52 



resolution was still adopted to discontinue all further attempts to check 

 the resident fishermen. The task had become, indeed, hopeless. The 

 tonnage of the merchants' ships had fallen to less than eighteen thou- 

 sand, and their catch to one hundred and thirty-six thousand quintals. 

 The produce of the boat fishery, on the other hand, had risen to three 

 hundred and ten thousand quintals. The boat-fishers, or inhabitants, 

 had, therefore, overcome every obstacle, and were in the ascendency. 



I reserve a full answer to the many complaints against our country- 

 men who fish in the seas of British America, for another part of this 

 report ; that, however, which is made by the people of Newfoundland, 

 may be disposed of here. 



The charge is, that the British flag is no longer seen upon "the 

 banks," and that the privileges enjoyed by the French and Americans, 

 by treaty and otherwise, have caused the withdrawal of the English and 

 colonial merchants from that branch of the fishery. This chaige is to 

 be found, in substance, in an oflensive form, in newspapers, in official 

 documents, and remonstrances to the home government. I submit, in 

 all kindness, that it is not so. The truth is, that the resident fishermen — 

 as t^ir Josiah Child, a hundred and eighty years ago, anticipated they 

 would do — have supplanted the merchants of England, with whom they 

 so long contended ; that the boat fishery has taken the place of the vessel 

 fishery, in the common course of things. To catch fish by long, expen- 

 sive, and perilous voyages, when they can be taken at the fishermen's 

 own doors, where catchers and curers can sleep in their own beds, taste 

 the sweets of a shore life, and enjoy the comforts of home, is to dispense 

 with the steam-spinxlle and go back to the distaff. There is no truth 

 in the complaint. The annual catch at Newfoundland, in whole num- 

 bers, is one million of quintals, and, on a mean of years, equal to that of 

 any former period. This fact is conclusive. That the x\mericans dis- 

 turb the industry of the colonists, is not possible. The restoration of 

 the by-gone vessel fishery can be accomphshed, not by driving these 

 "foreigners" from "the banks," but by a new edict to hum and destroy the 

 dwellings of British subjects.* 



* Lord DundonalcT expressed liis Tiews with regard to the British fishery at Newfoundland 

 in a conuiiunication published in the London Times, August, 1852, in the followiug terms. It 

 will be seen that he attributes the suspension of the vessel fishery to the bounty system of 

 France and the United States ; and that he considers the employment of a naval force to pre- 

 vent " aggressions," a mistaken policy. 



To the Editor of the Times. 



Siii : The leading article of the Times of the 3d inst., on the subject of the British North 

 American fisheries, involves a maritime question of such vital importance to the permanence 

 of our naval power, that I hope you will devote the corner of a column of your paper (perused 

 and pondered over by civilians and statesmen) to convey, in as few words as posaible, the real 

 cause of the progressive decay, and now total abandonment, of that once important uurseiy 

 for seamen, with which the duties of my late naval command required that I should make 

 myself intimately acquainted. 



TIk- result of authentic infi)rmation derived from official documents, most of which were 

 obligingly furnished by the zealous and iudefatigable governor then presiding in Ne\rfoimdland, 

 (Sir G. LeMerchant,) proved that the British " bank" or deep-sea fishery formerly employed 

 400 sail of square-rigged vessels and 12,000 seamen, and that now not one of tliese fi)llow 

 their vocation in consequence of the niinous efiect of bounties awarded by the French and 

 North American governments. The former pay their fishery lOf. for every quintal of fish 

 debarked in the port of France, and 5f additional on their exportation in French vessels to 

 toreign States, once exclusivoly supplied by I'lngland — a transfer which cannot be viewed 

 eimply as a mercantile transaction, seeing that the substitution of a greater number of foreign 



