EVOLUTION OF THE FRENCH FISHERIES 295 



vessel this time, its tonnage being 176. About the same 

 time the first steam line-fishing vessel, the Arc-en-ciel, was 

 launched. Early in 1881 Boulogne made a fourth 

 attempt, and the little trawler Reine Berthe was launched. 

 Then a Marseilles company, the Marie des Deux Mondes, 

 despatched its great steamer, the Stella Marts, a vessel of 

 1,400 tons, equipped with refrigerating chambers on the 

 Carre system, to fish the waters between the Canaries 

 and Senegal. Then Great Britain, followed by Germany, 

 adopted the steam fishing boat. In 1890 Arcachon 

 possessed five steamers : the Heron, Cormoran, Pingouin, 

 Petrel, and Courlis. Boulogne, however, was the first 

 port to produce in the shape of the Ville de Boulogne, a 

 steamer of 195 tons, launched at the end of 1894 a vessel 

 making catches comparable to those of to-day, and the 

 first European steamer equipped for all kinds of fishery : 

 for trawling as well as for the herring and mackerel 

 fishery. The two Dutch fishing-boats which followed 

 the Ville de Boulogne were built on the same model. The 

 necessary impulse had been given ; steam-trawling was 

 at last practicable, but it had yet to win its spurs. 



To win them cost it dear. Nothing was left undone 

 that might hinder the development of trawling on the 

 grand scale. The Congress of Saint-Brieuc demanded 

 the abolition of the otter-trawl. In 1898 the fishermen 

 of almost the entire Atlantic coast addressed a vigorous 

 protest to the Ministry of Marine. In the same year the 

 fishermen of Trouville pillaged the cargo of a steam 

 trawler. M. de Lamarzelle, senator for Morbihan, in 

 his speech of May 20, 1899, expounded from the tribune 

 the grievances of the Breton fishermen ; the latter, the 

 majority of whom owned their boats, could no longer 

 struggle against the large shipowners ; the otter-trawl 

 was flooding the markets with enormous quantities of 



