FISHING NATIONS AND THE FISHERIES 277 



I 



The Orkneys and the Shetlands live wholly by the 

 product of their fisheries. Lerwick, the principal town 

 of the whole group of islands, contains a winter 

 population of only 4,000 persons. In summer it is a 

 hive of more than 16,000 individuals, who have come 

 thither to catch and prepare the herring. In 1900 the 

 little Scotch port of Buckie possessed three drifters : 

 to-day it has nearly 150. With Fraserburg it has an 

 annual output of 100,000 tons of herring, valued at 

 720,000. The revenues of the port of Aberdeen are 

 sixty times as great as they were fourteen years ago ; 

 the steam trawler has made its home there. In 1887 

 the trawlers landed 400 tons of fish ; in 1907, 88,000 

 tons. The production of Scotland has increased in 

 astonishing proportions. Between 1898 and 1908 it 

 has increased from 39,000 tons of bottom-fish to 

 103,000 tons, or from 440,000 to 1,000,000. Three 

 years ago Scotland earned 2,980,000, as against 

 2,640,000 in the preceding year. Of this sum the 

 herring stood for 1,640,000, as against 1,360,000 in 

 the preceding year. The " Steam Herring Fleet, Ltd.," 

 founded in 1899 w * tn a capital of 90,000 in i shares, 

 has paid its shareholders dividends of 22^ per cent. 



The east coast of .England takes the palm with its 

 1,700 steam drifters and trawlers, which, crowding into 

 the ports like bees into a hive, throw more than 

 500,000 tons of fish annually upon the English markets, 

 their value being roughly 6,400,000. The 100,000 tons 

 of Yarmouth-Lowestoft herring sell for 1,000,000. 

 The 600 trawlers of Grimsby bring up fortunes of over 

 3,000,000 annually from the floor of the sea. It is 

 not uncommon, at the Fish Dock, to see 250 to 400 



