HERRINGS. 
245 
at the season when it approaches the shallows to 
spawn, have given it its common name, Herring 
being derived from the German heer^ an army. 
The end of October is the ordinary period of the 
commencement of the spawning season, but it 
seems subject to local variation. For two or three 
months before this, the fish is in the highest 
condition, and is the object of eager pursuit all 
around the coast. The principal places where the 
Herring fishery is carried on may be thus enume- 
rated Yarmouth, Lowestoffe, Hastings, Folke- 
stone, Cardigan Bay, and Swansea, in England 
and Wales; the coasts of Caithness, Sutherland, 
Aberdeen, Banff, Moray, and Ross, in Scotland ; 
and Galway, the coast of Donegal, Mayo, the 
mouth of the Shannon, Bantry Bay, and the coast 
of Wicklow, in Ireland. 
The number of barrels of Herrings cured in the 
British fisheries may be considered to average 
four hundred thousand per annum; this is, of 
course, exclusive of the vast quantities that are 
eaten in a fresh state. The fisheries of Northern 
Europe are also very extensive ; in those of Swe- 
den and Norway, it is said that near four hun- 
dred millions fish are taken yearly, and twenty 
millions have been the produce of a single port. 
Yarmouth, whose smoked Herrings are well- 
known by the term bloaters,” derives no small 
portion of its prosperity from this fishery. A 
hundred sail of vessels, averaging forty tons each, 
hail from this place, and about seventy hail from 
the neighbouring town of Lowestoft. This fleet 
is augmented by fifty or sixty vessels that arrive 
from the Yorkshire coast during the season. The 
capital engaged at Yarmouth is estimated at 
