Within two or three years of the accession of James, the project took more definite form, and was brought before the Privy Council, and it was carefully considered in 1607. An integral part of the proposal was that strangers fishing in the British seas should pay tribute to the king, while the native fishery remained untaxed, and that the tribute should be farmed out to patentees, as was done with the assize-herrings in Scotland, who would then establish a national buss fishery and pay a rent to the crown.[265] There were several schemes of the kind, but the one which received most attention was put forward by a Mr Richard Rainsford, acting on behalf of a number of London merchants, who aimed at forming an association to be called the Society of Fishing Merchants. In 1608 the proposals were referred to the Earl of Northampton, Lord Privy Seal, and the Earl of Devonshire, who commended them as being for the public good, and early next year a formal and detailed scheme was prepared.[266] In the preamble stress was laid on the fact that the Hollanders and other nations had their principal fishing on his Majesty’s coasts and seas, “whose soveraignty ought therein to be acknowledged, not only to procure thereby payment of his Majesty’s duties of fishing, but also to have his kingdom provided with fish at such reasonable rates and prices as other nations have maintained thereby navigation and mariners; and setting of an infinite number of subjects on work within the realm of England and Scotland to strengthen his Majesty’s dominion by sea and land, as the chief point of a most commendable Union,” that is to say, a union of England and Scotland, the idea of which was still in the mind of James. The justification for imposing a tribute on foreign fishermen, which was to be in kind, was the king’s right to the tithe, “grounded by ancient customs and records of his Majesty’s predecessors demanding the tenth fish; whereunto three things were required: (1) how his Majesty’s tithe and right can be evidently proved; (2) precedents, that other kings and princes have and do the like in their seas; (3) that it shall give no cause of offence to other princes or states to move war.” The second part of the project was to build a “competent number” of ships or busses yearly, and so to re-establish the fishing trade which, it was said, one Violet Stephens and other discontented fishmongers from England had transferred to Enkhuisen and other places in Holland some ninety years earlier, teaching the Dutch to come and fish in the British seas—a false tale current in England in the reign of James.
As an alternative plan, to be put into immediate execution in connection with the truce just concluded between Spain and the United Provinces,[267] it was proposed that, his Majesty’s right and tithe having been made plain as above described, the Hollanders themselves should be invited to join on reasonable terms with the English projectors in the fishing trade for one-third part, or even a half, of the fishery. This course, it was believed, would prevent any cause of offence, being, it was said, in agreement with “the known precedents of other princes.” It was also thought that it would be agreeable to the Hollanders, since they would see that the Society of Fishing Merchants, being free from license or tribute, could afford to have busses built in Denmark for themselves should that be necessary. If the Hollanders could be induced to associate themselves with the Society, then, it was argued, when the time came to interfere with their “general fishery,” the risk of war would be removed, and the king’s tithe and right might be acknowledged and established by proclamation or otherwise.[268]
The acknowledgment of the king’s “sovereignty or title annexed to the dignity of the Crown” required the contribution of the tenth or the twentieth fish, more or less, to be delivered at sea for the general good of the Society, so that they might be able to tide over bad years and maintain the fishermen. In this way, by heavily taxing the Hollanders, it was believed that “no man should be discouraged by bad successe, but might depend upon God’s blessing with a quiete minde to follow his vocacion avoydinge Idlenes by ye survey of others.” On the other hand, the Society would undertake to pay the king so much upon every last of fish as might be thought convenient, provided that letters patent were granted under which the Hollanders and other strangers would be “limited and ruled.”
