OF ALL COUNTRIES. 57 



This steady increase of the fishery during the period 

 when trawling was practised, they went on to say, could not 

 be ascribed to any augmentation in the number of drift-net 

 boats ; for these, on the average of the same years, with 

 the exception of 1862, show no increase, while the number 

 of square yards of netting employed remains also com- 

 paratively stationary. Hence they were forced to the con- 

 clusion that there were no grounds for the alarm that the 

 fishery of Loch Fyne was being destroyed by the operations 

 of the trawlers. The same reasoning was found to apply to 

 the west coast of Scotland as a whole, viz., that there is a 

 steady increase in the fishery during the periods when trawl- 

 ing was prosecuted ; and that trawling (or rather seining) 

 for herring has been an important means of cheapening 

 fish to the consumer, and has thrown into the market an 

 abundant supply of wholesome fresh fish at prices which 

 enable the poor to enjoy them without having to come into 

 competition with the curer. They pointed out also that 

 by prohibiting the use of herring for bait during the close 

 period from ist January to 31st May, the white fish, like 

 cod and ling, have been allowed to multiply. A single 

 herring used for bait is employed to catch three of those 

 fish, each of which if left in the sea would have devoured 

 annually at least between four and five hundred herring ; 

 so that the cod and ling actually caught and cured on the 

 Scotch coasts in 186 1, would, if left in the sea, have destroyed 

 • more herring than 48,000 fishermen. As only 42,75 1 fisher- 

 men and boys were engaged in fishing in the year, the 

 magnitude of this destructive agency will be readily per- 

 ceived. The close time which diminishes the capture of 

 such fish must necessarily prove destructive to the herring. 

 Nothing can be more satisfactory than to find that so 

 far as regards the ocean, no danger of scarcity need be 



