140 CHRONOLOGICAL HISTORY OF THE HERRING-FISHERY. 



Large shoals are mentioned as having appeared off 

 Whitby in 1394. 



The Scotch seem at an early period to have asserted 

 their claim to the exclusive right of fishing on their own 

 coasts ; for on the 14th June 1410, on the petition of the 

 inhabitants of Brauershavn in Zealand, William, Earl of 

 Holland, granted power of reprisals against the Scotch, 

 for their having taken several Dutch vessels employed at 

 the herring-fishery, and after a long continuation of 

 hostilities at sea, a treaty of peace was entered into 

 on 1st August 1416, in which no mention is made of the 

 fishery, and consequently of no compromise having been 

 made.* 



In the ancient history of Norwich, there is an amusing- 

 account of the celebration of the Christmas festival held 

 there on Fastings Tuesday, wherein part of the herring- 

 is made to aid in the decoration of one of the performers 

 on that occasion in 1444. John Gladman was tricked 

 out with tinsel and ribbons, and was crowned king of 

 Christmas, and before him went a personification of the 

 month of December, dressed as the season required, with 

 an efiigy of Lent, " clad in red and white herring skins," 

 following him on horseback, the horses' harness at same 

 time having been ornamented with shells, the symbol of 

 those holy men called palmers. f 



In 1415, Henry V., on complaint of Eric, King of 

 Norway, addressed a proclamation to the towns of 

 " Yernemouth, Linn, Kingston-upon-Hull, Gippewick, 

 Scardebourg, D'Orwel, Newcastle, Grimsby, Berwick, 

 Cranmer, and Dersingham," prohibiting the inhabitants 

 of those towns from fishing on the coasts of Norway, so 



* Groot Charter Bock, van Holland, vol. 4, pp. 146, 378. 

 t Hogg's Instructor, 9th February 1850. 



