2g6 The Herring 



mighty influence in the moulding of Europe. For 

 upon that apparently insignificant basis arose the 

 Dutch Republic, which successfully resisted the 

 infernal domination of Spain, and dealt one of the 

 deadliest blows at the truly Satanic Inquisition that it 

 ever received, making it, in fact, possible for Britain 

 to finish the good work so well begun. Alas ! that 

 before doing so we should have been compelled to 

 destroy the splendid fisheries and oversea trade built 

 up by the strenuous Dutchmen. 



First the Herring, then the whale. These two 

 sea-folk brought great prosperity to Holland, but 

 note well, not a prosperity based upon luck, or accident, 

 or coincidence, but sheer hard work, dogged perse- 

 verance, and undaunted courage. Faithful to their 

 first great success, the Dutchmen always spoke of the 

 Herring as the ' great fishery,' of the whale as the 

 * small,' having reference, of course, to the relative 

 importance of the two industries and not at all to the 

 size of the creatures taken. 



Truly the Herring fishery was a great undertaking 

 — in 1606, when it was at the height of its prosperity, 

 it gave employment to two hundred thousand men. 

 Three thousand smacks were employed and treble 

 that number of schuyts and galliots were engaged 

 in the transportation of the spoil of the sea. Then 

 came the unhappy quarrel with England arising out of 

 the partisanship of the States General for the Royalist 

 party. Cromwell and his great admiral, Blake, dealt 

 such disastrous blows at the sea business of the Nether- 

 lands as practically crippled them. Then, when 

 they were struggling doughtily to recover from their 

 great misfortunes, they found the hardy Northmen 

 already in possession of the bulk of the trade, and to 

 crown all their misfortunes, they fell at last between 



