260 JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
A fresh start has taken place with some of our Brixham and 
Plymouth fishermen (Trawlers), in fishing the Irish Sea in small 
fleets, and bringing their fish to Plymouth and Brixham by carriers, 
the fish being well iced. This enterprise has, on the whole, 
succeeded, and marks quite a new phase in the experiences of our 
fishery, though it is only practicable during the months of April, 
May, June, July, and August. Some very superior catches were 
secured by our men, and there is every prospect of this becoming 
a valuable fishery. 
So far as local circumstances are more or less favourable, our 
men have met the ever-varying conditions of our fishery, and have 
adapted themselves to take the full benefit of any opportunity to 
develope it; but we cannot hope to see it grow to anything like 
the proportions of the great fisheries in the North. 
The distribution of fish is a matter of the utmost consideration, 
and its record, past and present, is not at all unsatisfactory. Before 
railway days, it was the custom of our fishermen to carry Neptune’s 
hosts to those ports where the best markets were procurable, and 
a constant trade was carried on from Plymouth to Portsmouth, 
Southampton, and Weymouth, as circumstances warranted, and 
according to the state of fishing. Hakes and mackerel were the 
principal sorts so treated, the fastest of the craft being thus 
engaged in this important traffic. The same kind of thing 
happened in connection with the fishery of Cornwall; and Swansea, 
Cardiff, and other ports in the Bristol Channel, were kept 
supplied. 
It was, however, the custom to post considerable quantities of 
mackerel and other kinds—as soles, turbot, and brill—to Exeter, 
Bristol, Bath, and even to Birmingham, by road. This method 
was not only costly, but very difficult; and it can easily be 
imagined that the fish, ere they reached their destination, had lost 
their special freshness, and exchanged it for quite another flavour. 
The Railway Revolution has changed all this. You can now, 
if you happen to be staying in any of these towns, have your 
table served up with these tempting creatures on the same day, or 
the following morning of the night or day of their death, and 
hundreds of villages now are suppled with fish that were com- 
pletely beyond reach in past years. And if at any time you may 
be in Paris, you can be regaled with a mackerel, or sole, or ray, 

