SOCIAL LIFE ON THE COAST 203 



green, red as though the better to attest the incontestable 

 proprietorship of the occupant. 



To the flotilla of boats fishing in common corresponds 

 the Breton or Cornish fishing village. Men are plentiful, 

 the fishing-ground is limited. 1 They must therefore 

 gather together to defend themselves against foreigners. 

 Foreigners are men of the nearest village, and villages 

 swarm along the Breton coast. We know what a fishing 

 village is in Brittany. At Douarnenez the houses are 

 huddled against one another : the alleys are winding and 

 narrow. The fishing quarter of Boulogne has the same 

 appearance. If Fecamp is different it is because the 

 majority of the Newfoundland fishers live in the suburbs : 

 Senneville, Criquebceuf, &c. Crowded populations de- 

 pend always on the size, fertility, and distance of the 

 fishing-grounds. Grimsby and Aberdeen are cities of 

 artisans. Saint-Pierre, the port of the island of that name, 

 is the central station of the French cod-fishery. Thus 

 the more extensive the cecumene, the greater the con- 

 centration of the fishermen. The men of the coast lag 

 behind those of the interior, but they follow the same 

 path : from the garret or shed to the workshop, and from 

 the workshop to the factory. 



Groups of economic and professional origin fashion 

 the spirit of the race. The Norwegians, who are indi- 

 vidualists, furnish the school of Le Play with its strongest 

 arguments as to the social importance of the family. 

 The Bretons, who are particularists, are brought up in a 

 parochial atmosphere like the Norwegians, they handle 

 both the oar and the sickle ; there is nearly always a 

 little field of oats or barley near the fisherman's cottage. 



1 In St. Ives Bay the lights of eighty to a hundred and twenty 

 " drifters " may be seen on a calm night, all within the shelter of 

 Godrevy reef. [TRANS.] 



