10 



NATURE 



[February 2$, 19 15 



other vessels were laid up. Restrictions, by the Ad- 

 miralty, on the movements of trawlers, also affected 

 the industry, though as time went on it became 

 ■evident that some of these restrictions were unneces- 

 sary. The positions of the mine fields became known, 

 since it was seen that these had been placed (with 

 characteristic ingenuity) near places from which mer- 

 chant vessels making for English and Scottish ports 

 took final bearings. The mine danger did not, it 

 appears, frighten the skippers of trawlers very greatly, 

 and the Admiralty even threatened "disciplinary 

 measures " on skippers neglecting their instructions 

 and taking their ships into danger. In fact, the 

 danger of mines was less than had been anticipated. 

 At the end of September eight British steajn fishing 

 vessels had been destroyed by mines and twenty-four 

 "had been sunk or captured by the Germans. At the 

 end of the year seven mine-sweepers had been lost 

 with fifty-nine casualties, forty men being reported as 

 killed or missing. 



Fish became scarcer and dearer, though less so than 

 had been anticipated. The chart below shows the mean 

 wholesale prices ^ of two species of fish (haddock and 

 hake) at Billingsgate Market during each week of the 

 last five months of 1913 and 1914 : — 



Scale }or haJJock: sh'illlnQS jbe*- fj-unt\- 



10 Ih IQ 82 ^b 50 54^ .56 



X/7 25 

 fiug. I 



2 3 4-5- 6 18 



^ca/e Jor hake : shillings per s^re 



The continuous thin line refers to haddock, and to the year 191 3. The con- 

 tinuous thick line refers to the same lish sold in 1914. The broken line 

 refers to hake of 1913 ; the dotted line to hake of 1914. 



Haddocks are essentially North Sea fislies, the per- 

 centage taken from that area being about 61 per 

 cent. Hake are southern fishes, and are talcen mostly 

 to the south-west of Ireland and towards the Bay of 

 Biscay. There are always violent fluctuations in 

 prices of fish due to the effect of gales on the supply, 

 but apart from these the price rises towards the end 

 of the year. The rise of price over that of 1913 is 



1 The figures are summarised from ihe weekly list-; puhlished by the /•'I's/i 

 Trades Gazette. 



fairly considerable in the case of the North Sea fish, 

 and much less so in the case of the southern species. 

 But it is far less than anyone might have anticipated 

 at the beginning of August. There was, in fact, a 

 general tendency to keep prices as nearly normal as 

 possible, and it was also seen that the public were 

 certainly not prepared to pay highly exaggerated 

 prices for fish. 



The shortage of skippers and mates of fishing 

 vessels is far from creditable to the country. It was 

 pointed out in Nature some time ago that there was 

 great need for the education and technical training 

 of deep-sea fishermen, and that facilities did not 

 exist. The trawler section cf the Royal Naval Reserve 

 was established in igii, and it was evident two or 

 three years ago that both the Board of Trade and the 

 Board of Education were alive to the necessity for 

 the better technical instruction of deep-sea fishermen. 

 The local machinery was, however, wanting, and the 

 efforts that have been made since 19 11 to provide this 

 have been most unsatisfactory. Now the pinch has 

 come. It is no secret that a much larger number of 

 trawlers would be employed in defence operations if 

 officers were obtainable. 



The scientific investigation of the sea-fisheries has 

 not been abandoned, but its most important side, the 

 work at sea, has practically been discontinued. This 

 has been unavoidable, and if the organisations in 

 existence before the war can only be kept going a 

 great recrudescence of activity may be expected when 

 peace comes. It must be admitted that the probable 

 defection of Germany from the international inves- 

 tigations will be a great loss. That country has made 

 few original and fertile discoveries in fishery science ^ 

 — it is to Norway that we are principally indebted. But 

 Germany has characteristically carried on routine re- 

 search in a very thorough manner, and we may miss 

 this in the near future. May we hope that a result of 

 the war will be the determination of Britain to make 

 this research with the honesty and efficiency represented 

 by the German publications We are only now realising 

 how very painstaking was the German scientific and 

 industrial campaign in the interest of her developing 

 sea fisheries. It was stated a few weeks ago in 

 Nature that meteorological science had been pressed 

 into the service of warfare by Germany. That has, 

 probably, also been the case with some of the purely 

 scientific results obtained during the mvestigation of 

 the deep-sea fisheries ; and it is a manifestation of 

 kultur that we might very well imitate in the future, 

 in peaceful interests. J- J- 



METEOROLOGICAL CHARTS FOR THE 



MEDITERRANEAN. 



PROF. L. MARINI has contributed to the Annali 

 Idrografici of the Hydrographic Institute at 

 Genoa a brief descriptive account of the distribution 

 of pressure and wind in the Mediterranean region, 

 together with tables of averages and charts based 

 upon them. The publication is intended primarily for 

 the use of the seafaring man. 



The tables of pressure contain normal values for the 

 four seasons and the year for 174 places. The values 

 are given in millimetres, but it is not stated in the 

 tables or on the charts if the gravity correction has 

 been applied nor to what period the values refer. The 

 values are given to two places of decimals w-hich 

 implies a far greater degree of accuracy *;han would 

 be possible with the instruments used at most of the 

 places; to say nothing of the differences arising from 

 the exposure of the instruments, the reduction to sea- 



2 Perhaps Hensen's quantitative Plankton methods .nre ihe exceptioa to 

 this siatemcnt. 



NO. 2365, VOL. 94] 



