THE RISE OF THE HERRING FISHERIES 117 



Statistical evidence of the extent of this fishery will be found 

 in Appendices (VI and VII) to the Second Report on the State of 

 the British Herring Fisheries of 1798. 



In the Firth of Forth the old method of fishing was by means of 

 nets set between two anchors at night, and fished the following 

 morning. This fishery seldom lasted above a week. 



Subsequently the fishermen sought for the herring in deeper 

 water, further from the coast, by means of drift nets. A boat 

 engaged in this fishery had nine nets each, 45 yd. long and 10 yd. 

 deep. In 1784 the herring caught at Eymouth, Dunbar, and on 

 the Fife coast amounted to about 10,000 barrels.^ 



The working of the various Acts designed to improve the herring 

 fisheries was closely watched by Parliament, and Committees were 

 appointed from time to time to report on the state of the sea fisheries, 

 and the best means for securing their development.* 



Apart from two reports of Committees on the state of the pilchard 

 fisheries (1785 and 1786), and which are only of local interest ; 

 the first reports which throw light on the bounty system, the salt 

 duties and other matters affecting the sea fisheries, were those of 

 the Committees of 17858 and 1786. When the first of these Com- 

 mittees was appointed the Act of 1750 had been in force for thirty- 

 five years, and it was reasonable to expect definite information as 

 to the success of the bounty system or the contrary. As a matter 

 of fact, it is found that the evidence available was of a conflicting 

 nature, and in this respect the eighteenth century resembles the 

 twentieth. 



The earlier statistics of the busses fitted out under the bounty 

 system are not available. The Society of the Free British Fishery, 

 which was estabhshed under the Act of 1750, is supposed to have 

 fitted out from thirty to forty busses, but the custom-house books 

 for 1753 prove that the whole herring fleet consisted of eight vessels 

 only. In spite of the increase of the bounty from 30s. to 50s. per 

 ton in 1757 the Society gradually died out, and it was left to the 

 enterprise of the towns on the Clyde to carry on the herring buss 

 fishery. From 1760 to 1766 inclusive, the number of busses was 

 respectively 13, 17, 49, 87, 119, 157 and 261. In the last year 

 the revenue was found insufiicient to pay all the demands on it, and 



^ For further details of this fishery, see, in addition to the Report mentioned 

 above, Robert Fall, " To the Honourable the Committee of the House of Commons 

 appointed to enquire into the state of the British Fisheries, the following observa- 

 tions on their Report are most respectfully subscribed by their most obedient 

 humble servant," p. 103. Dunbar (n.d., but circa 1786). 



* For further details see, " Tenth Volume of Reports of the House of Commons," 

 1785-1801, large folio, pp. 1-390. 



' The Committee of 1785 issued three reports, the first two being very brief and 

 the third voluminous. 



