CHAPTER XVIII 

 COLLIERS 



FOR many centuries great fleets of sailing ships and 

 steamboats have passed in constant procession up and 

 down and across the North Sea, bearing coal, just as for 

 countless generations craft have plied with fish. Only 

 the imagination can adequately estimate the wealth that 

 is represented in the total by these two great essentials 

 of life. Millions sterling to a bewildering aggregate 

 stand for the value of the coal alone, and vast sums 

 indicate the worth of the food which has been taken 

 from the teeming waters. 



It is significant that two of the hardest and most 

 perilous callings in existence coal-mining and deep-sea 

 fishing are closely associated with the North Sea ; and 

 of all the craft which navigate that stretch of ocean none 

 are harder driven than the colliers and the trawlers. 



In the olden days Newcastle and Sunderland were 

 the two northern ports from which most of the coal was 

 shipped to London, and at times as many as a hundred 

 vessels were lumbering on their way together to the 

 Thames. For example, it is recorded that in September 

 1675 a hundred "loaden colliers" passed through Yar- 

 mouth Roads for London River ; and to-day you may 



not look from any part of the coast between the Thames 



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