Feb. 25, 18922]

well represented at Berlin; and it must be admitted that the Americans excel in the arts of fish-culture, which they carry on both on their rivers and in the sea on a truly gigantic scale. We beat the world at that,' said an American gentleman to us lately. We do in tens of thousands what you do in hundreds. One of our rivers yields as many salmon as all your streams put together.' That statement is so far true; the Americans excel in fish-breeding; and nature, in the Columbia River, has given them a wonderfully prolific salmon stream. But for all that is being done in the States in the way of pisciculture, fish are becoming scarce throughout America, and oysters less plentiful, vast as is the extent of oyster-ground across the Atlantic.

Another feature of the Berlin Exhibition which cannot be looked for in that of Edinburgh, we fear, was the Chinese collection; but that fact is only regrettable because the Chinese collection is 'curious;' it is only worth looking at as an example of the peculiar industry of a distant country. There is not much in the way of Chinese fishing-gear that we could copy in this country with the hope of its being useful to us. We could hardly fish with cormorants with any hope of commercial success, nor would their bamboo-mounted nets suit our purposes. One of the chief fishing industries of the Celestial Empire is the cuttle-fishery; nine thousand Vessels and fifty-four thousand men are engaged in this fishery alone. The chief seat of the Chinese fisheries is at Ningpo; and Mr Hart, the Inspector-general of Customs there, thinks there are eighty thousand persons engaged in the fisheries.

Coming back to the colder seas of Great Britain and the Fishery Exhibition about to be held in Edinburgh-the London Fishery-show will not take place till next year-it may be interesting to state that the annual value of the British fisheries, to the men who capture the fish, is over eleven million pounds sterling! The fish are caught by over one hundred and ten thousand fishermen and boys, who require as many as thirty-five thousand boats to carry on their work. These figures relate only to the sea-fisheries; the river-fisheries will be worth about a million pounds additional.

To pr ovide such a fleet of fishing-boats, and pply the requisite kind and amount of gear for the capture of the fish, has undoubtedly involved a large expenditure. If some of the fishery apparatus now in use could be shown, at a Fishery Exhibition, as it is used, it would doubtedly form a fine feature of the show. A herring-boat, for instance, at the present time carries a suite of nets extending fully three thousand yards in length and ten yards in depth, presenting to the fish a catching surface of thirty housand square yards. An attempt was made to how a suite of nets at the Hague, though the play had to be curtailed, for want of room. Though it would of course be impossible to show entire suite of nets duly hung, a portion of the Waverley Market of Edinburgh in which the Exhibition is to be held, might be allotted the display of a portion of netting bladdered, weighted, and hung as in the sea. A few dummy herrings might even be thrust into

the meshes, to show how they 'strike' the perpendicular net. The catching power of each herring-boat in Scotland, so far as the nets are a factor in the work, has been largely increased within the last twenty years; and it has been calculated that the total of the herring-nets now in use in the Scottish seas would, if all the nets were joined in a continuous line, extend twelve thousand miles, and cover a superficial area of seventy square miles! Those who, at a Fishery Exhibition, see only a great pile of nets heaped together in a mass, can obtain from the sight no idea whatever of the formidable character of the great perforated wall of filmy cotton that is let down into the sea to interrupt the speeding fish, and capture them in tens of thousands for the use of mankind. Nor does a show-case containing a few score hooks give anything like an idea of the long lines used for the capture of deep-sea fish; and in the same way as we desire to see a display of the herring-nets, we would like also to see a full suite of long lines baited and ready-an artificial bait could be used for action. It requires to be kept in mind, however, that a Fishery Exhibition can only be made up of what is sent to it; it is in a sense a commercial speculation, the chief exhibits being displayed as a means of attracting customers; and as for the more interesting and out-of-the-way fishery apparatus, they can only be shown if they are received. One of the most curious things of the kind we ever saw was a salmon trap which was exhibited at one of the Boulogne Fishery Exhibitions; it was made to work with the flow of the water; it was entirely self-acting; and each fish that was secured in the chamber gave notice of its capture by ringing a bell which formed part of the machinery! At the viviers of Arcachon, already alluded to, M. Boisère has so studied their construction that he is enabled to work them with very little assistance-six persons only to three hundred acres of water. If a plan of these viviers could be given at the approaching Exhibition, it would be of great interest; as would also a really good chart of the labyrinths of the extensive eel-farm of Commachio on the Adriatic Sea, and plans of the piscicultural laboratory of Huningue.

