I S 6 



THE RELATIONS OF THE STATE WITH 



Survival of 

 old customs. 



Effect of 

 State inter- 

 ference with 

 trade. 



should be " made from the sun rising till the sun going 

 down, and not before nor after, upon forfeiture of the same 

 merchandises ; " and that " no hostelers, nor any of their 

 servants, nor any other whatsoever he be coming to the 

 said fair shall go by land nor by sea to forestal herring 

 privily nor openly." Finally, this law ordained that the 

 maximum price at which herrings should be sold should be 

 4OJ. per last, two lasts of " shotten herring " being sold for 

 the price of one last of full herring, and red herring being 

 sold at half a mark profit per last. 



As an instance of the survival of old customs in the 

 fishing trade, it may be mentioned that the existing 

 method of counting six score of fish to the hundred 

 originated in an enactment of this Act of Edward III. 

 which directed that "the hundred of herring shall be 

 accounted by six score, and the last by the thousand." 



The very next statute in the Statute Book aims at re- 

 ducing the price of salt fish brought in vessels " pertaining 

 to the haven of Blakeneye and coasts thereunto adjoining," 

 and orders that such ships shall " discharge their fish within 

 the haven of Blakeneye only ; " that " no fish be delivered 

 out of the ship before that the owner and the merchant be 

 agreed of the price of the same by clear day ; " and that 

 " by the advice of the merchants and buyers of the owners 

 coming to the fair of Blakeneye, and of the owners of the 

 ships, a price shall be set at the beginning, and assessed 

 upon the dogger fish and loych fish before that any sale be 

 made, which price shall be holden during the fair, and the 

 said fish be sold at such a price openly." 



These enactments were intended to reduce the price of 

 fish. They probably had the opposite effect ; and Parlia- 

 ment itself seems to have had some misgivings about the 

 success of its attempts at regulating the market, and 



