We remained until the following day, that we might see the fish caught. Our friend the skipper gave us a great deal of information about trawlers. The Yarmouth fleet consists of several hundred vessels, ranging from fifty to seventy tons. They have increased rapidly. Fifty years ago, there were none belonging to Great Yarmouth. They only form a small portion of English and Irish trawling vessels. Many hundred sail leave the Thames, the Humber, Scarborough, and Lowestoft, to fish in the North Sea; while several other places send out fifty or sixty vessels to the English or Irish Channels, manned by some thousands of fishermen. It is calculated that they supply the English markets daily with three or four hundred tons of fish.
The beam trawl consists of a triangular purse-shaped net, about seventy feet long, forty wide at the mouth, gradually diminishing to four or five at the commencement of the cod, as the smaller end is called. This part of the trawl, about ten feet long, is of a uniform breadth to the extremity, which is closed by a draw-rope, like the string of a purse. The upper part of the mouth is made fast to a beam about forty feet in length, which keeps the net open. This beam is supported by two upright iron frames, three feet in height, known as the trawl heads, or irons; the lower being flattened, to rest on the ground. The under side of the net is made with a curved margin. The outside is guarded from chafing, when the trawl is being worked over the bottom, by pieces of old net. The meshes vary in size according to the part of the trawl. Near the mouth, they are four inches square, and in the cod, an inch and a quarter. The trawl is hauled along by a bridle, that is to say, by two ropes of about fifteen fathoms each, which are fastened to the ends of the trawl heads, and unite at a warp, one hundred and fifty fathoms
long, which serves to haul the net along. Trawling, as a rule, is carried on in the direction of the tide, although sometimes across it, but never against a stream. It is usually kept down for one tide, and its rate of progress is generally from half a mile to two miles an hour faster than that of the stream. The fish caught are turbot, skate, soles, though others are occasionally taken in the net. The trawl can only be used with advantage on smooth ground; and, of course, a sandy bottom is preferred, not only from that being the usual resort of several valuable kinds of ground fish, but from the less danger there is on such a surface of tearing the net to pieces.
Formerly, the fish as soon as they were caught, were sent to market in fast-sailing cutters, but now steamers are generally employed; the fish, as soon as collected, being packed in ice. The trawlers themselves stay out for six weeks at a time, in all seasons of the year. They are remarkably fine vessels, and capable of standing a great deal of rough work; and a hardier set of men than their crews can scarcely anywhere be found. Steam trawlers are gradually coming into use, being independent of wind and weather, and one boat is capable of doing the work of several ordinary vessels.
Chapter Thirteen.
Safe in Port.
Steering for Harwich after we had left the fleet, we passed, at a distance, the handsome town of Lowestoft, from which a considerable fishing-fleet sails, and then Aldborough, an ancient seaport, with a number of new houses near it. When off Orford, on the Suffolk coast, papa told us that we were crossing the submarine telegraph line which runs from thence to the Hague. We had also passed another, which extends from Cromer to Emden.