SOME REMARKS ON 



of the Scotch, and of the Cornish and the Welsh who, 

 by the way, are westerns a more foolishly improvident 

 class than the fishermen scarcely exists, no matter which 

 point of the compass they come from ; if a trawler earns 

 ten pounds in one week, the chances are that he will not 

 have a halfpenny by the end of the next. I am well 

 aware that there are exceptions, and that in every fishing 

 town there are generally one or two wealthy men who 

 have made every penny of their money in the boats. 



What is much nearer being the reason is that the per- 

 centage of Danish, Saxon, and Jutish blood is far greater 

 in the east, and that for one western Rolf Ganger or 

 Ragna Rough-breeks, the east coast can produce twenty 

 Hengists, and Gorm Ethelstans and Herewards ; and that 

 therefore the inclination to a sea life is far stronger in 

 the Yorkshire man or the Norfolk man than it is in the 

 average Kelt. To this must be added the fact that the 

 power of steady work is sadly wanting in some of the 

 fishing people of the west ; at any rate among the Irish, 

 Welsh, and Manx. 



Five-and-twenty years ago the fisheries of Ireland were 

 apparently in an almost hopeless condition, but to-day 

 things are certainly on the mend. Much has been done. 

 Government has built piers and harbours, has made 

 grants or loans to the fishers, and, even as far back 

 as 1875, had begun to spend large sums in encouraging 

 the industry generally. If you ask an Irish fisherman 

 why trade is so bad he will tell you that the mackerel 

 have all gone away, and that the Scotch and Devon- 

 shire trawlers have broken up the herring shoals; but 



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