10 IMPOBTANCE OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF 



consume large quantities in Lent as well as other periods 

 of the year, but the demand on the Continent has not 

 necessarily ceased or diminished on account of the Refor- 

 mation. So far from this being the case, the Protestants 

 as well as the Eoman Catholics are great consumers of 

 our Scottish herrings ; and there can be no doubt that the 

 consumption of these herrings on the Continent has been 

 annually increasing since 1815, in which year the number 

 of barrels exported to the Continent was only 35,891, 

 while 344,029 barrels was the quantity of Scottish her- 

 rings exported to the Continent in 1855, and which, there 

 is no doubt, is a much larger quantity of herrings than 

 was imported by the Dutch into the Continent in any 

 one year either in the 13th, 14th, or 19th century. 



The next quotation is rather a long one, but it is so 

 utterly at variance with what is generally known to be 

 the case, that it is extraordinary that it has not been 

 sooner contradicted. The paragraph begins : " Impor- 

 tance of the Herring Fishery. Progress in Great Britain. — 

 There is perhaps no branch of industry the importance of 

 which has been so much overrated as that of tlie herring- 

 fishery. For more than two centuries, company after 

 company has been formed for its prosecution ; fishing- 

 villages have been built, piers constructed, boards and 

 regulations established, and vast sums expended in boun- 

 ties, yet the fishery remains in a very feeble and unhealthy 

 state." After making these statements, we should have 

 expected to have been informed by the author in what 

 way " the importance of the herring fishery was over- 

 rated." The mere assertion that fishing villages have 

 been built and piers constructed do not prove that the 

 importance of the herring fishery was overrated. If the 

 villages were built, they found inhabitants ; if piers con- 



