284 THE RELATIONS OF THE STATE WITH 



one, it is not to the present purpose to inquire here ; but in 

 the case of fisheries there can be no doubt that, as com- 

 pared with each other, the newer policy, which forbids 

 bounties, but which is not entirely adverse to loans in 

 exceptional cases, is the more satisfactory of the two. 



Parliament has, since 1833, interested itself greatly in 

 sea fisheries through Royal Commissions. The most 

 recent investigation is that of last autumn (the autumn of 

 1882), the Report of which, I believe, is not yet published. 

 The case of Otto Brand, a Hull skipper, who was hanged 

 for the murder of an apprentice at sea, and other causes, 

 rendered an investigation into the treatment of apprentices, 

 and similar matters, desirable. This Commission contained 

 amongst its lay members as distinguished from those 

 commissioners who are also legislators a marine official 

 of the Board of Trade, and this fact is worthy of notice as 

 showing the preponderance which that department con- 

 tinues to acquire in matters relating to fisheries. The 

 abolition of the arrest without warrant of absconding hands 

 is, according to some evidence, occasioning considerable 

 expense and difficulty to boat-owners on our East Coast. 

 Temperate, hardy, and manly, though it is and these 

 attributes are evidenced by the fact that the Royal 

 National Lifeboat Institution mans its boats from beach- 

 men and fishermen the fishing class is naturally neither 

 possessed of the most rudimentary book-learning, nor of 

 those " powers of description " so necessary in order to 

 give conclusive evidence before Royal Commissions gene- 

 rally. The School Board and the general advance of educa- 

 tion will probably enable fishermen to keep satisfactory 

 log-books, to acquire a knowledge of water-temperatures, 

 of classes of fish, and of some other very rudimentarily 



