136 On the Use of Lights in the Cornish Fisheries, 



rienced in other fisheries, should I consider that a light on the 

 shore would engage their attention, unless they were already 

 in such depths as to have permitted the use of the seine. 

 Hence, then, I would suggest to the fishermen the adoption of 

 the mode actually practised in the Mediterranean and the Ame- 

 rican rivers, or elsewhere ; and this is, to carry their lights to 

 sea, or to establish a sufficient fire-boat as the leader, and as 

 an essential part of the arrangements for a seine. It is not 

 necessary to say how this ought to be constructed ; it is suffi- 

 ciently obvious, since its essence is a grate with flaming fuel, 

 so as to maintain a large, brilliant, and durable light. Nor 

 need I suggest to these active and keen fishermen that their 

 object should be to attempt, first, through scouts, to discover 

 where the fish are, and then by means of the light to entice them 

 to follow into the requisite sounding. It is not easy to believe 

 that it would be inefficacious, nor to admit this proposal to be 

 termed a wild speculation, because it would be a very sin- 

 gular anomaly that this fish alone, of all those on which the 

 experiment has ever been tried, should be uninfluenced by that 

 which influences the whole race, apparently because to the 

 whole, as 1 have shewn when explaining the use of the uni- 

 versal luminous property of fishes, it is the indication of the 

 presence of their food, their general guide to their prime ob- 

 ject, through the darkness of the night or the deep ocean. 



Thus have I taken the liberty to urge this question once 

 more on the proprietors of these fisheries, regretting only that 

 I cannot hope to be a witness, or to assist more usefully, and 

 making the only necessary apology if I have here proceeded on 

 wrong information. I have yet also, however, to learn, why 

 the seine should be the exclusive instrument of the pilchard 

 fishery, why the driving or herring net may not be applied to 

 the one case as well as the other, if the fish are determined 

 to hold to the deep water. The captures might not be so great, 

 but the necessary capital is less ; and if the herring fishery is a 

 profitable trade, why would not the pilchard one be the same, 

 under the same system? when the joint value of the fish and 

 the oil are, I believe greater, surely at least equal to that of the 

 herring. I am, &c, 



J. Mac Culloch. 