In this scheme of the London merchants it was proposed to acquire in the first year fifty fishing vessels, partly by buying them beyond the seas, and partly by building them in Denmark, Scotland, and the north of England. The busses were not to exceed fifty, or the dogger-boats thirty tons, since the Dutch in recent years had found the smaller vessels more profitable than the larger ones. It was stated that some families in Holland, the “east countries,” and Hamburg, with vessels of their own, were desirous of joining the London Society,—several of them had indeed arrived in England,—and it was proposed to admit them for a few years only, in order to lay the foundations of the business, and to educate English lads in the curing of herrings, and, what was “not the least point,” to make the English as industrious as themselves. When the fishery was thoroughly established, it would be easy to erect “staple towns and magazines” for the commodities of other countries; the ships of the Society would bring back merchandise for the fish exported, and a great commerce would be created. In all this prosperity “the King’s Majesty might be made a partaker, as a Royal Merchant,” while the stock required would easily be found among the merchants. On the other hand, if the king confined his action to the issuing of licenses to foreigners, without giving means for establishing a society of merchants for the fishing, then his subjects would be entirely dependent for their fish on these foreign fishermen, who would charge higher prices to recoup themselves for the cost of the licenses. The country, moreover, would suffer from the loss of the commerce that sprung from the trade in fish; the transportation of money and bullion for fish and other commodities brought into the realm would continue unchecked; and the king would lose the great strength of shipping and mariners that otherwise would be available for the defence of the kingdom.
Objections were raised to the project on the ground that it was unlikely that the Society, even with the advantages which they desired, would be able to compete with the Hollanders. The Hamburgers and other peoples who had previously made the attempt had failed, for the Dutch were very industrious and frugal, their fish always brought the highest price, often 25 per cent above that of other nations, because they were thoroughly skilled and experienced in the industry. The freights of the Hollanders were, moreover, far lower than in English ships, as they took barrelled herrings for ballast, or even for “drink money.”
A more serious difficulty was the principle that lay at the root of the scheme—the taxation of the Dutch fishermen for the benefit of the Society. It was evidently admitted that the project would fail, even if the busses were manned by Dutchmen and the herrings cured and exported by them, unless some form of subsidy was provided. But on the threshold lay the question of the king’s right to impose a tribute on foreign fishermen. Rainsford endeavoured to help the solution by submitting a memorandum, “Touching his Majesty’s Tythe.”[269] It has some interest from the circumstance that it was the first attempt made in the reign of James to furnish historical and legal precedents for interfering with the liberty of fishing. In substance it is little more than a collection of the stories current at the time concerning the sovereignty of the sea, such as those about King Edgar, Queen Mary and Philip, and Camden’s statement about Scarborough.[270] It was also said that fishermen were compelled to pay taxes for liberty to fish in Russia, at the “Shoffland” islands and other islands belonging to the King of Sweden, in Denmark, and in Spain, where the Duke of Medina Sidonia derived a large revenue from the taxes on the tunny fishery. Rainsford reiterated the advantages of the scheme to the nation and the navy, and promised an annual revenue of £20,000 to the king, after the lapse of seven years, so long as he granted to the patentees the tribute on foreign fishermen.
About this time, whether by arrangement with the London merchants or independently, some influential persons addressed the king in denunciation of the Dutch. Sir Nicholas Hales in 1608, and again in 1609, strongly advised the king to take action against them. Their fisheries in his Majesty’s seas, he said, were worth more than the mines of gold and silver in the Indies; in one year they had sold fish in England alone to the value of £1,200,000; by their means they maintained 100,000 men with their wives and families. Then their immense shipping was a menace to the security of the realm. They came into our roads and harbours with their guns and ordnance on board: sometimes three or four hundred sail of Hollanders sheltered in St George’s Channel, where our fleet, if need were, could always strike them. The whole trade of Christendom appeared to be going into their hands. Sir Nicholas was afraid they might join with the “Turks” against us; there was even risk of invasion unless measures were taken to curb their growing power. The measures he proposed were the delivery of Flushing and Brill as pledges of security, and the payment of £4,000,000 for the king’s license to carry on their fishery for twenty-one years on the British coasts. Otherwise they should be compelled to pay a tithe of the twentieth herring or be forbidden altogether.[271] Sir William Monson—who was a Roman Catholic, had been Admiral of the Narrow Sea, and was accused by the Dutch of antipathy to them—wrote several papers in the same strain. He dwelt upon the danger to England of their increase in shipping commerce and power, all derived from the fisheries in the British seas. They had already got the Irish and Russian trade, as well as that to the Mediterranean, so that while twelve years before there were twelve English ships to one Hollander in that sea, there were now ten Hollanders to one English; they even transported the red-herrings from Yarmouth and the pilchards from Cornwall and Ireland, which was previously done by English vessels. Monson’s remedy was to obtain possession of the fisheries and build a fleet of English busses.[272]
