84 THE COMMONWEALTH 
Association to settle its affairs as best they could, and to con- 
tinue with the enterprise if they were so minded. The times, 
however, were no longer favourable to the success of such 
an undertaking ; the Civil War soon engrossed the attention 
of all; and, as was to be expected, the Society, now deprived 
of the king’s encouragement and assistance, gradually ceased 
to have any interest for the great majority of its members 
and soon became almost a thing of the past. 
The next suggestion with regard to the fishing industry 
came from Scotland, where, in 1645, a certain Frenchman, 
named Hugo L’Amey of Mouhon, laid the details of a curious 
scheme before the Estates. He intended, he said, to benefit 
Scotland by introducing and superintending the cultivation 
of Indian corn, on condition that he received a grant of 
all the Scotch fisheries. His scheme lacked nothing in 
definiteness, including as it did a Scotch fleet of thirty- 
six ships of four hundred tons burden each, the establish- 
ment of a trade with the Indies, and the planting of a Scotch 
colony there. Nor had the sanguine Frenchman any doubt 
that the “ Indian wheat ’’ would thrive in Scotland, if his 
directions for its cultivation were followed; he was con- 
fident, indeed, that it would yield a fourfold greater increase 
than ordinary corn, and would, at the same time, be found 
less liable to injury from winds, rain, or frost ; the ground 
whereon it grew became more fertile, the flour from it made 
very good white “bisket breed,” while the “ dightinges or 
refuise” was very good for feeding swine. Moreover, its 
cultivation would give employment to a great many people, 
since the Indian corn had to be worked “ only by strenth 
of hand,” no horses or oxen being required. The result 
would be that “‘ poor people that have many children and 
are unable to menteane them shall be of there charge dis- 
burthened be setting of there children a working whom 
before they wer wont to sett a begging.”! 
1 Act. Parl. Scotland, vol. vi. 1, pp. 372-3. 
