! [29] THE FISHERIES OF INDIA. 411 



i pay a tax of 10s. a ton yearly on their fishing-boats, while I have al- 

 i ready alluded to the rate at which they borrow money for the purpose of 

 ! procuring- boats and nets. Here these people are well off. At Gujerat, 

 I in Bombay, the fishermen are poor, and the precarious living they make 

 ; often induces them to accept service as sailors, laborers, or anything that 

 insures them a steady competence. Although following out the coudi- 

 1 tion of the fishermen in various districts must have rather a sameness, 

 it will be necessary to do so in order to see clearly whether these people 

 are really in a prosperous or in a poverty-stricken condition ; whether, 

 in short, it is the case that they are in the utmost misery, not due to 

 tlieir own laziness, but as a result of British legislation imposing pro- 

 hibitory duties on salt, which is even now being made heavier and 

 ' heavier, regardless of the injury to these people, and the enormous loss 

 of food to the inhabitants at large. In the Junjura district the fisher- 

 men supply themselves with boats and nets 5 six or ten club together 

 i to obtain a boat and net, dividing the produce ; here they have decreased 

 in numbers. At Broach they are also said to have diminished. The 

 same report comes from Kaira. In Eutnagiri the practice of saltiug 

 fish has decreased during the last fifteen years in consequence of the 

 increase in the price of salt, but the fisherman are said to have increased. 

 If, however, the practice of curing fish has decreased while the number 

 of fishermen has augmented, such must be due to a greater demand for 

 fresh fish, or else the fishermen, from increased numbers, must be worse 

 off than they previously were. However, the official from Canara gave 

 a similar reply. The commissioner observed that at x>resent no larger 

 number of men are engaged on fisheries than are required to provide 

 sufficient for local consumption. The practice of curing fish has largely 

 diminished, owing partly to the falling off in the amount usually cap- 

 tured, and also to the duty on salt in British territory. 



In the Madras Presidency, we are informed that, in the Tinnevelli 

 collectorate, the fishermen, as a rule, are a very miserable lot of people, 

 and exceedingly poor. The way in which they work is by a system of 

 advances made by traders, a few of whom reside in each fishing village, 

 and supijly all the requisites for fishing, as well as the boats, taking one- 

 third of the captures as their share. In the Fellore district, although 

 no one claims exclusive rights to the sea fisheries, the inhabitants 

 •f the different villages are exceedingly tenacious in order ,to prevent 

 fishermen from other localities plying their occupation within what 

 they believe to be their limits. In the South Canara district, where 

 the use of spontaneous salt is, or rather was, not prohibited, the num- 

 ber of sea*tishermen is stated to have increased of late years. This 

 augmentation has been computed as high as 15 per cent. The same 

 symptom of prosperity was reported all down the Malabar coast. At 

 Ponani there is an annual increase in the number of fishermen. At 

 Cananore the owners of boats and nets supply them to these people, 

 as well as advance certain sums of money. The money-lenders sell the 



