58o THE HISTORY OF DUTCH SEA FISHERIES. 



vessels. The law is as yet of too fresh a date for a fair 

 judgment of its effects to be formed. In the meantime, 

 lack of able crews is still a drawback upon Dutch sea- 

 fisheries ; a circumstance which in itself proves their 

 expansive vitality. 



Desertion till 1881 was not the only offence frequently 

 laid at the doors of Dutch fishing-crews. We have seen 

 in earlier parts of this work that a peculiar standard of 

 notions on private property seems from early times 

 downward to have existed among sea-fishermen at large ; 

 that they appear never to have strictly respected each 

 other's possessions, and have from time immemorial been 

 given to acts of petty piracy, which, when carried on 

 between crews of different nationality, frequently took the 

 aspect of private warfare. This state of things, inherent 

 in the nature of both the men and the trade, has of course 

 become worse in proportion as fishery in the North Sea 

 developed in the several countries surrounding it. The 

 available fishing-grounds have of late become very much 

 crowded by vessels of many descriptions and nationalities, 

 using herring-nets, trawls, and hook-and-line gear, of 

 increasing dimensions, every one of which implements is 

 liable, either by accident or wilful mismanagement, to 

 injure or destroy others. A man may sometimes be in 

 the necessity of cutting his neighbours' fleet, and is often 

 tempted to do it, and to appropriate them afterwards, by 

 having so formidable an instrument of destruction as a 

 trawl in the water at the time. To pilfer nets from the 

 fleet of a vessel lying helpless miles away is often a hard 

 temptation for a conscience no stronger than a fisherman's 

 appears but too frequently to be ; and, though most of the 

 evidence on this head now before me is relative to outrages 

 committed by British fishers upon Dutch, I do not mean 



