THEIR TRADE-UNIONISM 93 



kill, but pause not to eat, such fish as escape the meshes. When 

 at last the catch is saved, then they fall to and devour the fish 

 already killed. 



Here let us note an instance of intellectual anticipation of 

 Trade Unionism. Well aware that their labour has yielded 

 far more than the regulation Trade stroke, and earned more 

 than the Eight Hours' wage, they quietly await settHng day — 

 next morning — when they are paid by being stuffed not only 

 with fish, but also with crumbs soaked in wine.i 



Thus Oppian of another fish-drive, 



" The Fishers pick the choicest of the Spoil, 

 Supply their wishes and reward their Toil." 



In a story of similar fishing by Mucianus the Dolphins 

 await neither summons by voice as above, or signal by torch 

 (as in iElian, II. 8) but "uncalled and of their own accord" 

 present themselves ready for work. 



Trades Unionism among the Dolphins is again not obscurely 

 indicated, ipsis quoque inter se puhlica est societas. Furthermore, 

 close corporations, not unlike mediaeval Guilds or modern 

 Unions, but wotting not of " blackleg " or even " dilutee," 

 surely prevailed, for suum quceque cymba e delphinis socium 

 habet.^ 



.Elian's dolphins foreshadow, it would seem, our modern 

 principle of co-operation, when " they draw near demanding the 

 due reward of their joint-undertaking." But their organisation 

 of labour differed from ours in two respects. 



First, the wiUingness and the wage for night and day shift 

 were identical. Second, since they were not blessed as we in 

 the higher civilisation of the twentieth century are by the 

 exalted, if not always successful conceptions of Conferences 



^ Pliny, IX. 9 : " Sed enixioris operas, quam in unius diei praemium conscii 

 sibi opperiuntur in posterum : nee piscibus tantum sed et intrita panis e 

 vino satiantur." 



^ In Lapland the " sea-swallows " render great aid in the salmon season. 

 For some cause these small marine birds elect to follow the inward and outward 

 course of the fish, and are thus infalhble guides to the fishermen, with whom 

 they become so tame that they will light on their fingers, and take, if not " the 

 choicest of the spoil," scraps of fish. No wonder they are termed " The 

 Luck-bringers." See S. Wright, The Romance of the World's Fisheries (London, 

 1908), p. 6g. 



