214 CONDUCT OF THE WHITB FISHERY. 



the last thirty years. She remembers ■when the primest had- 

 docks were sold at about one penny per pound -weight, and in 

 her time herrings have been so plentiful that no person would 

 purchase them. We shall not soon look again on such times- 



The cod and haddock fishery is a laborious occupation. At 

 Buckie, a quaint fishing-town on the Moray Firth, it is one of 

 the staple occupations of the people. At that little port there 

 are generally about thirty or forty large boats engaged in the 

 fishery, ,as well as a number of smaller craft used to fish 

 inshore. These boats, which measure from thirty to forty 

 feet, are, with the necessary hooks and lines, of the value 

 of about £100. Each boat is generally the property of a 

 joint-stock company, and has a crew of eight or nine indi- 

 viduals, who all claim an equal share in the fish captured. 

 The Buckie men often go a long distance, forty or fifty miles, to 

 a populous fishing-place, and are absent from home for a period 

 of fifteen or twenty hours. At many of the fishing villages from 

 which herring or cod boats depart, there is no proper harbour, 

 and at such places the sight of the departing fleet is a most 

 animated one, as all hands, women included, have to lend their 

 aid in order to expedite the launching of the little fleet, as the 

 men who are to fish must be kept dry and comfortable. Even 

 at places where there is a harbour, it is often not used, many of 

 the boats being drawn up for convenience on what is called the 

 boat-shore. At Cockenzie, near Edinburgh, several of the boats 

 are still drawn up in this rude way, and the women not only 

 assist in launching and drawing up the boats, but they sell the 

 produce taken by each crew by auction to the highest bidder — 

 the purchasers usually being buyers of speculation, who send 

 the fish by train to Edinburgh, Manchester, or London. 



Prom the little ports of the Moray Firth, the men, as I 

 have said, have to go long distances to fish for cod and ling. 

 As they have none, but open boats, it wUl easily be understood 

 that they live hard upon such occasions. They are sometimes 

 absent from home for about a week at a stretch, and as the weather 

 is often very inclement the men sufier severely. The fish are 

 not so easily procured as in former years, so that the remuner- 

 ation for the labour undergone is totally inadequate. A large 

 traffic in living codfish used to be carried on from Scotland ; 

 quick vessels furnished with wells took the cod alive as far as 

 Gravesend, whence they were sent on to London as required. 



I cannot say much about the white-fish fisheries of Ireland 



