170 
JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
is a fact that the fishermen with their families have to leave the 
town, not because they cannot obtain house room, or land on which 
to build houses, but simply because there is no room for their 
fishing boats in their exceedingly small tidal harbour of three and 
a quarter acres. In 1866 the Mevagissey men got an Act, 
accompanied with the usual extensive scheme of harbour im- 
provements, costing many thousands of pounds, which of course 
can never be accomplished except gradually. 
I have shown in diagram the receipts of this harbour from 
the dues on the boats, from its commencement up to the year 
ending March, 1884. This shows among other points that the 
fishing industry is a very fluctuating one ; for this is a harbour 
unaffected by any influences besides the fishing and its con- 
comitants. Mevagissey harbour started in 1866 — the year in 
which it obtained its Act — with a revenue of ,£148, which 
increased in 1867 to £225, where it remained approximately till 
1874, when there was a sudden increase to £275, followed by a 
severe depression from 1875-78. Since this last date the revenue 
seems to have prospered, reaching its maximum of £412 in 1883, 
and £359 in the year ending March, 1884. An expenditure of 
capital in the harbour at this place would add to the size of the 
town and enable more persons to live in comfort in the county. 
This small spot sends on an average £12,000 worth of pilchards 
to the Mediterranean per annum, and pays something like £5000 
per annum for the carriage of the fish caught. One hundred hands 
are employed off and on at its sardine factories. 
Going further west we find that the same state of matters is 
repeated in Penzance Bay to an even greater extent. We have 
here a bay of some twenty-five miles of coast-line, abutting on 
the finest fishing -ground around the British Isles, with no 
single harbour to which boats can run at all states of the tide ; 
and as the most dangerous and prevalent winds are from the 
south-west, these boats are simply embayed between the Land's 
End and the Lizard. In consequence of this many days' and 
nights' fishing are lost by the fishermen in this district, because 
they are unable to start at any time, and dare not run in for 
shelter at low-water at any point on this coast. During the last 
twenty-five years 130 vessels are said to have been wrecked in 
this bay, and four-fifths of these wrecks occurred on its eastern side. 
Just fancy a fishing fleet of some 300 boats, with a capital of 
