermen own their boats ; 

 they may indeed be somewhat in debt to money-lenders 

 but they are seldom, if ever, under the control of the 

 curers or dealers, and they sell their catches on the 

 beach to the highest bidder ; conversely the curers have 

 no certainty of supply of fish but are obliged to buy in 

 open market ; this independence of the fishermen and 

 this freedom of sale is an attractive feature and conso- 

 nant with our ideas of independence and the open 

 market. But the results, even on the existing fish trade, 

 of these two systems (there are other systems and rela- 

 tions which will be mentioned in the final report) are 

 remarkable. Tellicherry dried fish is the best on the 

 market ; it is not unpleasant to smell or taste, it bears 

 a good price, and is exported in immense quantities 

 to Ceylon where bad fish is refused ; Tanur dried fish 

 is malodorous and poor in quality and goes wholly to 

 inland markets. One cause appears on enquiry ; at 

 Tellicherry and the neighbourhood the fish is not 

 detained on the blazing beach while the fishermen are 



