A HISTORY OF CORNWALL size of this measure at different times makes it somewhat difficult to compare the figures of one period with those of another. About 1600 the contents of the hogshead were apparently mea- sured by the number of fish, for Richard Carew l says that ' on packing they keepe a juste tale of the number that every hogshead contayneth, which otherwise may turn to the marchants pre- judice : for I have heard that when they are brought to the place for sale, the buyer openeth one hogshead at adventures ; and if hee finde the same not to answere the number figured on the outside he abateth a like proportion in every other, as there wanted in that.' But the traditional size of a hogshead of pil- chards is if cwt. 2 when packed, and as the oldest of the fishermen learnt this from their fathers and grandfathers, it may be fairly assumed that the hogshead of Dr. Borlase's time was of this capacity. It contains about 3,000 fish, and this gives an annual average export in the middle of the eighteenth century of more than eighty-nine millions of fish. One hundred years later the average an- nual export was 21,732 hogsheads, 3 or about sixty-five millions of fish. In 1847 the total was 40,883 hogsheads (122 millions of fish), which is probably the largest on record for a single year. In consequence of a decreasing demand for the fish by Italian markets, and an increase in the pilchard fishery off the north-west coast of Spain, the export from Cornwall has diminished to a great extent in the last thirty years. The fish are still plentiful enough, and, as Mr. T. Cornish said in 1 883,* 'we could easily find thirty or forty millions of fish for the supply of a fresh fish market without feeling the loss of them.' The pilchard is a small fish of the ' herring ' family, generally about ten inches long, and less than half a pound in weight. Although it is occasionally caught off Exmouth and Seaton in South Devon, it practically confines itself to the coast west of the Start Point in Devonshire and Trevose Head in Cornwall. In these waters it usually appears in July, coming from the west in large schools. A small quantity of scattered fish are sometimes taken in the drift nets in June. During July the bulk of the fishery is in Mount's Bay ; in August and September, in Mount's Bay and to the east of the Lizard ; and in September and October, chiefly off St. Ivesand the north coast. It is caught both in drift nets and in seines, and the methods in use to-day are the same as those which were in use 300 years ago. In 1602 R. Carew wrote that ' the Drouers hang certain 1 R. Carew, Surv. ofCornw. 33. ' Of recent years the fish have been packed in 'half-hogsheads,' each containing 236 Ib. a Trans, Penzance Nat. Hist. Sac. i, 444. 4 ' The Mackerel and Pilchard Fisheries.' Inter- national Fisheries Exhibition Conference, 1883. square nets athwart the tide thorou which the schoell of pilchard passing leave many behind entangled in the meshes ' ; a short but accurate description equally applicable to the drift fishery now. It would seem from his remark that 'the Sayners complayne with open mouth, that these drovers worke much prejudice to the common wealth of fishermen and reape thereby small gaine to themselves ; for (say they) the taking of some few breaketh and scattereth the whole Schools and frayeth them from approaching the shore . . . ,' as though the drift fishery was at that time a comparatively new thing, but he does not say so definitely. As the pilchard fishery is everywhere conducted close to the shore, and in the bays on the coast, the boats engaged in the drift-net work are much smaller than the mackerel drivers, being usually about thirty feet long ; even smaller boats are sometimes used, and the men go out driving in the fine summer even- ings in open hookers or gigs of as little as twenty- two or twenty-five feet. St. Ives has the largest number of these pil- chard drivers, the total being about 200. A large number of these come to Newlyn in July, as at that time the fish are more plentiful on the south coast, returning to St. Ives in August, as the quantity of fish increases on that side of the land. The Mount's Bay ports have about 170 boats (Porthleven 90, Mousehole 50, Newlyn 30), and there is a goodly fleet of about 60 at Port Isaac, which are largely engaged in pilchard driving in the autumn. In the ports east of the Lizard there are altogether about I oo 6 (Polperro 40, Mevagissey 30, Looe 20), and many of these boats are also used for the local mackerel drift fishery, which is not the case west of the Lizard, where the smaller boats are not suitable. The pilchard seine fishery is even more of an inshore fishery than the drift. The seines are of the same kind as are used everywhere, but have a smaller mesh than those used for mackerel, and the method of saving the fish is slightly different. In catching mackerel the seine, when shot round the school, is towed into shallow water, and the foot of the net hauled up into the seine boat so as to enclose the fish in the net itself; but the enormous size of a school of pilchards, 6 com- pared with one of mackerel, makes this method impracticable in dealing with the local fish. When the fish are safely surrounded by the seine, 6 Mr. Pezzack's Report. 6 A school of mackerel averages from 2,000 to 5,000 fish. A school of pilchards on the south coast (i.e. in the early part of the season) averages less than 500 hogsheads, or 1,500,000 fish ; on the north (i.e. the later part of the season) they are usually larger. The greatest recorded number taken in one seine was at St. Ives in 1868, when 5, 600 hogsheads, or more than 16,500,000 fish, were saved. Almost as many were taken there in one seine in 1851. 584
