41 8 ON THE PRICE OF FISH. 



probably obtained in the neighbourhood of Iceland. There 

 are however many other kinds of salt fish, on which I shall 

 be able to comment. For the first fifty to sixty years of the 

 period a smaller kind of ling is quoted. But entries of this 

 kind of fish are rare towards the conclusion of the period. 



By far the largest amount of the evidence, the records of 

 the corporation being fortunately preserved, comes from King's 

 College, Cambridge. Oxford bought salt fish, but the accounts 

 of the colleges were in the first place exhibited in a very 

 clumsy, condensed and uninstructive form, and next, many of 

 them have disappeared. 



Haberdens appear to be ordinary salt cod. They are 

 bought by the hundred of 120, the long hundred, and pro- 

 bably, as a rule, at Stourbridge fair, for I frequently find 

 notes of the purchase of fish at this renowned mart. They 

 are also found by the warp or couple, and occasionally by 

 the burden, forms which were exceedingly common in earlier 

 years. As they and some other kinds are purchased by tale, 

 they may have greatly varied in size. At the same time, 

 certain entries of salt cod, under this name, are dearer than 

 haberdens in the same year. 



The price of haberdens is generally stationary on the 

 decennial averages of the first forty years ; the fluctuations, 

 during the period represented, when the prices are taken in 

 this manner, being only a few pence. Then the price steadily 

 rises for the next forty years. For the next twenty it is un- 

 changed. During the last twenty it rises again, the highest 

 average being recorded in the last decade. 



In the first forty years the hundred of haberdens ranges 

 from 50^. to 73^. 4^., the lowest and highest prices registered, 

 i.e. from $d. to *]\d. the fish. None of the salt fish purchased 

 by tale are so cheap as these prices, and most of the entries 

 which I have discovered under the name of salt fish are in 

 the first forty years. But it is quite reasonable to believe 

 that purchases in bulk were much cheaper than small ones 

 effected as occasion arose. In the later years the price is 



