INDUSTRIES 



another net called the ' tuck-net ' is passed under 

 the fish inside the seine itself, and the fish are 

 ' lifted bodily to the surface and so taken into the 

 boats. 



At all the chief places of the pilchard seine 

 fishery the local fishing ground is divided by 

 shore marks into regular areas or ' stems,' and the 

 boats take up their stations on these ' stems ' in 

 regular rotation. When a school of fish comes 

 into the ' stem ' the boat whose turn it then 

 happens to be has the first right to shoot her net. 

 This custom, intended to prevent quarrelling 

 amongst the seiners, was of great service in the 

 days when there were large numbers of pilchard 

 seines in use, and is enforced at St. Ives by an 

 Act of Parliament. 1 



The seine fishery for pilchards has declined 

 very largely in the last twenty or thirty years, 

 and there are now fewer boats engaged in the 

 whole county than there formerly were at St. 

 Ives alone. The total now is about forty-four, 

 of which ten are at St. Ives, twelve at Cadgwith 

 and Mullion on either side of the Lizard, the 

 only four in Mount's Bay are at Porthleven, 

 there are nine in the coves near Falmouth, and 

 single ones at Penberth, Porthgwarra, and New- 

 quay, and six at Sennen, whose fishing ground is 

 in Whitsand Bay, near the Land's End. 2 



The fish intended for export were until 

 recently prepared by a method known as ' bulk- 

 ing,' which had been used for more than 300 

 years ; they were placed in the fish cellars in 

 layers with alternate layers of salt, and pressed 

 with heavy weights until the oil and blood were 

 driven out, which result was attained in two or 

 three weeks. The fish were then taken out and 

 washed and packed in hogsheads and again 

 pressed. For some years now it has become the 

 more usual practice to put the fish with salt into 

 large tanks and leave them for some two or three 

 weeks until they are thoroughly pickled, instead 

 of * bulking,' and to press them with screw presses 

 when they are in ths hogsheads. 



The oil, of which the pilchard contains an 

 enormous quantity in proportion to its size, is 

 collected in tanks, and finds a steady sale in 

 English markets. 



The fish, when packed in this manner, are 

 called locally 'fermades' (fumados), a name 

 derived from the fact that at one time they were 

 smoked ; the term still survives, although that 

 method of curing went out of use more than 300 

 years ago. 



R. Carew, 3 after describing the custom of 

 'bulking,' which was the same in his time (1602) 

 as it is now, adds ' those that serve for the hotter 

 Countries of Spaine and Italic they used at first 

 to fume by hanging them up on long sticks one 

 by one in a house built for the nonce, and there 

 drying them with the smoake of a soft and con- 



1 4 & 5 Vic. c. 57. ' Mr. Pezzack's Report. 



* Carew, Surv. ofCornvi. 



tinuall fire, from whence they purchased the name 

 of fumados ; but now, though the terme still 

 remaine, that trade is given over . . . . ' and the 

 fish were packed in hogsheads just as they are 

 to-day. 



The herring is an inhabitant of the cold water, 

 and is not found off the coast of Cornwall in such 

 quantities as in the northern and eastern waters 

 of England. In fact Cornwall lies across the 

 extreme southern limit of the range of this fish 

 so exactly, that whereas there is a regular herring 

 fishery from the ports on the north coast, 

 especially Port Isaac and St. Ives in the late 

 autumn, it is only occasionally that they are 

 taken in any quantity on the south coast. It is 

 curious that the southern limit of the range of 

 the herring is so closely identified with the 

 northern limit of the range of the warm water 

 pilchard. St. Ives is the chief centre of the 

 Cornish herring fishery, and there the average 

 annual export amounts to about 2,000 tons, or 

 perhaps six millions of fish. They are caught 

 exclusively in drift nets, and usually in the 

 larger boats, but in some seasons the fish are 

 so near the shore that open boats and large gigs 

 can be used. The fish are sent to English 

 markets by rail. 



The common shellfish, crab, lobster, and 

 crayfish, are caught all round the coast, and the 

 fishing employs about 370 boats, the majority of 

 which (about 250) are in the ports east of the 

 Lizard on the south coast, the largest number 

 being at Mevagissey. This distribution of the 

 fleet is probably due not to any absence of the 

 fish from the western or northern waters, but to 

 the fact that the sea to the east of the Lizard is 

 more sheltered, and not so continuously troubled 

 by the great seas and strong tides which make 

 fishing in small open boats so precarious off the 

 cliffs and headlands of the south-western and 

 northern shores. Of late years a considerable 

 number of French fishing boats from the neigh- 

 bourhood of Brest have been employed in taking 

 shellfish in the deep waters off" the coast, especially 

 between the Land's End and the isles of Scilly, 

 with success. These are decked boats of about 

 twenty or thirty tons, while the local boats are 

 usually open boats of about twenty-five feet in 

 length. The fish are caught in crabpots, those 

 made of withy being most commonly used. The 

 season is confined to the summer months. 



The grey mullet has a habit of congregating 

 in an enormous school at Whitsand Bay, by the 

 Land's End, and sometimes in the smaller bights 

 of the coast between that and St. Ives, in the 

 winter months. The fish are often seen lying 

 for many days in some inaccessible place under 

 the cliffs, and the men wait until the school 

 moves into shoaler water over a sandy bottom 

 where they can shoot a seine. A catch when it 

 occurs is a great boon to the local fishermen, as 

 the fish are taken in many thousands and sell for 

 as much as lod. or is. each at the boat side, and 



585 



74 



