408 EXAMINATION OF THE PRESENT STATE 
makes a practice of Janding its fish in London, but at rare intervals 
sends a cutter to Grimsby. Fish landed in this way are omitted 
from my own returns, as I think that to include them might lead to 
erroneous conclusions as to the abundance of supply. 
From various causes it was not possible to keep the records for 
several days in various months, and, in order to remedy the omission, 
Thave made up the amount by means of averages. The method is 
not an exact one, perhaps, but is probably sufficiently sofor our purpose 
here. In the Journal, where my statistics have already been published 
in a simpler form, I have made no attempt to supply the omissions, but 
have simply made a note of the number of days on which no record 
was made. 
The Board of Trade returns deal with weight, while I prefer to 
use the box as the unit of calculation. Indeed, no other method is 
possible in statistics taken on the pontoon. The official weights have 
therefore been converted into boxes in the earlier period, but as 
weights are more intelligible to many people, I have retained them 
also, and in the returns since April, 1893, have computed the boxes 
from my own record in weights. 
I must explain that at Grimsby a ‘‘box”’ of fish means a box 
packed in such a way that a considerable number of fish are above 
the level of the top ; a box which is only filled up to the top is 
called a ‘‘level.” Boxes of North Sea plaice, as I am informed by 
fish buyers, and as I find by experiment, average a weight of nine 
stone ; but boxes of plaice from Iceland, owing to the larger size of 
the fish, can be packed much higher, and are so packed with a view 
to tempt the rather unwilling market, and weigh about ten stone 
each. Accordingly cols. v and xiv require different treatment for 
conversion into weights. 
When a vessel is ‘‘ single-boating,” the fish are landed in baskets 
and packed in boxes upon the pontoon, but in “ fleeting” large 
plaice are packed in boxes on board of the vessel which catches 
them, and placed on board the “ cutter ”’ for transport to market. 
In this case, for convenience of stowage, the boxes are only filled 
up to the top, consequently fish derived from fleets are sold in 
“levels.” * A certain allowance of large plaice has to be made for 
home consumption, and this, I believe, has been done with suffi- 
cient accuracy in counting “levels”? as ‘boxes,’ though the 
allowance ought really to be spread over the whole year instead 
of appearing, as it does by my method, highest in the chief fleeting 
season. Ido not know that there is any home consumption of 
small plaice. 
The approximate numbers of fish are derived by multiplying the 
* Small plaice are always sold in “ boxes,”’ whether derived from fleets or single-boaters. 
