What most roused Mr. Gentleman's indignation
was, that the Dutchmen caught the fish and sold them to the
Yarmouth herring-mongers "for ready gold, so that it amounteth to
a great sum of money, which money doth never come again into
England." "We are daily scorned," he says, "by these Hollanders,
for being so negligent of our Profit, and careless of our
Fishing; and they do daily flout us that be the poor Fishermen of
England, to our Faces at Sea, calling to us, and saying, 'Ya
English, ya sall or oud scoue dragien;' which, in English, is
this, 'You English, we will make you glad to wear our old
Shoes!'"
Another pamphlet, to a similar effect, 'The Royal Fishing
revived,'[17] was published fifty years later, in which it was
set forward that the Dutch "have not only gained to themselves
almost the sole fishing in his Majesty's Seas; but principally
upon this Account have very near beat us out of all our other
most profitable Trades in all Parts of the World." It was even
proposed to compel "all Sorts of begging Persons and all other
poor People, all People condemned for less Crimes than Blood," as
well as "all Persons in Prison for Debt," to take part in this
fishing trade! But this was not the true way to force the
traffic. The herring fishery at Yarmouth and along the coast
began to make gradual progress with the growth of wealth and
enterprise throughout the country; though it was not until
1787--less than a hundred years ago--that the Yarmouth men began
the deep-sea herring fishery.
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