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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 69

Fisheries

Fisheries.

From whaling to fishing seems but a short stride, and yet the industries are widely apart. Fishermen rarely become whalers, while whaling crews are composed of men of all conditions and all classes. And though edible fish swarm all around the New Zealand coast (several known varieties not yet being classified), with its 5300 miles of coastline, serrated with numerous bays and inlets, there never has been any really steady supply of fish at any one of the centres of population in either Island. Not enough, even, for local consumption, let alone for steady export. The explanation is simple, as are most other things when known. Fisher folk are bred and are not trained. Our Legislature passed a measure for the establishment of fishing villages, but they did not transport fisher-folk to fill them. Fishermen form a class that live apart nearly all the world over. They certainly do so, at least in Europe. They live in hamlets by themselves, and the calling seems hereditary. They rarely intermarry. The fish women are as important as the fishermen. They sell the fish which the men capture. In some places they also make and mend the nets while their husbands or fathers repair and paint their boats. Some time since, when the late Mr. Waddel was Mayor of Auckland, a number of citizens signed a letter which was drafted and sent to Mr. Davitt, of Home Rule notoriety, asking him to use his influence to induce some fisher folk from the West Coast of Ireland, who were in sore straits for sustenance, to migrate here to form a fishing village in the Hauraki Gulf, stating that homesteads would be provided for them if they came, and that the Government would be moved to grant them free passages, but Mr. Davitt never thought it worth his while to reply to the letter, though the present acting-Premier of New Zealand, the Hon. Mr. Mitchelson, was among the persons signing the document. It was the lack of fish in Auckland, with which its surrounding waters swarm, with the knowledge that if a fishing village was wanted here a village would have to be imported—young and old, grandparents and grandchildren—before a regular supply of fish could be obtained. A fishing export trade has yet to be established, as neither fish, fishing, nor fisheries have as yet found a place in the copious index of our volume of statistics.