It will be a feather in the cap of the Edinburgh Fishery-show if it is able to teach us, by means of either its essays or exhibits, what we most want to know in the work of the fisheries. There are certain data in the natural history of most of our food fishes, of which, notwithstanding all that has been written and spoken on the subject, we are still ignorant. One of the great questions appertaining to the subject may be formulated here: 'At what age do these animals become reproductive, and how long is it ere their eggs come to life? How best to fish, so as only to capture those fish which have just arrived at the proper size for table use, is still an unsolved question in fishery economy; and if that point could be determined at the forthcoming Exhibition, it would signalise the accomplishment of a bit of useful work. That the most economic ways of fishing have not yet been discovered, is obvious enough to all who have had an opportunity of studying the practical work of our fisheries. In the herring-fishing season, cartloads of the ova of these fish are wasted, it being the rule to

'My dear,' returned Mr Jolly, 'I only profess to read symptoms. I do not profess to be a prophet. Sir Fawdry and young Solitair were both deeply smitten—but'

Nonsense!' said Constance ungraciously. 'But,' pursued her father, disregarding this interjection, 'people marry nowadays for money. Your face is your fortune, Constance. At least it is the better part of it, and men know it. Your brother Reginald must be provided for. By all law and justice, I am bound to deal well by Reginald. And you, my dear, must do as well as you can. Meantime, I am very favourably impressed with young Lumby-very favourably impressed indeed.

Very well, papa,' returned Constance; we shall know in time. I am not skilled in the reading of symptoms; but this affair will probably end like the rest.'

My dear,' cried her father, 'you are ridiculous -positively ridiculous. One would think, to hear you talk, that instead of being in the very freshness of your youth, you were an old woman, and had had a life of disappointments.'

'Papa,' said Constance severely, as one whose mind was made up past altering, 'the days of romance are gone and over. Sir Croesus Croesus marries Lady Midas, a fat widow with a lapdog, and admires the poor pretty Phyllis from a safe distance.'

poor

'And what becomes,' asked Mr Jolly, 'of pretty Phyllis?' 'That depends,' said Constance. 'Perhaps a Gnome from Staffordshire, or a Cyclops from Wales, runs away with her-that is, if she is lucky; perhaps, if she is silly enough, she marries Corydon, and lives in a cottage, and cultivates the virtues of cottage-life-envy and ill-temper and vicious-headache. Perhaps Corydon jilts her -being wise in time-and marries Lady Croesus, a second time widowed.'

'And so, Romance is born again,' said Mr Jolly with his wrinkled smile.

'For Lady Croesus,' said Constance. 'And there is the moral of my song, papa.'

'Which is ?'

"That when you have married twice for money, you may, if you have survived that double ordeal, marry once for liking.'

And so, Romance is born again,' said her father a second time. 'It is impossible,' he quoted, with a dim remembrance of his classic days, 'to expel Nature, even with a pitchfork.'-Constance laughed, and they rode on a little while in suence. You don't dislike young Lumby, do you?' he asked at the close of this pause, turning a somewhat anxious face upon her. 'No,' she answered carelessly. 'He is well enough.' Then there was another pause. 'My dear,' said Mr Jolly in a confidential tone, pressing his horse so near to hers, that his knee touched the off-side flap of her saddle, 'young

Lumby cannot have less finally coming to him than half a million. Even in these days of huge fortunes, half a million of money is something considerable.' Mr Jolly, like many men of limited income, had permitted himself to think of colossal fortunes more than was altogether wholesome for him, and his tone in speaking of money was always large and unconcerned. He thought of 'a few odd millions' like a Chancellor of the Exchequer, and would speak of them in the same vein.

'Considerable indeed,' returned Constance, who in monetary matters was severely practical. 'He is richer than Sir Fawdry,' said her father, 'and probably as well to do as young Solitair.'

