58 
small that they only fetched a shilling to eighteen pence 
per sack, and there was nothing for the fishermen. As far 
as this is concerned, the evidence falls by its own weight. 
All those boats with four men each would not have come 
from Morecambe tide after tide, and done the fearfully hard 
work connected with musseling, unless it had paid them 
well on the average, and if it did pay them, it 1 was certainly 
no harm, but probably a distinct gain, for if more had been 
taken the many acres of ground left bare by the tide might 
have retained their stock. The work is too hard,and the 
economical conditions too ‘strict: to allow men wantonly and 
for pure destructiveness to take mussels, and when. they 
are so plentiful that they can be got so as to sell them cheap 
and yet pay it is a distinct advantage to the community. 
There has been no such fall of spat since; though there has 
apparently beén no scarcity, and, the fishing has never 
fallen on the evil times of the latter seventies. 
Now, if trawling could trawl out a space open to the 
ocean, surely it should have done so in the narrow channel 
of Fleetwood, for so many boats must have taken a very 
large proportion of the fish out each time, but as man took 
them Nature supplied them from her reserves, over 
and over again, and wiil do so as long as there is the attrac- 
tion of food, whatever man can do. 
One thing might be done for mussel culture, though not 
on the natural beds. There are large areas in the estuary 
