A second reason why fisheries have developed in high latitudes is that fishing takes a great deal of energy. On the sea, as on the land, the development of new resources waits for the active people of the North. The adventurous spirit of the northerners seems to lead them to go to sea out of sheer curiosity even if there is no other reason.
(b) Fisheries and Agriculture.—Another reason for the develop ment of fisheries in high latitudes is that agriculture is there difficult. In cool northern lands like Norway or Newfoundland only a scanty living can be obtained from agriculture, partly because the land is hilly, but still more because the climate is too cool. Therefore such people are forced out onto the sea. In a less degree the same is true of New England, England, Brittany, and Japan.
(c) Fisheries and Submerged Coasts.—Along some coasts the land has recently been submerged. On such drowned coasts the water has filled the valleys with bays and left the ridges as headlands or islands. In North America such coasts are found along the north Atlantic shore from Virginia to Labrador, and on the Pacific coast north of San Francisco. In Eurasia they are found around the North Sea and northward to Scandinavia, and in Japan and the regions farther north. On submerged shores innumerable little harbors tempt people to keep boats. The island headlands arouse curiosity and lead people on and on. When storms arise an island or a bay usually offers shelter. The land behind the coast is apt to be hilly, so that people are fOrced to seek the level land along the shore. Thus in such surroundings many conditions combine to cause a large portion of the people to be familiar with the sea, and to give them confidence to undertake short trips within sight of land, and then long adven turous voyages across the ocean.
Fisheries as a School of Seamanship.—On such voyages no one can succeed except men who have learned the art of bravely enduring difficulties and who have great strength and courage. On the Newfoundland Banks, for example, the fishing fleet, partly steamers and partly schooners, often lies for weeks in the cold fogs. On the Banks the fishermen are exposed to the danger of being run down by great ocean "liners," for the fishing grounds are near the route from England to America. Icebergs often bear down upon a boat and some times overwhelm it before they are seen. In the fog the small boats that are sent out to take the fish from the trawls and rebait the hooks occasionally lose their bearings, and may never be able to get back.
Even when the boats are in no danger, the work is miserably wet, cold, and tiresome. Ages of such fishing have bred courageous quali ties in New England, the Maritime Provinces of Canada, Norway, Great Britain, and Japan. This has greatly helped to give those regions a foremost -rank in commerce. The fishing fleets are the school of seamanship, and from them come the men who make it possible for a great fleet of merchantmen to be developed.
Norway furnishes the best example of the effect of geographical conditions upon fishing and thus upon commerce. Her abundant harbors, bracing northern climate, and agricultural poverty cause her to have a merchant marine surpassed only by those of the far more populous countries such as Britain and the United States. Italy illustrates the matter in another way. The coasts of Italy are not particularly well supplied with harbors and the land is fertile. Accordingly, from the days of Caesar to our own, Italian ships have been largely manned by sailors from the submerged and relatively sterile Dalmatian coast on the other side of the Adriatic Sea. This condition led to a serious quarrel at the end of the Great War. Italy wanted to keep the Dalmatian coast, especially Fiume, because of the little Italian seaports along it, but the other powers thought Jugo-Slavia ought to have this coast.
(6) Oceans as Barriers.—From the earliest times the ocean has been a barrier, but its importance in this respect is steadily decreas ing. For thousands of years the Atlantic, the Pacific, and the other oceans were such barriers that people never crossed them. That is one chief reason why the race of men and the species of animals and plants in Australia are so different from those of the other continents. That is also the reason why the great land mass on one side of the world is called the Old World, while the two continents on the other side are the New. Not till 1492 did any Europeans except the Norse cross the Atlantic barrier to the strange lands of America. They marveled at the Red Men, they were surprised to find a new grain known as maize, a new vegetable called the potato, a weed which people smoked in pipes, and a host of other things which were un known to them because they had not been able to cross the water.