62 
. Now, sir, can we conceive anything much worse? The 
well- fed * Bumbles ” of the Sea Fishery" Committee, waiting 
comfortably on shore, know that fishermen’s wives and 
children have a bad habit of getting hungry even in 
stormy weather, and that husbands and fathers must risk 
their lives in wind and storm to feed them, see their op- 
portunity of getting “cases,” and seize it. I won't say 
more. The report is enough. ; | 
Finally, sir, let us enquire what the deep sea trawling 
fishery of the Irish Sea is, for all this cost and cruelty is 
avowedly in order that more large fish may be caught there. 
The position ofthe Irish Sea is precisely the same as a large 
ae Enormous quantities .of seed can be planted and 
grown to acertain age and size, but the amount of fish or 
full-grown plants, say, for example, cabbages, is regulated 
by the size and fertility of the fields. We find while the 
eoed beds are enormous along the coasts, the fields are com- 
paratively small. 
The law of retardation of growth, which I have explained 
before, seems to apply in this limited sea, and I think also 
the feeding grounds are not rich pasture. The beds can in 
no possible sense compare with the grounds out in the open 
sea. In its palmiest days, 30, 40, 50 years ago, the fishery 
was more important than it -is to-day, but 508 per se simply 
because of the economic conditions that prevailed, just as in 
those days our English copper and tin mines, or wheat 
