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ART. VII-1. Report from the Select Committee on British Channel Fisheries; with Minutes of Evidence and Appendix. 1833.

2. A Treatise on the Management of Fresh-water Fish, with a View to making them a Source of Profit to Landed Proprietors. By Gottlieb Boccius. London. 8vo. 1841.

BUTCHERS' MEAT has risen of late considerably in price,

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and it is still rising. Housekeepers are now paying 9d. or 10d. a pound, where last year they paid 6d. or 7d. The Scotch and Irish steam-vessels unremittingly pour their living freight upon the banks of the Thames in addition to the contributions that the railroads are constantly dispatching to the London shambles; yet the gigantic metropolis has stomach for them all; and, like Vathek's Giaour,' incessantly mutters ' more-more! —In truth, were it not for the supplies that steam regularly contributes in aid of those which formerly fed the great city, its flesh-markets, now that it is grown greater than the greatest, would, so to speak, not be furnished at all; and as it is, the poor people do not think of meat as they did two or three years ago. This is a bad state of things; and in looking for a remedy we naturally turn first to the ocean which embraces our isles; there, indeed, is

A harvest ripe for the gathering at every time of the year, without the labour of tillage, without the expense of seed or manure, without the payment of rent or taxes. Every acre of those seas is far more productive of wholesome, palatable, and nutritious food than the same quantity of the richest land; they are fields which, perpetually " white to harvest," require only the labourer's willing hand to reap that neverfailing crop which the bounty of Providence has kindly bestowed. Had it not been ascertained by actual experiment, it would have been considered as fabulous to assign to the female cod from three to four millions of eggs.'

So said we (Q. R. vol. ix. p. 266) five-and-twenty years ago;but our statements have seldom, we believe, been found extravagant, and in this case the result of subsequent experiments is that nine millions of ova are comprised occasionally in the roe of one codfish.—

Nor is it from the deeps alone that this plentiful harvest may be secured.

The law of Nature,' says Mr. Yarrell, which obliges mackerel and many others to visit the shallower water of the shores at a particular season, appears to be one of those wise and beautiful provisions of the Creator by which not only is the species perpetuated with the greatest certainty, but a large portion of the parent animals are thus

brought

brought within the reach of man, who, but for the action of this law, would be deprived of many of those species most valuable to him as food. For the mackerel dispersed over the immense surface of the deep, no effective fishery could be carried on; but approaching the shore as they do from all directions, and roving along the coast collected in immense shoals, millions are caught, which yet form but a very small portion compared with the myriads that escape.'

The harvest, then, is everywhere ready. But where are the labourers to gather it in? It is with us an old subject of lamentation, that the Celtic tribes still retain those prejudices against fish and fishing which almost characterized the uncivilized ancient Grecian; and true it is that they cannot be easily made deep-sea fishers: but the difficulty, though great, is far from an impossibility, and we hope the time will yet arrive when the Irish peasant will diligently search for treasure where he will be sure to find it.

But we shall look in vain for this desirable change of character, to any great extent at least, till there is such a steady demand for the article as will insure a constant and lucrative employment for the poor, and a satisfactory return for the investment of capital by the rich. Now fish, with the exception of some of the more common kinds, such as sprats, herrings, and mackerel, is looked upon by all classes at present as a luxury, and not as a necessary of life, as it once was. In some of our inland counties the peasantry know not the taste of fresh sea-fish, their ideas upon the subject being for the most part limited to the flavour of red herring, which, by the way, is among them more frequently used as a sovereign remedy to restore the healthy function of digestion to their horned cattle, than as a solace for their own palates; or, as they say for a cow that has lost her quid. To bring this back they administer a portion of red herring, and mostly find that the power of chewing the cud is restored to the animal. But if the taste of fresh fish is unknown to the poor in some central localities, they too commonly despise it on the sea-coast. A duke does not scorn a dish of crimped skate, yet we have seen those fish thrown from the seine and left to decay on the shore in the west of England as worthless, when some of the neighbouring poor wanted a dinner.*

Time was when fish formed a great part of the diet of the people of this country, and when religious observances lent their aid to enforce a system which operated beneficially both on body and mind. Abstinence from flesh on certain days and at certain seasons was rigidly prescribed by the Roman Catholic ritual; and it seems to have been considered almost an article of faith, the

* See Q. R. vol. lviii. p. 369.

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breach of which was unpardonable. When Cardinal Wolsey was dying at Leicester Abbey, after he had eaten of a cullace made of chicken a spoonfull or two, at the laste quoth he, " Whereof was this cullace made?" "Forsothe, sir, of a chicken." "Why," quoth he, "it is fasting day!" (being St. Andrew's Even). "What though it be?" quoth his confessor, "ye be excused by reason of your sickness." Yea," quoth he, "what though? I will eate no more.' Then was he in confession the space of an houre*.' In The Forme of Cury compiled about 1390 by the chief master cooks of our second Richard, whose merit as the 'best and ryallest vyand' of all Christian kings is duly set forth, there are no less than twenty-five receipts for dressing fish—to say nothing of Furmente with Porpeys and Porpeys in brothe, &c., for the porpoise is a mammal, and no true fish. Again, the Servicium de Piscibus (1381) gives thirty-three formula for dishes applicable to fish-days and consisting principally of fish, whilst those for flesh-days are no more than fifty-eight. In the Rolls of Provi sions expended by Sir John Nevile of Chete, Knight, on occasion of the marriage of Roger Rockley with his daughter Elizabeth Nevile the 14th of January, in the 17th yeare of the reigne of our Soveraigne Lord King Henry VIII.,' we find the following bill of fare:

'For Frydays and Saturdays.