Mr Jolly's veneration for the aristocracy naturally displayed itself in familiarity. I have no desire to be obscure. Let me explain. Mr Jolly in a lord's presence fawned upon the lord; but in the lord's absence, he used his name in an everyday fashion, to feed his own sense of his own importance. And a lesser reverence than his own for lordship could not have made the title seem important enough to do that. Therefore-so complicated a thing is snobbery—a most genuine reverence and worship bred a sometime seeming irreverence of speech. I am sometimes almost persuaded that if our House of Peers could guess the sum of snobbery which their presence creates among us, they would of their own free act abolish themselves, and spare the country much republican oratory.

'Papa,' said Constance, 'there is a vulgar fable about an old woman who counted her chickens before they were hatched. But,' she added, smiling again, the wisdom of our ancestors is wasted upon you-altogether wasted. You were counting already, you stupid dear, what could be done with half a million. I know you were.'

Mr Jolly absolutely blushed. That had been indeed the mental effort of the moment, and he had seen his daughter enthroned in Lumby Hall, and himself freed of all anxieties. 'One counts many unhatched chickens,' said he, recovering himself. It is the privilege of mankind to hope. When I see you settled, my dear,' he added almost with pathos, 'I can die in peace.'

'Pray,' said Constance, make the settlement less remote.'

The satire of this feminine thrust was too subtle for Mr Jolly; but in the fullness of hope he took a more cheerful tone. 'Croesus is coming along, my dear-plain Mister Croesus; but not much the worse for that, after all.'

'Croesus,' said Constance, 'will marry Lady Midas, as already arranged.'

'And Phyllis?' said her sire, reverting to the former parable.

'And Phyllis will die an old maid.' There was not a creature in sight in all the widespread fields. A hundred yards away, the lane in which they rode dipped suddenly with a curve, and the hedge rose high, thick with prickly holly leaves and red berries. The air was as blithe and soft as that of a spring day. A southerly wind and a cloudy sky,' with rifts of soft blue in it, and the fresh gentle breath of the soil, and once or twice across the fields the tongue of the distant pack, proclaimed it a hunting morning. Phyllis, said Constance roguishly, 'will die an

all

Ilka lassie has a laddie;

Nane, they say, hae I;

But a' the lads they smile at me When comin' through the rye.

very

Her voice was just as perfect as her face-a rich and mellow mezzo-soprano, not of so rare a type as her beauty, but as perfect of its kind. Now, it happened, as if set there as a warning to young ladies against the practice of singing in the open air, which, though natural to youth and good spirits, is opposed to the dictates of fashionable reserve-it happened that a young man stood at that moment in the hollow beyond the high hedge of holly. He had alighted from his horse, and was anxiously inspecting a hoof, and making himself a little muddy in the process, when the first notes of the sweet voice struck upon his ear. He raised himself, let go the horse's foot, and listened. The little carol was sung with exquisite grace and archness, and the young man smiled.

'If your face matches your voice,' he said to himself, you won't have to mourn long, young lady.' When the voice ceased, the sound of hoofbeats on the soft road became audible; and down the slope and round the bend in the lane came Mr Jolly and his daughter. Now, no man can paint in words a pretty woman; and even Leigh Hunt's charming apology for failure will not greatly help him:

Let each man fancy, looking down, the brow He loves the best, and think he sees it now. For some of us have loved homely women in our time-what a provision of Nature that is to be thankful for !-and have found a beauty beyond beauty, in plain faces. But if no word-painter can show you a reliable, recognisable portrait of a pretty girl, what is to be done when he comes to actual loveliness? What can he do beyond pleading the inutility of his art-its utter helplessness? Yet, I would fain give you some semblance to the picture to carry in your mind. Fancy, then, a form-not too Juno-like, but ripe and round-clad in a habit of black broadcloth, with scarcely a single crease or wrinkle from the waist upwards; a form which swayed with the horse's motion, and yet preserved a sense of firmness-the little gloved hands low down with a look of mastery at rest; the little hat raking forward slightly, with an air not altogether coquettish, on a head altogether stately, with one superb knot of living gold behind; a face charming in all its lines, and fresh with hues of health and airs of heaven, and on the face a little touch of fun, of pride, of wonder-a startled look, with hauteur and humour in it, at remembrance of the song and the sudden encountering of this unexpected stranger. And beneath this vision, a steed of price, who bore the lady as though he loved her and were proud of her, with high stately step, free yet mincing, like a cavalier in a minuet. This was the sight which broke on the eyes of Valentine Strange, when Constance and her father-whom, by the way, you may, if you choose, leave out of the picture-came dancing round the holly hedge at the bend of the lane.

