28 CHARLES I. 
viously, therefore, the answer simply amounted to the 
statement that the Dutch, determined to make their fisheries 
a success, had provided harbours and all other things 
necessary so that the industry might be carried out on a 
large scale, while the Scotch, although consumed with 
jealousy, were still pursuing the primitive fishing methods 
of their forefathers. 
As at the beginning of the century, the great herring 
fishery was confined to the North Sea, commencing “ at 
the north pairt of Zetland and Orknay, Murray Firth, 
Buquhanes, Aberdeen, Montros, and so alongst the coast 
to St. Tabhead, and so to the coast of England.” ! Being 
chiefly in the hands of the Dutch, and regulated by the 
rules of the Dutch Fishery College, the fishing here began 
on the 24th of June and continued till the end of September. 
Coke puts it that the first fishing, to the middle of August, 
was engaged in exclusively by the. Hollanders, along with 
some 40 sail of Frenchmen.? The Scotch contemporary 
account, however, while admitting this to be the fishing 
“* qch is used by the fflemings,”’ states “ there is also imployed 
about 6 score vessels betwixt 3 and 4 Tuns apiece of the 
burrowes of Scotland ?—a statement much more in accordance 
with the tale of continual conflict between the Dutch and 
the native fishermen, whose chief cry it was that owing to 
their small numbers, they could not possibly adopt the 
violent tactics of their rivals in dealing with them. 
Scotch herring boats were also engaged at Dunbar and 
upon the coast of Fife during August and September, 
and in the Firth of Forth during November. Another 
fishing took place in the ‘North Isles,”’ from the Ist of October 
to the 25th of December. From the Ist of April to the 24th 
of June, the fishers upon the east coast of Scotland were 
1MSS. 32.1.16, Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh. 
2 « Propositions for Fishing,” Cal. S.P. Dom. Car. I., vol. 229, No. 78. 
3 MSS. 32.1.16, Advocates’ Library. 
