CELTIC AVERSION TO FISH. 169 



ish people is this employment unfailing, and sufficient 

 to supply all they need, is at their doors, but they will not 

 resort to it. The Celtic race seem affected with some- 

 what of the horror of the sea which characterises the mo- 

 dern Hindoo, and with that aversion to fish and fishing 

 exhibited during the uncivilised period of ancient Greece. 



A writer in the ' Quarterly Keview/ in a notice of Mr 

 Yarrell's * British Fishes/ says of the starving Irish, 

 " These people have their salvation before their eyes, 

 but they will not turn to it with a good heart." " It 

 is the same," continues this writer, " or even worse, 

 with the Hebrides at this moment. We happen to 

 number among the most esteemed of our personal friends 

 one of the principal proprietors of that interesting archi- 

 pelago ; and we are assured that though, during thirty 

 years past, that family has made every effort to encou- 

 rage sea-fishing among their dependants, it has never 

 been in their power to procure, except during the 

 smoothest weather of summer and autumn, a decent 

 supply of sea-fish even for their own table." 



This is corroborated by the recent statements of Mr 

 Andrews, President of the Natural History Society of 

 Dublin, who, when speaking of the depression of the 

 Irish fisheries, says that the salt fish imported into Ire- 

 land annually amounts to 1200 tons, valued at 27,000; 

 and that the annual import of herrings is about 80,000 

 barrels, valued at 128,000 ; and this, too, at a time 

 when the Irish fisheries, if properly worked, are far 

 more than equal to any demand which can be made 

 upon them. Irishmen living on imported fish ! this is 

 really too absurd. The provoking part of this Irish 

 folly is yet to be told. Enterprising foreign craft come 

 to the coast of Ireland and carry off the treasures of the 

 deep before the very eyes of the often-starving natives 

 of the country. Hearing such things makes one ask, 

 Of what use, then, is the sea ? 



Such statements may surprise some of our readers, 

 especially those living in large towns, fish-fed by the 



