32 THE UNAPPRECIATED FISHER FOLK. 
THE CORNWALL. PILGHARD CATCHERS 
Importance of the pilchard—Catching pilchards by the seine net— 
Earnings of the pilchard-catchers—Cure of the fish—‘“ The Pope 
and pilchards”—The pilchard Harvest—Drift-net fishing by 
Cornwall boats. 
THE pilchard is an important member of the herring 
family, the capture of which may be said to form the staple 
fishing industry of the coast of Cornwall; and it may be 
said of the Cornish fisher folk that they greatly resemble 
the fisher people of Scotland, inasmuch as they are here- 
ditary fishers, and conduct their business much in the same 
way as many of the Scottish fishermen conduct theirs. 
The boats in many instances are family concerns, and the 
profits made are divided in equitable proportions among 
the crew. These fish are in some seasons more abundant 
than others, and are anxiously watched for and industriously 
fished when found. It is not our cue in the present work 
to deal with the natural history of the pilchard, but we may 
perhaps be allowed to say that the circumstance of the fish 
frequently coming in shore in large bodies—“schulls ” these 
bodies are called in Cornwall—affords an opportunity to 
the most stay-at-home fisherman to participate in the work 
of capture. This coming in of the fish to the bays has 
given rise to one of the modes of capture, namely, that 
mode which is carried on by means of the seine net, and 
which has been so successfully imitated by the herring 
fishermen of Lochfyne in Scotland. It may be explained, 
however, that the seine or sean net, either as used in Corn- 
