Second Shetland Truck System Report Part 136

5117. Have you any pa.s.s-book?-No, I don't keep any pa.s.s-book.

5118. Is your account read over to you at settlement time?-Yes.

5119. And you see that it is correct?-Yes; so far as my judgment leads me.

5120. But you say you don't get many goods at the store: is that because you can get them cheaper elsewhere?-Perhaps that is sometimes the reason, and sometimes I don't require the things which are there. I always take my fis.h.i.+ng materials, lines and hooks, and other things of that kind, from the store.

5121. Are these things reasonably priced?-We suppose they are much the same as in other places in the neighbourhood.

Lerwick, January 9, 1872, HENRY LESLIE, examined.

5122. You are a fisherman, and a tenant under Grierson at Gord?-I am.

5123. You have heard the evidence of Flawes and the others?- Yes.

5124. Do you agree with it, so far as you know?-Yes.

5125. You know the facts which have been stated by them to be true?-Yes.

5126. Have you been a long time a tenant on that estate?-Yes; for fifty years at any rate.

5127. At the commencement of that period, were you free to fish to any one you liked?-No; there has always been a bond on that estate to fish to Mr. Grierson, or to any one to whom the fish were let. That has been the case all my time, and I have been more than sixty years there.

5128. Have you fished to anybody else during any part of that time?-No; it was always to him. There were three years when Mr. Bruce and Mr Grierson were in company together.

5129. But before that you were not free?-No; I never knew a time when we were free all the time I have been there.

5130. Who did you fish to before that?-To Mr. Grierson and to his father. I fished to the present Mr. Grierson's grandfather, and I was at the beach to him.

5131. Was he a fish-curer and fish-merchant also?-Yes.

[Page 127]

5132. Was that property ever set in tack to a fish-merchant?-Yes; but that was before my day.

5133. Has the obligation to fish always been a part of the condition on which you held your land?-Yes.

5134. Were you present at the time when young Mr. Grierson intimated to the tenants that he was taking the fis.h.i.+ng into his own hands?-Yes; I and every man and boy on the estate were all a.s.sembled in the same room, and we all heard the same agreement read

5135. Was not that the beginning of the present state of things under which you are now bound to fish?-Yes.

5136. Then you were free before that?-No, we were not free; but we wrought upon a different scale.

5137. Were you bound at that time to fish for Mr. Grierson?-Yes.

5138. Is there anything you wish to add to the statement which the other men have made about the present state of things?-I have nothing to add to what the other Quendale men have stated.

5139. Have you been getting meal from Mr. Grierson's store?- No; I have got none there for the last two years. I required none during that time.

5140. Have you had plenty to supply you from your own ground?-Yes; or I had bought it at a roup when other people were going out.

Lerwick, January 9, 1872, PETER MOUAT SANDISON, examined.

5141. You are inspector of poor in the parish of Fetlar and North Yell?-I am.

5142. You were formerly engaged in the fish-curing trade?-I was, for a considerable time.

5143. Have you heard the evidence of any of the witnesses who have been examined here to-day?-I have.

5144. Was the mode of paying for fish, and the way in which the accounts of the fishermen were settled at the end of the year, much the same in Yell when you were engaged in the business as you have heard described?-Yes, the settlement was much the same.

5145. Was it made about the same season of the year?-It was generally made about 20th November on towards the end of the year.

5146. Does the fisherman who is employed there by a merchant usually open an account in that merchant's books for provisions and soft goods and other things which he wants for his family?- Yes, he does, almost invariably.

5147. In your experience, is that account pretty nearly even on the two sides, or is there a balance due on the one side or on the other at the end of the year?-That, of course, depends a great deal upon the party who is running the account. There is a difference in men as well as in merchants and fish-curers. Some have larger families and require a great deal more supplies than others. Some have smaller families, and the produce of their own farms can serve them for a longer period in the year than others. From various causes the amount of their supplies is very different; but for the last three years I should say there have been only about 20 to 25 per cent of them who have not had money to get at settlement.

5148. It has been said that it is an important thing for the success of a merchant to get his fishermen into debt to him, so that he may secure their services for the succeeding year: would you consider that a safe policy to pursue on the part of a merchant?-I was a fish-curer and merchant for twelve years myself, and I am always considered it to be the best policy to have clear men

5149. Did you find that, as a rule, the best men were clear in your books?-Decidedly. I never found that debt afforded me any hold whatever upon a man.

5150. Then you found the case to be rather the reverse of what I have stated?-Yes; and the reason why I think it was the reverse is, that no man was in debt who could help it, and generally a man who was in debt was found to be an extravagant, careless man, or there was something wrong with him. Whenever a man got a certain depth into debt, he did not care how much deeper he went; and if I refused him further supplies at the shop, then he just went to another merchant.

5151. Or he might go south?-Occasionally he did, but not often.

These kind of men don't go south.

5152. But if he went to another man, you could charge him for your debt?-Yes; my only recourse was to summon him; but what was the use of doing that. I would only have lost the expense of my summons, because he had nothing that I could take from him; or if he had anything, his landlord generally came in with his right of hypothec.

5153. Could you not arrest the proceeds of his fis.h.i.+ng in the hands of the other merchant to whom he had gone?-No; I think that is not legal. I have tried it, but I could not succeed. A considerable number of the men who left me one year went to another fishcurer, who happened to be their own proprietor. He had not been curing fish previously. I summoned several of them; and with one of them especially I had a case in court in Lerwick for a considerable time. It was ultimately decided that the merchant, as proprietor, should pay the expense to which I had been at; but as to the account, I did not get one penny of it. I got my expenses and nothing more. I give it up as hopeless case.

5154. Had these fishermen been obliged to leave your service and go to fish for their proprietor?-Yes; at that time they were obliged to do so.

5155. He had regarded it as part of the obligation under which they held their land that they should fish for him?-He had not been carrying on the fis.h.i.+ng previously; and he allowed the men to fish for me, or, least, for the firm which I was conducting; but when he took the fis.h.i.+ng into his own hands, he required his men to fish for himself.

5156. I suppose he agreed to pay the expenses of the case you mentioned because he felt it was some hards.h.i.+p to you to deprive you of the services of these men?-It was his lawyer and mine, I think, who agreed together about the expenses.

5157. Was the proprietor to whom you refer Mr. Henderson?-No.

5158. Was it Mr M'Queen?-No.

5159. Was he a proprietor in Yell?-Yes.

5160. How many fishermen did you generally employ?-At one time I employed 90.

5161. Would the whole of these men have accounts in your shop books?-Yes.