170 BRITISH INDUSTRIES. 



the terrible north-east gales. In the last winter of 

 1876-77, when wrecks strewed our coasts, and the North 

 Sea week after week added to the list of disabled and 

 missing ships, Wick harbour has been exposed to a 

 succession of bad weather, the effects of which are re- 

 ported as having been more disastrous and destructive 

 to the piers than on any previous occasion. It will be 

 an engineering triumph when the harbour is properly 

 completed ; but it would seem almost impossible to 

 construct any piers there that can withstand the forces 

 to which sooner or later they must inevitably be ex- 

 posed. Great as is the importance of a harbour of 

 refuge at Wick for the hundreds of fishing boats which 

 at the different seasons make that place their rendez- 

 vous, it would be of no little value also to larger 

 shipping which risk the passage through the dangerous 

 Pentland Firth, and which now have no place of refuge 

 in the neighbourhood, when caught in bad weather on 

 that coast. 



Besides the regular herring fishery from July to 

 September, Wick has also a small winter fishery for 

 herrings, frequently interrupted, however, by bad 

 weather; and cod, ling, and other line-fish are also 

 worked for at the proper season. 



I may now say a few words about the Orkneys 

 and Shetlands, islands whose fisheries are especially 

 subject to the difficulties arising from the combination 

 of bad weather, deep water close inshore, and very 

 rapid tides ; and yet whose fishermen, particularly the 

 Shetlanders, are as daring and enterprising as any in the 



