18 
MR. J. T. HOTBLACK ON THE HERRING. 
As I have said, the Stornoway fishing begins the latter part of 
May or beginning of June; then follows the Shetland fishing, the 
beginning of July; Wick, in August; the East of Scotland and 
North of England in September (this year there has been an 
exceptionally good September fishing out of Grimsby) ; and the 
Yarmouth home fishing in October ; and so to the south-east of 
England, where at Hastings they generally get some quantity of 
Herring the beginning of November, and expect to continue the 
fishing (as at Yarmouth) till the end of December. Of course the 
fishing at each place varies a little both as to the time of com- 
mencement and duration ; but, speaking roughly, it seems as though 
one might start at Stornaway in May and finish at Hastings with 
the year. It might be thought they were the same fish you were 
following all the time ; but any one at all conversant with the 
fishing trade will say at once that they are not ; the fish taken in 
the various localities being often of a markedly different character. 
What I have just said applies to the big fishings, and it is with 
them I intend principally to deal. There are other and smaller 
local fishings, such as that for the justly celebrated Yarmouth 
“ Long-shores,” which I take to be really local fish, and, like the 
Wild Duck and Snipe hatched on our marshes, they have little 
connection with the great army of migrants. Among other such 
local fishings, I believe there is sometimes one at Wick in 
December and January, when fish of an altogether larger race are 
caught, full of milt and roe. I suspect they are not local fish, 
but from their close resemblance to some of those caught off 
Norway, probably come from the far north. Then there are the 
Yarmouth and Lowestoft spring and midsummer fishings, during 
the former of which fish are taken of very inferior quality, without 
either milt or roe ; but during the latter sometimes fish of delicate 
quality, and well suited for home and immediate use, are brought 
to market. There might be a great deal said about these two 
fishings, but I must pass on. 
To return to the big fishings. It seems to me that the enor- 
mous shoals there met with are vast gatherings of migratory fish, 
that they are generally different fish in each locality, and that 
they must have come long distances, but that, like the Salmon and 
the Swallow, they return each year to the place of their birth ; and 
T find myself in good company in this opinion, for Couch says : 
