T h r e a d .
Sa lm o n .
Each piece is thirty-eight yards long, and numbered from VIII,
to I. No.-VIII. weighs twenty-four pounds, and every piectj
down to No. I, gains three pounds in the piece. The thread for
this cloth is fpun here, not by the common wheel, but the hands,
Women are employed, who have the flax placed round their waftes
twift a thread with each hand as they recede from a wheel,- turned
by a boy at the end of a great room.
Coarfe cloth for fhirts for the foldiery is alfo made here; he.
fides this, coarfe linens, which are fent to London or Manchefiet t
be printed; and cottons, for the fame purpofe, are printed at Ptrli,
Great quantities of fine linen, lawns and cambricks are manufac,
tured in this town, the laft from two fhillings and fixpence to fi?e
ihillings a yard. Diapers and®Ofnaburghs make up the fum d
the weavers employ; which are exported to London, and from
thence to the IVeJt-Indies.
Much thread is fpun here, from two fhillings and fixpence it
five fhillings a pound. It is fpun both in the town and.countrj,
and brought here by the rural fpiniters to be cleaned and made
into parcels; and much of it is coloured here.
The bleachery is very confiderable, and is the property of tk
town: it is not only ufed by the manufacturers, but by private
families, for the drying of their linen ; all paying a certain fee to the
perfon who rents it from the magiftrates. The men pride them-
felyes on the beauty of their linen, both wearing and houiholdt
and with greater reafon, as it- is the effeft of the fkill and d
duftry of their fpoufes, who fully emulate the character of the good;
wife, fo admirably defcribed by the wifeft of men.
The falmon fifhery of thefe parts is very confiderable; from ft
hundrd
hundred to a thoufand barrels áre annually exported, valued at three
Bounds each; and about fifteen hundred pounds worth of kitted
•or pickled fifh. Much of the frefh fifh is fold into the country,
I f r o m three halfpence to twopence-halfpenny a pound. The fifhery
Commences the fecond of February, and ends at Michaelmas. Its importance
has been eonfidered in very early times, and the legislature
confulted its prefervation by mbit fevere penalties *.
■ Quantities of white-fifh, fuch as the cod kind, turbots, &c.
might be taken on the great fand banks off this coaft. The long
\fortys extend parallel to i t ; and beyond that lie Montrofe pits f ,
a great bank with fix pits in it of uncommon depths, and Angular
in their fituation. They are from forty to a hundred fathom deep,
Reckoning from the furface of the water, and poffibly may be
fubmarine fwallows. Thefe banks fwarm with fifh, but are fhame-
fully négleéted, or left perhaps to foreigners. In the laft century
#baut five' hundred barks and boats, which during winter were
employed in the herring fifhery on thefe coafts, during lpring and
part of fummer, turned their thoughts to the capture of cod and
fingj;, and after curing, carried their cargoes to Holland, Ham-
Wrgh, into the Baltic, to England and to France. By fome mif-
Chance this fifhery was loft; and the Hollanders and Hamburghers
fairly beat the natives out of their trade. In the time of Henry
■III. England was fupplied' with fait fifh from this market: the
mabberdyn (Aberdeen)'fifh was an article in every great larder §.
■ * Vide Tour, 1769.
■ t Hammnd’ s chart o f the North Sea.
■t Accempt current between England and Scotland, p. e6.
§ Northumberland Houlhold Book.
, U Incredible
W h i t e -F i s h *