FISHERIES AND THEIR PRODUCE. 33 



" Most of the boats employed in the fishery 

 never touch the water but during six weeks, 

 from the middle or end of July to the middle 

 of September. They are owned and sailed, 

 not by regular fishermen following that voca- 

 tion only, but by tradesmen, small farmers, 

 farm- servants, and other landsmen, who may 

 have sufficient skill to manage a boat at that 

 season, "but who do not follow the sea, except 

 for the six weeks of the herring fishery, when 

 they go upon a kind of gambling speculation of 

 earning a twelvemonths 7 income by six weeks 1 

 work."* It has been often said, in vindication 

 of the bounty system, that by extending the 

 fishery it is an important nursery for seamen, 

 but the preceding statement shows that such 

 has not been the effect. On the contrary, it 

 has tended to depress the condition of the 

 genuine fisherman by bringing a host of inter- 

 lopers into the field of speculation ; and it has 

 been also prejudicial to the little farmers and 

 tradesmen, by withdrawing their attention from 

 their peculiar business that they may embark 

 in what has been hitherto little less than a sort 

 of lottery adventure. The system, was in fact 

 demoralizing ; it was a bounty on idleness and 

 perjury ; it acted as a clog upon industry, and 



* Quarterly Journal, No. xi. p. 653. 

 B 



