The two proceeded arm in arm up Market-Jew Street, and turning down towards the shore, walked briskly along in the direction of the picturesque fishing village of Newlyn, which lies little more than a mile to the westward of Penzance.
Chapter Twenty Two.
Shows how Oliver and his Friend went to Newlyn and saw the Mackerel Market, and found some Difficulties and Mysteries Awaiting them there.
The beach opposite Newlyn presented a busy scene when Oliver Trembath and his friend Charlie Tregarthen reached it.
Although the zenith of the season was over, mackerel fishing was still going on there in full vigour, and immense crowds of men, women, and children covered the sands. The village lies on the heights above, and crowds of people were leaning over the iron rails which guard the unwary or unsteady passenger from falling into the sea below. A steep causeway connects the main street above with the shore beneath; and up and down it horses, carts, and people were hurrying continuously.
True, there was not at that time quite as much bustle as may be witnessed there at the present day. The railway has penetrated these remote regions of the west, and now men work with a degree of feverish haste that was unknown then. While hundreds of little boats (tenders to the large ones) crowd in on the beach, auctioneers with long heavy boots wade knee-deep into the water, followed and surrounded by purchasers, and, ringing a bell as each boat comes in, shout,—“Now, then, five hundred, more or less, in this boat; who bids? Twenty shillings a hundred for five hundred—twenty shillings—say nineteen—I’m bid nineteen—nineteen-and-six—say nineteen-an—twenty—twenty shillings I’m bid—say twenty-one—shall I make it twenty-one shillings for any person?” etcetera.
The bells and voices of these auctioneers, loud though they be, are mild compared with the shouts of men, women, and children, as the fish are packed in baskets, with hot haste, to be in time for the train; and horses with laden carts gallop away over the sands at furious speed, while others come dashing back for more fish. And there is need for all this furious haste, for trains, like time and tide, wait for no man, and prices vary according to trains. Just before the starting of one, you will hear the auctioneers put the fish up at 20 shillings, 25 shillings, and even 30 shillings a hundred, and in the next half-hour, after the train is gone, and no chance remains of any more of the fish being got into the London market by the following morning, the price suddenly falls to 8 shillings a hundred, sometimes even less. There is need for haste, too, because the quantity of fish is very great, for there are sometimes two hundred boats at anchor in the bay, each with four thousand fish on the average, which must all be washed and packed in four or five hours. Yes, the old days cannot be compared with the present times, when, between the months of April and June, the three hundred boats of Mounts Bay will land little short of three thousand tons of mackerel, and the railway, for the mere carriage of these to London, Manchester, Birmingham, etcetera, will clear above 20,000 pounds!
Nevertheless, the busy, bustling, hearty nature of the scene on Newlyn beach in days of yore was not so very different as one might suppose from that of the present time. The men were not less energetic then than now; the women were not less eager; the children were quite as wild and mischievous, and the bustle and noise apparently, if not really, as great.