20 THE UNAPPRECIATED FISHER FOLK. 
is considerably less than it is elsewhere, the hereditary 
Scottish fishers being an anxious and careful body of men. 
But although the men who caught the fish are in bed 
asleep the industrial drama of the herring cure still goes 
on; as the boats reach the harbour a new phase of work 
begins. As has been stated, the greater portion of the 
herring taken are cured, which involves their being gutted 
and salted as well as being packed in barrels. These 
processes are all organised by the curer and his confidential 
assistant, the head cooper ; the women who are entrusted 
with the disagreeable work of eviscerating the fish per- 
form their part with great celerity, and will go on working 
for several hours in the most active way. They are paid 
according to the tale of work they do, which is a great 
incitement to industry. A woman has been timed to gut 
two dozen herrings in a minute, so that she can fill a 
barrel in the course of about thirty-five minutes. When 
it is considered that over a million barrels of herrings are 
cured in Scotland every year, and that each barrel contains 
over seven hundred and fifty fish, it will be apparent that the 
females engaged in the work of evisceration have plenty of 
work cut out for them, seeing that the season on the north- 
east coast of Scotland, where most of the herrings are cured, 
only lasts for about eight weeks. We do not know any 
other kind of labour for women that could be classed with 
the curing of herrings, and we dare say it would be rather 
difficult to find females in inland places who would consent 
to work at the herring troughs. The rate of payment for 
this kind of work used to be at the rate of fourpence for 
each barrel of herring filled with the gutted fish; and 
hundreds of persons fishermen’s widows and others were 
very glad of the work, so that they might earn a few pounds 
during the course of the fishery. At such times as there is 
