152 STUDIES IN INSECT LIFE, ETC. 



quantity landed on the East Coast of England 

 from the North Sea (s. str.) by steam trawlers 

 last year was 500,000 cwts. less than in 1904, 

 in which year it was also 500,000 cwts. less than 

 in 1903. The decrease is shown to be almost 

 entirely in cod, haddock, and plaice, and works 

 out at something like 300,000*3 worth per 

 annum. We may be as surely exhausting our 

 fish supply as the farmers of the middle west 

 are said to have exhausted the virgin fertility 

 of the plains, and the world could not be fed 

 if on land men sought their food with as little 

 forethought and system as the fishermen cast 

 their nets into the sea. 



Grave as the North Sea problem undoubtedly 

 is, it is equally certain that the condition of the 

 fishing industry generally was never more pros- 

 perous than at the present time. Thus, although 

 the total fish landed in Scotland in 1905 showed 

 a decrease of 91,519 cwt., the value showed an 

 increase of 418,046, the average price per cwt. 

 being 6s. gd., 4 as compared with 5s. 7jd. in 1904. 



Interference of some kind, whether by legis- 

 lation, transplantation, or artificial culture, or 

 by some combination of all these means, seems 

 ultimately to be inevitable. But if we are to 



