WHERE AEB THE HADDOCKS ? 25 



I could analyse the natural history of many other, fish, 

 "but the result in all cases is nearly the same, and ends in a 

 repeated expression that what we require as regards all fish 

 is the date of their period of reproduction ; all other informar 

 tion, without this great fact, is comparatively unimportant. It 

 is difiicult, however, to obtain any reliable information on the 

 natural history of fish either by way of inquiry or by means 

 of experiments. Naturalists cannot live in the water, and 

 those who live on it, and have opportunities for observation, 

 have not the necessary ability to record, or at any rate to gene- 

 ralise what they see. No two fishermen, for instance, will 

 agree on any one point regarding the animals of the deep. I 

 have examined many intelligent fishermen during the last ten 

 jeais, and few of them have any real knowledge regarding the 

 habits of the fish which it is their business to capture. As an 

 instance of fishermen's knowledge, one of that body recently 

 repeated to me the old story of the migration of the herring, 

 holding that the herring comes from Iceland to Great Britain in 

 order to spawn, and that the sprat goes to the same icy region 

 that it may fulfil the same instinct ! 



"Where are the haddocks?" I once asked a fisherman. 

 "They are about all eaten up, sir," was his very innocent 

 leply; and this in a sense is true. The shore races of that 

 :fiBh have long disappeared, and our fishermen have now to seek 

 this most palatable inhabitant of the sea in deeper water. Vast 

 numbers of the haddock used to be taken in the Firth of Forth, 

 but during late years they have become very scarce, and the 

 boats now require to go a night's voyage to seek for them. If 

 we knew the minutiae of the life of this fish we should be better 

 able to regulate the season for its capture, and the percentage 

 that we might with safety take from the water without deteri- 

 orating the breeding power of the animal. There are some 

 touches of romance even about the haddock, but I need not 

 further allude to these in this division of my book, as I shall 

 have to refer to this fish under the head of the " White Fish 

 Fisheries." The haddock, like all fish, is wonderfully prolific, 

 .and is looked upon by fishermen as being also a migratory fish, 

 as are also turbot and many other sea animals. 



The family to which the haddock belongs embraces many of 

 our best food fish, as whiting, cod, ling, etc. ; but of the growth 

 and habits of the members of this family we are as ignorant as 

 we are of the natural history of the whitebait or sprat. I have 