'First, leich brayne.t Item, frometye pottage. Item, whole ling. Item, great goils [jowls] of salt sammon. Item, great salt eels. Item, great salt sturgeon goils. Item, fresh ling. Item, fresh turbut. Item, great pike. Item, great goils of fresh sammon. Item, great ruds. Item, baken turbuts. Item, tarts.

"Second Course.-Martens to pottage. Item, a great fresh sturgeon goil. Item, fresh eel roasted. Item, great brett. Item, sammon chines broil'd. Item, roasted eels. Item, roasted lampreys. Item, roasted lamprons. Item, great burbutts. Item, sammon baken. Item, fresh eel baken. Item, fresh lampreys baken. Item, clear jilly. Item, gingerbread,'

Again, at the Lammas assizes, in the 20th year of Henry the Eighth, the same Sir John Nevile provided thus for

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Fryday and Saturday.

3 couple of great ling. 40 couple of heberdine [Aberdeen ling]. Salt sammon (20s. worth). Fresh sammon and great (31. 6s. 8d.) 6 great pike. 80 pickerings. 300 great breams. 40 tenches. 80 touling eels and brevet eels, and 15 ruds. A firkin of sturgeon. In fresh seals, 13s. 4d. 8 seame of fresh fish. 2 bretts'

the only flesh among these items being that of the seal, which,

* Cavendish's Life of Wolsey.

This seems to have been a jelly composed of cream, isinglass, and other gentle ingredients.

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from its amphibious nature, was one of those mammiferous animals which the church allowed to be eaten on fast-days.

All this, be it remembered, was at a period when our gentry lived almost entirely in the open air as long as daylight lasted, and sometimes longer, liking better to hear the lark sing than the mouse squeak.' The fish fare did not prove insufficient for people who led that healthy life; but how beneficial would it be with our lazier habits! Sumptuary laws are now out of the question; but if we were all obliged to keep the old fasts, none but invalids-and not many of them-would be the worse for the regimen. Let any one who is not in a course of strong out-door exercise, and is beginning to be hipped, as the phrase goes, confine himself to fish two days in the week, and he will soon find that he has a much clearer head, and a much lighter heart. There is no article of food that requires less extensive preparation. The pot, the gridiron, the frying-pan, and the oven, may be brought to bear upon these sapid esculents, as well as the best-mounted batterie de cuisine; though upon no viands can the latter be more effectually directed. The Cuisinier des Cuisiniers` has nearly a hundred excellent receipts for fish. How seldom are fish-soups or cold fish seen on our tables! yet the former are excellent; and what is better than slices of a fine salmon fried, as Jewesses only now fry them, served cold? In the Expenditure of the Lord Steward of the Royal Household for 1840,' given in the Times of last October, we have the following items :

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£10,000

4,260

2,188

2,350.'

The item of fish being the smallest, and that of butcher's meat amounting to more than the other three together; and, in most cases, private households would show a similar proportion.

Supposing, however, that we were all to take to a larger consumption of fish, would, it may be asked, the present supply be equal to the wants of the metropolis?

'There is a general complaint prevalent in London and its environs, that fish is not so plentiful, and consequently not so cheap, as it was wont to be some two or three years since, although no reason can be assigned for the cause of this falling off; nevertheless, the circumstance will admit of an explanation. There are many persons who are in the habit of buying up large stocks of fish at Billingsgate daily, and of exporting them into the

A turtle is not a fish; it is a reptile; and, therefore, we dare say nothing more of it here than that Professor Owen has lately discovered a multitude of fossil species at Sheppey, and not a single anthropolite among the lot! Turtle without aldermen seems a strange dispensation; but so says the Professor.

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interior of the country, where they meet with a ready and advantageous sale. This expedient is greatly facilitated by means of railway conveyance, and vans may be seen in regular attendance at the Gate, waiting to take in the supplies of fish, which are promptly despatched by the various trains to the more central towns and districts of England. This circumstance tends most materially to affect the poor industrious marketwomen who are in the habit of hawking their wares about the different parts of the metropolis and its suburbs for sale.'-Times, 15th October,

1841.

We are sorry for the poor hawkers of London, but still it is to the railroads we must look in great measure for carrying a taste for fish into the central counties, and thus assisting to create that steady demand which will, in our opinion, produce a constant and adequate supply, and restore fish to the regular place on English tables which it once occupied. Neither ought we to forget that railways may bring fish up as well as carry fish down. And, in truth we believe there would be no great want of fish on the Londoner's board, if the supply to the metropolis were but fairly

used.

The Select Committee of 1833 say they

have examined the clerk of the fish-market at Billingsgate, and some salesmen and fishmongers who frequent it, in reference to the present state of the supply of fish to that market, and the regulations under which the market is conducted; with a view to ascertain whether any improper monopoly or regulations exist affecting the supply of the market, or tending either to increase the price of fish to the consumer, or to lessen the fair profits of the fishermen; but your Committee do not feel that they have fully investigated the subject, although from the evidence which has incidentally come before them it has not appeared that any such monopoly or injurious regulations exist, either in the mode of supplying the market or in the sale of fish.

It appears, however, to your Committee to be desirable that a more efficient remedy should be provided to enable the clerk of the market to prevent the sale of fish in an improper state; there being now no other remedy than the forfeiture of the fish, and the expensive and dilatory proceeding by indictment. Your Committee therefore recommend that a clause should be inserted in any Bill which may be introduced upon this subject, inflicting a pecuniary penalty for this offence, recoverable by summary proceeding before a magistrate.'

The wording of the first of these paragraphs is cautious enough. It will not be denied that the bulk of the fish sent to this great town is so consigned that it gets into comparatively few hands, or that the dealers place their own value upon the article, regulating the supply of cod, &c., from the well-boats and store-boats lying near Gravesend, and feeding the market with the stock there accumulated to the profitable point, taking care that there

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