There is no doubt James was inclined to listen with a favourable ear to the proposals to establish a native herring fishery at the expense of the Dutch. A year or two earlier he had, indeed, induced the Parliament of Scotland to pass an Act providing, among other things, that the royal burghs should equip busses for the herring fishery,—a suggestion frequently made and never well received. When the burghs were called upon to state the number of busses they were prepared to set forth, they declared that some of the coast towns already had vessels engaged in this fishery, especially in summer, “att the back of the Isles besyid the Flemeingis”; that on the coast there was more shipping for fishing than “substance” to furnish them with or mariners to serve in them; and that the most profitable and “easy” fishing was at the Isles and lochs on the west coast, though they were hindered there by the barbarous conduct of the natives. It was therefore, they said, “in vain” to ask them to fish “in the mayne sea” when they could get this easy and profitable fishing at the lochs and near the shore at all seasons, in great abundance, both summer and winter.[273]
At the time the fishery scheme was under consideration some events occurred which favoured the plans, if not of the London merchants, at least of those who were preaching hostility to the Dutch. A chorus of complaints came from Scotland and England as to the encroachments of the Hollanders near the shore on the east coast, not only interfering with the operations of the native fishermen, but breaking up and scattering the shoals of herrings. Whereas they had been prescribed “in ancient times” in Scotland from fishing nearer the land than they might see the shore from the main-tops of their vessels, they now came as near as they pleased, and would not sutler any others, whether subjects or strangers, to fish within the bounds of their fleet, which, it was said, extended over a space “at least forty Scottish miles in length and twenty broad,” thus “breaking and killing” the shoals before they could reach the mainland. They were also accused of drawing “the great fish” (by which was meant cod, saithe, &c.) from the grounds along the shore, by casting into the sea the guts of the herrings they cured on board their busses. By reason of all this the Scottish fishermen, who used to get abundant supplies at “yair awn dooris” to supply the whole country, were now scarcely able, with great pains, to supply their own families, and there was in consequence a general clamour in the country, the people affirming that “the Hollanderis fishes the meait out of thir mouthis.” The evil was felt all the more by the Scottish fishermen because they paid three “assizes” every year for their several fishings, each consisting of 1000 herrings, while the Hollanders paid nothing.[274]
Early in 1609 the fishermen of the Cinque Ports, who frequented the Yarmouth fishing in large numbers, sent a petition to the king, in which they recited their grievances. They alleged that the laws prohibiting the purchase from foreigners of fish unless sufficiently salted and casked (laws which, they pointed out, had done great good in the past, and had increased shipping and mariners) were not properly enforced. This complaint was aimed against the Dutch, who sold large quantities of fresh herrings at Yarmouth, and supplied London and other towns with fresh cod. They also complained that fishermen from the Low Countries, with a few from France, came before the fishing season and “preoccupied and environed” the best places with their shipping, enclosing, as in a circle, the shoals of herrings, and preventing the native fishermen from fishing among them. They were thus deprived of one of the best commodities of the land, and the herrings which they were prevented from catching were taken by the Hollanders and sold fresh on the English coast in contravention of the statutes. They said they were threatened with utter decay and impoverishment, and were discouraged from building barks for the Iceland fishing, which had in the past produced numbers of good mariners, to the great honour and defence of the realm. They pointed to the “ingenious dexterity of the Netherlanders, who in the care and pollicy of their State, and for the maintenance of their navigation and fishing,” had imposed a tax of fifteen shillings on every last of herrings imported by foreigners into their country; and they begged the king, by the justice of lex talionis, to do likewise, and thus to save the poor fishermen from the multitude of foreigners who oppressed them.[275] About this time complaints began to be made of cruel and harsh treatment of the native fishermen by the Dutch, but they appear to have rested on very slender grounds.[276]