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EVIL EFFECTS OF MEDDLESOME LEGISLATION. 



By the alteration in the Merchant Shipping Act in 1880, 

 by which the apprentice system was virtually abolished, a 

 serious blow was struck at the very root of the trawling 

 industry, and its injurious effects were severely felt by all 

 smack owners and fishermen engaged in the deep sea 

 trawling. It fell here perhaps more heavily than in any 

 other branch of the mercantile marine. Had the Act been 

 prospective instead of retrospective, the effect would have 

 been milder, but by taking away the only means of cor- 

 rection, and substituting a shadow, the master and 

 apprentice soon felt the difference in relationship, 

 and the apprentice became more unruly, and, by a 

 series of acts of insubordination, tired the master out 

 and the apprentice gained his liberty. The effect has 

 been to rob the master of his apprentice's service, entailing 

 a loss on the trade in Hull and Grimsby alone at a 

 modest sum .10,000. It is needless to say that few or 

 no boys are bound now, whereas in Hull and Grimsby, 

 when the Act came into force, there must have been no 

 fewer than 2,000 apprentices. Their place is now supplied 

 by casuals, drawn from every source, and in consequence 

 unfitted for the work they are called upon to do ; the evil 

 results of this will be felt more by-and-by than at the 

 present. Trawling is an art requiring skill and knowledge 

 beyond ordinary seamanship, and which can only be 

 acquired by training and practice. They must come to it 

 young, pass through the different grades from cook to 

 skipper, be taught to make and mend a net, to fix and tow 

 a trawl, to know the proper grounds and times to go there, 

 become acquainted with the habits of the fish they catch ; 

 and to be inured to every danger, knowing no fear, of 

 robust health, and sound intelligence. This training can 



