CHAP. II.] 



THE DUTCH FISHERIES. 



41 



been stated, because of the scarcity of rapid land carriage and 

 a comparatively scanty local population. 



The particular fishing industry which has bulked largest 

 in literature, and which was pursued after a systematic fashion, 

 is, or rather was, that of the Dutch, for Holland does not at 

 present make her mark so largely on the waters as she was 



PACKING HERRINGS. 



wont to do, being at present far surpassed in fishing enterprise 

 by Scotland and other countries. The particular fish coveted 

 by the Dutch people was the herring, and I have recently had 

 the pleasure of examining a set of engravings procured in 

 Amsterdam, that convey a graphic idea of the great import- 

 ance that was attached by the Dutch themselves to their 

 herring-fishery. This series of sixteen peculiarly Dutch plates 

 begins at the beginning of the fishery, as is indeed proper it 

 should, by showing us a party busy at a sea-side cottage knit- 