Val raised his hat. 'I beg your pardon,' he

caught a stone, and gone dead-lame. I see that you have a hoof-picker on your saddle; and I should be awfully obliged if you would lend it to me for a moment.-I'm sure I'm very sorry to detain you.'

'Not at all,' said Mr Jolly, fumbling at the strap which held the hook, with his gloved fingers.

Allow me,' said Val; and possessing himself of the hoof-picker, deftly whipped out the stone from his horse's hoof, and restored the little implement to its place with a cordial Thank you.'

'Not at all,' said Mr Jolly once more with great Constance had ridden on during this majesty. pause, and was perhaps two hundred yards ahead, when Mr Jolly, returning Val's salute, rode on Mr again, and in little space overtook her. Strange meantime having inspected all his gearing, remounted, and went rocketing up the lane in pursuit.

'I

What a beauty!' said Val to himself. must have another look at her.' Reaching the lady and her father, he flourished off his hat once more, and drew in his horse to a walk. Want of self-possession had never been among Val's failings. 'Immensely obliged to you, sir,' he said. 'It was a most fortunate thing for me that you came by just then.'

Mr Jolly bowed, and branched off at a lane which bore to the left. 'Good-morning,' from Mr Jolly.

'Good-morning.-And again, thanks,' from Val. (To be continued.)

NEWGATE PAST AND PRESENT.

IN TWO PARTS.-PART II.

THE shocking state of the prison, and the consequent frequent outbreaks of the malignant form of typhus known as 'jail-fever,' which in 1750 spread to the Old Bailey Courthouse, and caused the deaths of Baron Clark, Sir Thomas Abney, the Lord Mayor, some of the jury, several barristers, and a number of the spectators, led to an examination of the building in 1770; the result being that it was pronounced 'so old and ruinous that it was neither capable of improvement nor tolerable repair. A government vote of fifty thousand pounds, coupled with the gift by the City of additional ground for the enlargement of the jail, hastened the execution of the sentence of demolition upon Old Newgate. The task of rebuilding the jail was intrusted to Dance, the architect of the Mansion House; and the first stone of the new erection was laid by Alderman Beckford in 1770.

The work proceeded slowly; and the new prison was not yet completed, nor 'Old Newgate' entirely removed, when the outbreak of the Gordon Riots in 1780 added a new chapter to its history. The so-called Protestant Association having presented their absurd 'No Popery' petition to the Commons, and having failed to secure more than six votes in its favour, an unruly mob took possession of the streets, and for five days carried on a work of wholesale plunder and destruction. On the 6th of

the scene.

June, having destroyed several Roman Catholic chapels, and the houses of many of the leading Romanists, they turned their attention to Newgate, whose governor, Mr Akerman, having received warning of the danger, had made hasty preparations for their reception. The Old Bailey Sessions Paper graphically describes The attack commenced on Akerman's house, which was soon broken into and fired, and his furniture dragged into the street, and broken up to supply torches and firewood for further mischief. An organised attack was then made on the various prison gates; but finding them too strong to be forced, the rioters piled the debris of Akerman's furniture against them, and fired the pile. The warders made heroic efforts to protect the gates, which they deluged with water, to prevent the metalwork from melting; but meanwhile the flames from the governor's house spread to the wards; defence became hopeless; the mob entered the burning jail, liberated the prisoners-some of them showing familiar knowledge of the intricate interior of the prison-and finally reduced all that was combustible of the building to ashes. So perished the last remains of 'Old Newgate.'

