THE SECOND DUTCH WAR 443 



jointly raise a stock to buy hemp and other materials to equip 

 busses, which were to be built at the seaports nearest to them 

 and sent to the fishing at Shetland; and he calculated, after 

 the usual fashion, that each buss would maintain twenty 

 families in work, " breed country youths to be mariners," and 

 cause many ships to be employed in exporting the herrings 

 and bringing back commodities. 



Charles was apparently impressed by Smith's arguments. 

 Within two months of the Restoration he caused a letter to be 

 written to the Lord Mayor of London, referring to the good 

 done by the Society formed in 1632, "as by the book called the 

 Royal Herring Busse Fishing (sic) presented to him, plainly 

 appeared " ; requesting particulars to be obtained of all the poor 

 inhabitants within each ward who were in want of employ- 

 ment; requesting that the Lord Mayor and Aldermen should 

 raise a stock by a free subscription to fit out a buss or fishing 

 vessel for each ward ; and that storehouses should be built in 

 suitable places about the river Thames, provided with nets, 

 casks, salt, and all things in readiness. The busses were to 

 attend the fishing at Shetland, according to the "prescribed 

 orders in the aforesaid book," and the king declared he would 

 recommend the same course to all the cities and towns through- 

 out the kingdom, so as to make it a national employment. 1 



The assistance of Parliament was also called in. On 8th Nov- 

 ember 1660 the House of Commons remitted "the consideration 

 of the fisheries " to the Committee for Trade and Navigation, 

 who were asked to inform the House "what they thought 

 necessary for the regulation and advancement of that trade." 2 

 The Committee's report does not appear to have been preserved, 

 but on 8th December a " Bill for Encouraging the Fisheries of 

 this Kingdom" was introduced. It was remitted to a large 

 committee, including the members for the seaport towns, and 



1 Sir Edward Nicholas to the Lord Mayor, 23rd July 1660. Remcmbrancia, 

 p. 143. There is an undated copy among the State Papers (Domestic) erroneously 

 calendared under September 1662 (vol. lix. 6 : compare vol. xli. 19, under date 

 September 1661). The original is in the Guildhall. Simon Smith was employed 

 in the preliminary work connected with the Society, and in 1662 rendered an 

 account of his disbursements, amounting to 456, including 150 "for setting the 

 poor to work so as to breed up teachers for making nets, &c." State Papers, Dom., 

 liv. 77. 



8 Commons' Journals, via. 179. State Papers, Dom., Charles II., xxi. 27. 



