'I trust it will be seen from my evidence as to my own practice that I approve of making settlements as often as practicable, in order to teach the people self-reliance and provident habits, and also to give them a chance to lay out their earnings to the best advantage.
' I have no wish to disparage this people. On the contrary, I think they deserve very great praise for being what they are under very unfavourable circumstances, and if this were the proper place I would have great pleasure in saying a good deal on this point; but though their general intelligence is perhaps superior to that of the same class in any other part of the country, I have not met with much proficiency in arithmetic among old and middle-aged men especially; and it is not difficult to see from the evidence the small amount of their experience in handling accounts, and the want of inducements to cultivate the art of book-keeping.'
Scalloway, January 22, 1872, Rev. NICOL NICOLSON, examined.
11,871. You are a clergyman of the Independent Church in Scalloway?-I am. I have been twenty-two years here, first as missionary, and afterwards as pastor of a church.
11,872. Are your people mostly engaged in fishing?-Some of them are.
11,873. I suppose you are intimately acquainted with the condition of the fishing population of this district?-It appears to me by this time that I am not so well acquainted with it as I thought, because I have been hearing things coming out that I did not understand to be the case before the evidence was given.
11,874. Were you aware of the fact that very few fishermen received a large part of their earnings in money?-I understood that all of them who were out of debt got money from the merchants when they wanted it. I was once a fisherman myself, and that was the way in which I was dealt with. I did not think that in any of the shops here the men who had cash in the merchant's hands, and who were in necessity for it would not have got it.
11,875. Do you not think it would be better for the fishermen to be paid for their fish more frequently than once a year?-There are certain boats that deliver their fish weekly, and certainly it would be better for the men in them to be paid weekly; but there are a great many of the fishermen employed in smacks, from which they do not come ashore weekly, nor monthly.
11,876. Do you mean that the Faroe fishermen cannot be paid at short intervals?-I mean that those who fit out smacks and agree with men to fish on board of them for the season, cannot bring about a settlement with them until the end of the season.
11,877. But would it not be expedient for a man who is engaged in the home fishing, and who comes ashore every two or three days, to have his money paid to him at shorter intervals than those at which he now gets it, so that he might use it at his own discretion?-It has come under my observation that many crews who were ready to fish had no boat nor lines until they went to a merchant who would supply them with them, and then they made an agreement with that merchant to fish for him. They are in debt before they begin, and how can they be paid until the merchant sees his boat and lines clear?-Until they are cleared, he cannot afford to pay the men.