34 BRITISH FISH AND FISHERIES. 



a check to reliance upon personal exertions 

 independent of extraneous aid ; nor could it be 

 otherwise than impolitic, since it imposed a tax 

 upon the nation^ in order that other countries 

 might be supplied with articles of consumption 

 at prices below their actual cost. 



In due time, however, this impolicy began to 

 be acknowledged. In 1821, the tonnage duty 

 of 60s. was repealed, but a bounty of 4s. per 

 barrel was continued up to the year 1826, 

 After this, it was reduced by Is. each year, 

 thereby ceasing in the year 1830. Nor was 

 the reduction and ultimate abolition of this 

 bounty productive of any injury to the herring 

 fishery ; on the contrary, according to Mr. 

 Ternan, the houses of the fishermen of Skerries 

 (a village on the coast of Lancashire) are neater 

 and contain more comforts than formerly, and 

 the men are better clothed, better fed, and more 

 sober and industrious. The same observations 

 apply to Scotland, where the fishermen have 

 better and larger boats, and fishing utensils of 

 higher value, than those they possessed while 

 the system of bounty was in operation. 



" The greater part by far of the British her- 

 ring fishery has been long carried on from 

 different places, principally on the east coast of 

 Scotland, of which Wick, in Caithness, is the 



