7 
fishermen round the British coast, but by fishermen of all 
countries fishing in the same waters, and even in all parts 
of the world. That Conference had more particularly to 
deal with the destruction of immature fish upon the British 
coast, and therefore he would take the matters in proper 
rotation. He trusted that after many gentlemen had ex- 
pressed their opinions in that room, the further considera- 
tion of the subject would be adjourned until there was a 
better representation of fishermen present, and that the 
wardens of the Fishmongers’ Company would consent to 
lend their hall for the purpose of the matter being further dis- 
cussed inthe month of January. Drift-net fishing was in full 
operation as well as the trawl-net, and long-line and hand- 
line, consequently the present was a most inopportune 
time for holding the Conference. In the fishing population 
of the British islands, he might say there were not nine out 
of ten who believed in theoretical men, but rather in the 
practical man who had worked from his boyhood in every 
branch of fishery. One gentleman, who was a very high 
theoretical authority, lately said that the fishermen of 
England should be allowed to use what net they liked, 
to fish when they liked and how they liked, but that 
was what he should call extermination. Many of these 
theoretical people put views before the practical man 
that the practical man would not look at at all, as they 
were wrong altogether, and he did not think he should 
be far wrong in saying that ninety-eight out of one 
hundred of the fishing population did not believe in 
them. In the first place, he would deal with the drift-net 
fishery. Before the repeal of the Sea Fisheries Act, in 1868, 
no one could use a net for the capture of herrings with a 
mesh of less than one and a quarter inch, but since the re- 
peal of the Act he had measured no less than twenty herring 
