1188 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 



been conducted on too small a scale. If our sea-fisheries are to compete 

 successfully with the enormous fisheries of other countries great capi- 

 talists should interest themselves in the matter. Considering the ex- 

 pensive material, favorable results will never be obtained with little 

 capital. A herring-lugger of 100 tons costs 29,000 marks [|6,902J, the 

 outfit for trawling 7,000 marks [$1,666], and the two sets of nets which 

 are required 10,000 marks [$2,3^0]. With a small capital, and the 

 small number of ten or twelve vessels, the loss of a single lugger, or 

 l>oor fisheries, which are more likely to occur with a small fleet of fish- 

 ing-vessels than with a large one, which can go over a much larger 

 area, may have the most serious consequences. English fishery asso- 

 ciations and some private individuals therefore work with entirely dif- 

 erent means. During my stay in London Mr. Burdett-Coutts equipped 

 a fleet of from 60 to 70 large vessels, whicli were accompanied by 3 or 



4 steamers to convey the fish quickly to the markets and supidy the 

 fishermen with food, ice, &c. According to the data contained in a 

 very interesting treatise by His Koyal Highness the Duke of Edin- 

 burgh, on the English sea-fisheries, one of the largest fish-dealers owns 

 about 200 large vessels, of which from 140 to 150 are constantly em- 

 j)loyed, and are accompanied by 5 or 6 steamers, furnishing in 1881 

 for the London market 15,000 tons of fish, valued at 5,500,000 marks 

 [$1,309,000]. Whenever great capitalists in Germany will invest their 

 capital in the sea-fisheries, as they have done in the great steamship 

 lines, we may hope to reap a rich harvest in the North Sea, to give good 

 employment to thousands of persons, and educate a large number of 

 experienced sailors, a circumstance the importance of which cannot be 

 undervalued in view of the fact that sailing vessels are constantly being 

 thrown more and more into the background by steamers. 



For improving our sea-fisheries, however, it would not be sufficient 

 to find the means for equipping a large fishing-fleet ; we would also 

 need ports accessible at all times, and as near as possible to the fishing- 

 grounds. As the construction of harbors is very expensive, a project 

 by Greenway Thomas, exhibited at the London Exhibition, for construct- 

 ing cheap harbors in any place, even in the middle of the sea, deserves 

 to be carefully examined. 



A FLOATING WAYE-BREAKER. — In this project for fishing-ports, which 

 are to serve merely as temporary places for anchoring and as places of 

 refuge, Greenway Thomas starts from the well-known fact that the water 

 of the sea is violently agitated only near the surface, while at a depth of 



5 meters [16.4 feet] the water is comparatively calm. His floating wave 

 breakers, hollow triangular prisms, made of pieces of sheet iron soldered 

 together firmly, therefore draw only from 3 to 5 meters of water; their 

 breadth is 10 meters, and the two sides exposed to the waves are slightly 

 concave. These wave-breakers are anchored at intervals of 10 meters. 

 If the waves roll against a row of such apparatus, each one of them 

 does not have to sustain the full pressure of the water like a firm mole, 