The new jail, then in course of erection, having suffered severely in the fire, the repairs were rapidly pushed forward; but it was not until three years later that the new prison was ready to receive its inmates, having cost by that time nearly double the original government grant of fifty thousand pounds. Principally owing to the representations of John Howard, who, in the course of his term of office as Sheriff, had made it his business to inquire fully into the condition and working of the jail, and had reported the results of his investigation to parliament, the principles upon which the new building was constructed were a great improvement upon those of 'Old Newgate. But many of the worst evils remained, no provision being made for the classification of the prisoners; while the sanitary arrangements were so bad that outbreaks of 'jail-fever' were still frequent.

At the commencement of the present century, a more virulent outbreak than usual, at a time when there were no less than eight hundred prisoners within the walls, led to a resolution of the Council to remove the Debtors' prison; and this very necessary step was carried out in 1815, prisoners of that class being removed to the adjacent Compter in Giltspur Street. This building-now no more-had also been erected by Dance, to take the place of the old Wood Street Compter; but, so far as the debtors were concerned, the change was hardly for the better, their new quarters being described as 'one of the worst managed and least secure of the metropolitan prisons.' Newgate was, however, relieved of the evil of over-crowding, which had been an active agent in the spreading of disease, both physical and mental; and the first tep was thus taken towards improving the condition both of the prison and of its inmates.

The present jail is a solid, stone-built edifice, designed with a view to security rather than beauty; but the massive style of its architecture entitles it, externally at least, to a foremost place

among the buildings of the City. Its principal front is three hundred feet in length, and the depth is one hundred and ninety-two feet, a portion of the older erection extending a further distance of fifty feet in Newgate Street. Like its predecessor, it consists of three distinct portions; the centre, containing the residence of the governor, with the chapel behind it, being flanked by two wings, consisting of yards, wards, and cells for the confinement of the prisoners. The internal arrangements have been completely remodelled of late years, to provide means for complete separation of the prisoners.

On the opening of the new jail, the scene of execution was transferred from Tyburn to the exterior of Newgate, the drop being erected outside the Debtors' Door. This continued to be the customary place of execution until the passing of the Act of 1864 abolishing public executions, since which, the sentence of death has always been carried out within the walls. This salutary change must have caused a considerable reduction in the incomes of householders whose windows overlooked the fatal Debtors' Door, as the interest shown by the public in the horrible spectacle of an execution, enabled occupants of houses in the Old Bailey to reap a golden harvest on those occasions. It is said that no less than twelve pounds was on one occasion paid for the privilege of witnessing an execution from the first-floor windows of one of these houses; and even the roofs used to be crowded, for hours beforehand, with eager spectators; while the street itself was blocked with carts and carriages, the occupants of which beguiled the time of waiting with cards and refreshment.

Though the building itself was an improvement upon its predecessor, the Reports of the Inspectors of Prisons, in the early days of the present jail, show that, so far as the management of the inmates was concerned, Howard's efforts had been of little or no avail. As we have mentioned, no classification of the prisoners was yet attempted. Robberies continued to be planned, and the uninitiated were bullied, as before. The Parliamentary Report of 1814, speaking of the chaplain, Dr Forde, says: 'He knows nothing of the state of morals in the prison; never sees any of the prisoners in private; never knows that any have been sick till he gets warning to attend their funeral; and does not go to the infirmary, for it is not in his instructions.' Attendance at the chapel was entirely voluntary; gambling, drinking, and the like, were the only occupations; and the old prisoners instructed the younger ones in the deftest feats of robbery.

The cause of the female prisoners was taken up in 1817 by Mrs Fry, the female Howard,' under whose auspices a Society, known as the 'Ladies Prison-Visiting Association,' was formed, the unremitting and unselfish efforts of whose members met with almost incredible success. Not only was the moral welfare of the unfortunate women promoted, but they were also encouraged to spend their time in various sorts of useful work, the proceeds of the sale of which were employed, partly in bettering their condition while in jail, and partly in securing for them honest employment on the expiration of their terms of imprisonment.

On the male side, however, there was no change for the better; and in 1836 the Inspectors of