486 THE HISTORY OF DUTCH SEA FISHERIES. 



contradictory statements in which the Grand Fishery were 

 found out while insisting upon their curing monopoly 

 against the North Sea coast fishermen in 1751* were now 

 repeated by them against those of the Zuider Zee. Letting 

 alone the improbability of herring getting " crushed into 

 a jelly," during a transport home which upon the Zuider Zee 

 must have generally been of but a few hours' duration, how 

 could herring so crushed be cured with a result so satis- 

 factory as by its competition to endanger the Grand 

 Fishery ? As a fact, Zuider Zee cured-herring was certainly 

 of worse quality than Dutch, or, as it was styled at the 

 time, Batavian brand cured on board in the North Sea ; 

 but the former was taken by the markets abroad, where it 

 certainly was more profitable to sell Zuider Zee herring 

 than to sell none at all. 



The Grand Fishery's stand-still at the time is proved, 

 if not by any positive testimonies, by the fact that even 

 the coast fishery had come to a dead stop. If Dutch bum- 

 boats could not fish under the Dutch coast in 1799 because 

 . of the English cruisers, Dutch busses certainly could not 

 venture into their fishing areas off Shetland and Yarmouth. 

 And as regards the former, the forced stoppage of their 

 trade in the season of 1799 is established by several 

 petitions preferred by the municipality of Katwijk, suing 

 for a subsidy to maintain their poor, "because in the 

 present circumstances no fishery whatever can take place 

 in the North Sea." They applied for a weekly bounty of 

 .40 for each bum-boat and fl.8 for each of the smaller 

 or shrimping boats, instead of which the first Chamber 

 decreed to allow the village a subsidy of fl.2OOO down, 

 towards the maintenance of their poor. But the second 

 Chamber declined to ratify the edict ; and the " poor fishers 

 * See part ii. chap. iv. 



