Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-09-21
FISHER-FOLK.
The Largest Single Fishing Community
the World Has Ever Known.
People the Same in Regard to Dress, Gus toms,
Dialect, Mannerisms and Mode OF Lille
as Two Centuries Ago.
Copyright 1901

AFooT IN SCOTLAND.
Special Correspondence OF the Gazette.
NEwHAvEN, SCOTLAND, Aug .1s.-Wheneverwe
think at all of fsher-folk, we usually associate
them in our fancy with sea walls of sublimity or
shore-reaches of barrenness and desolation.
Sea-gulls lowering near; skeleton craft bleach
ing in wind and weather; tide-swept coves,
wind whipped and grewsome, vary the picture.
But the harvesters of the deep ever recall pict
ures of sea rage, wrath and wreck.
The most noted isher-folk in the world, these
of Newhaven, are differently environed.
Their sea- haunts upon and at the ocean mouth
of the transcendently beautiful Firth of Forth,
are of surprising loneliness. Their home
haunts are not in a dreary coast hamlet pounded
and howled at increasingly by the sea, but in
their own quaint. quiet city of 5000 souls. They
are not periodically subjects of starvation and
charity; but live in ample comfort both in their
sturdy fishing crafts and their clean picturesque
habitations. They are neither sodden or lgno-
rant. but are bright, earnest and healthy
more hopeless element OF pathos
among them than among ordinary
folk. 1t would be difficult to paint them ex
women folk who are all that save when in their
kirk brats'' or inery, of Sunday when they
will compare favoraby with any smart Ameri-
can worshipers. They are never dIunkards nor
eny other manner of swine. They do not favor
customers with Billingsgate, of the foul order at
any time. and the other sort of forgiyable objur-
cations and explosives are only ready for appll-
cation to those not possessing their own excel
lent manners. Thew speak too good English to
have pride in Scottish dialect. Their super
stitions chiefly hint at penalties for dishonesty.
In truth there is not enough about them. save
that which is upright, sturdy and fine, to attract
those who travel for the thrill of being shocked;
for they are one and all sturdily honest. humbly
God fearing, tenderly kind.
Because they have ever been represented in
the magazi ines and reviews as an odd. rough and
uncanny lot, and have found them upright.
sturdy and fine. it is a delight to let the world
know something about them and their environ
ment
AS THEY REALLY ARE.
Newhaven fishing village is very ancient
indeed In the early part OF the Pifteenf pn CEN f
| Grace. - from mite Of a chapel dedicated to
the Virgin Mary and st. James; aud e bit OF the
ruin of this ediice is still to be seen in the old
deserted battle-ground in the center Of the place
But it owes its later Importance to speculative
within on the part Of James w., who, in 1906
erected here rope-walk, docks and snip
building yard. In the latter was constructed
| that then most marvellous leviathan OF the sea,
| James ship, Great Michael, the largest
| ship the world had then known, whose sides,
| amidships were padded with solid oak ten
| feet Thick The Great Michael was 2iO feet
long and ffty-six feet wide; was armed with
| many heavy guns, and three great basslls, with
| no less than 300 moyennes, FALCONS, quar-
| falcons, Sings. pestilent serpentnes, and
double days with hacbuts. culverines, cross
bows and hand bows; was manned with 80
mariners 40 cannoniers. and 1000 soldiers; and
vas in other respects SO wonderful that TO TINS
/ Qay the monster Il IcCAlcu "hSAoNeA Hcn
| fshing-craft enters the harbor; for such is
| always 1.-THE borniest Newhaven boat syne
| Michael's time The only other noted
| incident ever occurring at Newhaven was when,
| in September, 1880 sixty stately galleys and
| other ships anchored here, and the queen
mother, with the most brilliant company ever
| assambied in Scotland sailed out of the Forth
| on her way TO visit her daughter Mary in
4 France. But the city OF Edin bprgh. whose great
] mort was and is the city of Leith. fearing the
| Growing prestige of the new haven pur-
| Chased The entire place from James ", in 1910,
| at good round sum; and for the last $50 year,.
While the little port has remained simply an ex-
| tension of old Edinburgh and Leith, up the
| south side of the Forth, Newhaven has had but
| slumberous growth. To-day it comprises 5000
/ souls over $500 of these are fishermen, fish
wives and fishers children. 1t is little world
1 by itself Its population are people by them