THE FISHERY BOARD FOR SCOTLAND 75 



work of the Scottish Fishery Board had three sides. 

 It was in its inception a semi-commercial body, 

 which had for its object the creation of a fishing 

 and curing industry, employing for means to this 

 end a system of bounties and other means of 

 artificial encouragement. Round this system, as 

 a nucleus, another system of regulation of the 

 methods, both of fishing and curing, and also of 

 the seasons when fishing might legally be carried 

 on, was developed. The payment of bounties gave 

 occasion for the collection of the commercial 

 statistics of the industry, and in this way a unique 

 and most valuable store of information was 

 gradually accumulated. Finally, there is the 

 scientific side of the work of the Board. This was 

 a feature of the administration almost from the 

 first, and at the present time the statistical and 

 scientific work of the Fishery Board forms perhaps 

 the most striking feature of the administration. 



The semi-commercial objects of the Board are 

 indicated in the title of the enactment : " An Act 

 for the further Encouragement and better Regu- 

 lation of the British White Herring Fishery,"^ 

 which gave it practically the present form.^ This 

 Act constituted a Board of (unpaid) Commissioners, 

 the " Board of British White Herring Fishery," to 

 take account of the herring fishery, not only of 



1 48 Geo. III. c. 110 (1808). 



^ Previous to the establishment of the British White Herring 

 Board the fisheries of Scotland were under the charge of the " Board 

 of Manufactures." 



