Besides the above, Boulogne, the most important fishing port in the country, Calais, Dieppe, Concarneau, Douarnenez, Les Sables d’Olonne, La Rochelle, Marennes and Arcachon are leading ports for the herring, sardine, mackerel and other coast-fisheries of the ocean, while Cette, Agde and other Mediterranean ports are engaged in the tunny and anchovy fisheries. Sardine preserving is an important industry at Nantes and other places on the west coast. Oysters are reared chiefly at Marennes, which is the chief French market for them, and at Arcachon, Vannes, Oléron, Auray, Cancale and Courseulles. The total value of the produce of fisheries increased from £4,537,000 in 1892 to £5,259,000 in 1902. In 1902 the number of men employed in the home fisheries was 144,000 and the number of vessels 25,481 (tonnage 127,000); in the deep-sea fisheries 10,500 men and 450 vessels (tonnage 51,000) were employed.
Communications.
Roads.—Admirable highways known as routes nationales and kept up at the expense of the state radiate from Paris to the great towns of France. Averaging 5212 ft. in breadth, they covered in 1905 a distance of nearly 24,000 m. The École des Ponts et Chaussées at Paris is maintained by the government for the training of the engineers for the construction and upkeep of roads and bridges. Each department controls and maintains the routes départementales, usually good macadamized roads connecting the chief places within its limits and extending in 1903 over 9700 m. The routes nationales and the routes départementales come under the category of la grande voirie and are under the supervision of the Ministry of Public Works. The urban and rural district roads, covering a much greater mileage and classed as la petite voirie, are maintained chiefly by the communes under the supervision of the Minister of the Interior.
Waterways.[1]—The waterways of France, 7543 m. in length, of which canals cover 3031 m., are also classed under la grande voirie; they are the property of the state, and for the most part are free of tolls. They are divided into two classes. Those of the first class, which comprise rather less than half the entire system, have a minimum depth of 612 ft., with locks 126 ft. long and 17 ft. wide; those of the second class are of smaller dimensions. Water traffic, which is chiefly in heavy merchandise, as coal, building materials, and agriculture and food produce, more than doubled in volume between 1881 and 1905. The canal and river system attains its greatest utility in the north, north-east and north-centre of the country; traffic is thickest along the Seine below Paris; along the rivers and small canals of the rich departments of Nord and Pas-de-Calais and along the Oise and the canal of St Quentin whereby they communicate with Paris; along the canal from the Marne to the Rhine and the succession of waterways which unite it with the Oise; along the Canal de l’Est (departments of Meuse and Ardennes); and along the waterways uniting Paris with the Saône at Chalon (Seine, Canal du Loing, Canal de Briare, Lateral canal of the Loire and Canal du Centre) and along the Saône between Chalon and Lyons.
In point of length the following are the principal canals:
| Miles. | |
| Est (uniting Meuse with Moselle and Saône).. | 270 |
| From Nantes to Brest....... | 225 |
| Berry (uniting Montluçon with the canalized Cher and the Loire canal) | 163 |
| Midi (Toulouse to Mediterranean via Béziers); see Canal | 175 |
| Burgundy (uniting the Yonne and Saône) ... | 151 |
| Lateral canal of Loire....... | 137 |
| From Marne to Rhine (on French territory).. | 131 |
| Lateral canal of Garonne...... | 133 |
| Rhône to Rhine (on French territory).. | 119 |
| Nivernais (uniting Loire and Yonne) .... | 111 |
| Canal de la Somme....... | 97 |
| Centre (uniting Saône and Loire).... | 81 |
| Canal de l’Ourcq........ | 67 |
| Ardennes (uniting Aisne and Canal de l’Est).. | 62 |
| From Rhône to Cette....... | 77 |
| Canal de la Haute Marne...... | 60 |
| St Quentin (uniting Scheldt with Somme and Oise) | 58 |
The chief navigable rivers are:
| Total navigated Length. |
First Class Navigability. | |
| Miles. | Miles. | |
| Seine ..... | 339 | 293 |
| Aisne.... | 37 | 37 |
| Marne.... | 114 | 114 |
| Oise ..... | 99 | 65 |
| Yonne.... | 67 | 53 |
| Rhône.... | 309 | 30 |
| Saône.... | 234 | 234 |
| Adour.... | 72 | 21 |
| Garonne .... | 289 | 96 |
| Dordogne .... | 167 | 26 |
| Loire..... | 452 | 35 |
| Charente .... | 106 | 16 |
| Vilaine.... | 91 | 31 |
| Escaut (in France) .. | 39 | 39 |
| Scarpe.... | 41 | 41 |
| Lys ..... | 45 | 45 |
| Aa ..... | 18 | 18 |
Railways.—The first important line in France, from Paris to Rouen, was constructed through the instrumentality of Sir Edward Blount (1809–1905), an English banker in Paris, who was afterwards for thirty years chairman of the Ouest railway. After the rejection in 1838 of the government’s proposals for the construction of seven trunk lines to be worked by the state, he obtained a concession for that piece of line on the terms that the French treasury would advance one-third of the capital at 3% if he would raise the remaining two-thirds, half in France and half in England. The contract for building the railway was put in the hands of Thomas Brassey; English navvies were largely employed on the work, and a number of English engine-drivers were employed when traffic was begun in 1843. A law passed in 1842 laid the foundation of the plan under which the railways have since been developed, and mapped out nine main lines, running from Paris to the frontiers and from the Mediterranean to the Rhine and to the Atlantic coast. Under it the cost of the necessary land was to be found as to one-third by the state and as to the residue locally, but this arrangement proved unworkable and was abandoned in 1845, when it was settled that the state should provide the land and construct the earthworks and stations, the various companies which obtained concessions being left to make the permanent way, provide rolling stock and work the lines for certain periods. Construction proceeded under this law, but not with very satisfactory results, and new arrangements had to be made between 1852 and 1857, when the railways were concentrated in the hands of six great companies, the Nord, the Est, the Ouest, the Paris-Lyon-Méditerranée, the Orléans and the Midi. Each of these companies was allotted a definite sphere of influence, and was granted a concession for ninety-nine years from its date of formation, the concessions thus terminating at various dates between 1950 and 1960. In return for the privileges granted them the companies undertook the construction out of their own unaided resources of 1500 m. of subsidiary lines, but the railway expenditure of the country at this period was so large that in a few years they found it impossible to raise the capital they required. In these circumstances the state agreed to guarantee the interest on the capital, the sums it paid in this way being regarded as advances to be reimbursed in the future with interest at 4%. This measure proved successful and the projected lines were completed. But demands for more lines were constantly arising, and the existing companies, in view of their financial position, were disinclined to undertake their construction. The government therefore found itself obliged to inaugurate a system of direct subventions, not only to the old large companies, but also to new small ones, to encourage the development of branch and local lines, and local authorities were also empowered to contribute a portion of the required capital. The result came to be that many small lines were begun by companies that had not the means to complete them, and again the state had to come to the rescue. In 1878 it agreed to spend £20,000,000 in purchasing and completing a number of
- ↑ See the Guide officiel de la navigation intérieure issued by the ministry of public works (Paris, 1903).
