EVOLUTION OF THE FRENCH FISHERIES 303 



year, as certain boat-owners of Dunkirk asked for a new 

 type of boat, characterised by a light draught, with 

 sufficient leeboard surface to enable it to keep close to 

 the wind, the Ecolin shipyards adopted the lines of the 

 " sharpie," with a projecting drop-keel of a new patented 

 type. On the other hand, M. Marcel Grenie enounces 

 certain general principles relating to the construction of 

 new motor-boats which he has put into practice in the 

 motor " dandies " or ketches of Pornic and Cap-Breton : 

 " The boat and I am speaking more especially of the 

 sardine boat must be decked ... it must have a fore- 

 castle, enabling the crew to sleep on board when away 

 from port ... a well for the nets is a necessity, or the 

 gear will rapidly deteriorate . . . finally, a hold for the 

 fish, with an ice-box or refrigerating machinery." 



IV 



The programme already formulated must be carried 

 out on the lines suggested above. Now, the question 

 arises : How many fishing boats are there in France 

 which could be adapted as motor-boats ? M. Sumet, 

 general secretary to the last Congress of Automobile 

 Navigation, says 6,300. The installation of motor-power 

 at the rate of 7 to 8 h.p. per boat, and 22 per h.p., 1 would 

 cost -1,000,000. But this estimate, I fear, is somewhat 

 too large ; I think 1,100 would be a more reasonable 

 number, being as it is the actual number of automobile 

 fishing boats in Denmark, Norway, and Germany. The 

 expense of adaptation would then be reduced to ;i 60,000. 

 The numbers matter little, however ; what is important 



only for light draught, and will probably not survive the selection of 

 time, as the pure hydroplane with detached metal planes will even- 

 tually beat it even for racing. [TRANS.] 



1 These rates would be lower in England. [TRANS.] 



