The fisheries of France are composed, like our 1 own, of those on the coast and those at a distance, particularly at Newfoundland. All along the north coast of France, the fisheries consist, as on our side of the Channel, of cod, mackerel, herrings, and pil chards. On the shore of the Atlantic, and still more on that of the Mediterranean, are caught great quan tities of sardines, a fish of passage, which appears periodically in shoals like the herring. The tunny, a fish not known in northern latitudes, is found in the Mediterranean in the early part of summer. It varies in weight from 10 to 25 lbs. and is in like manner caught in shoals. These home fisheries, lit tle calculated for forming seamen, have been left to their natural progress, while repeated attempts have been made by government to extend the fishery in America,—a design favoured by the early possession by France of Newfoundland and Canada, as well as by the long peace that followed the treaty of Utrecht. Towards the middle of last century the French fish eries in America employed annually about 5000 seamen, but the unsuccessful contest with England in 1756 reduced them greatly, and deprived them of their principal station, Cape Breton. The peace of 1783, concluded under better auspices, renewed their right to fish on the banks of Newfoundland, a right subsequently acknowledged by the .treaties of 1802 and 1814; and though their only permanent possessions for this purpose are the small islands of St Pierre and Miquelon in the Gulf of St Lawrence, the continuance of peace can hardly fail to give a considerable extension to this fishery. The Green land fishery,presents a less flattering prospect. It was attempted in -a former age by the inhabitants of Bayonne, and lately by those of Dunkirk,—a place much better situated for it,—but in either case the shipping employed was inconsiderable, and the whole is subject to capture and stoppage by our superior marine in time of war.
In this respect France was always inferior to Eng"hiPti* land, and a comparison is wholly out of the question, since the loss of St Domingo, and the almost total extinction of the mercantile navy of France by a war of twenty years. Since 1814 attempts have been made by the ship owners in Havre de Grace, Bordeaux, Marseilles, Nantes, St Maio, to re-estab lish their shipping, but as yet with very limited suc cess ; the deficiency of capital, the want of colonies, the fluctuations in trade, the dread which, however unfounded, is general among the present generation, that England will not long allow them to enjoy peace, having all concurred to discourage their efforts. No returns of the mercantile tonnage or seamen are made to the French parliament, but the insignifi cance of both in the foreign trade is apparent from the annual lists of vessels passing the Sound, or fre quenting the great foreign ports, such as Hamburgh, Amsterdam, Cadiz, Leghorn, New York. The in tercourse between France and America is conducted chiefly in American bottoms ; that between France and the Netherlands in Dutch ; and still more that between France and this country in British. Of the packets, that cross the Channel in such numbers since the peace, nine-tenths are British. A solitary French vessel appears, from time to time, in our ports with &cargo of provisions or of fruit. On the other hand, the coasting trade of France is very consider able, the commodities conveyed (chiefly corn from the north, and wine from the south) requiring a great deal of tonnage, and the still more bulky ar ticle of timber being occasionally transported by coasters.