FISH 207 



it owes its being. The framework of society is fishy and 

 inelastic, and the difficulty, which Newfoundlanders experience 

 in abandoning the sea, is due to their archaic social institutions 

 as well as to their inherited and natural proclivities. Their 

 political unchangeableness reflects the stereotyped monotony 

 of their social and industrial life. The backwardness of New- 

 foundlanders in turning to the land is also accounted for 

 by new fishing developments, which have from time to time 

 attracted, diverted, and absorbed the spare energies of men, 

 whom three or four centuries of continuous practice have made 

 the most expert fishermen in the world. 



In fashioning the political, economic, or social history oijust as cod, 

 Newfoundland the cod has been almost omnipotent, and has '^'^^'fi^^^^^S 

 set its image and superscription upon every institution. The trading, 



whole country seems cod-created, and the cod-banks have ^^^'^^ ^^^ 



^ ' the reasons 



proved more inexhaustible than any fields of gold and moun- of its being, 

 tains of silver. One nation- State, three savage nations, half ^J^^^^^ 

 a dozen genera of mammals and of birds, and a dozen 

 dynasties have become extinct while the much-persecuted 

 cod-fish of Newfoundland has shown no appreciable change in 

 its numbers, habits, and favourite places. Indeed, there is 

 something romantic in the immutability of the cod. Even 

 after death it goes in almost the same quantities, almost to 

 the same countries, as of yore. It is sublimely indifferent to 

 man, and its indifference is due to the fact that one cod's roe 

 contains nine million eggs, so that four or five cod's roes 

 could easily supply all the cod ever exported in one year from 

 Newfoundland. During the past century, when the utmost 

 skill and energy have been applied to its capture, it has in- 

 creased instead of diminishing ; but in reading the following 

 tables it must be observed that Labrador is not included 

 before 1886, and that Bank fish were not caught between 1821 

 and 1877, so that the figures indicate permanence rather than 

 progress. Nor do the figures mean that each year is exactly 

 like the last. Quantities have varied from time to time, but 



