1204. Have you ever represented their case to the merchants, and said that they ought to pay them in cash?-No. It is no use saying anything of the kind, because the merchants would not give them money. There is one thing I should like to say with regard to the Faroe fishing. We come into the town of Lerwick, or any other port in Shetland where the vessels happen be fitting out, and commence to fit the vessels so as to have them ready for sea. We have to go on board, and have only an allowance of one pound of bread a day for every day we are on board the vessel. We have nothing else to live on during the time we are fitting out the vessels, and if we are absent on any account whatever during the time the vessels are being fitted out they charge 2s., 6d. per day for that, in order to put a man in our place. 1205. Is not that merely a part of your bargain with the merchants for whom you engage to fish?-It is part of the bargain, but it is a very bad part. 1206. If you did not choose to make a bargain of that kind, you would not be bound to carry it out?-That is true; but the poor people here cannot strike as they do in England: because they are so poor, the merchants can just do as they please with them. 1207. Did you sign the obligation eight years ago which has been spoken to by the previous witnesses?-No. 1208. Do you go in for the home fishing at all?-Yes; I am a fisherman in the Burra Isles. 1209. Do you consider yourself bound to fish only for Messrs. Hay in the home fishing?-I do. 1210. Have you ever been told so by Messrs. Hay?-Yes, I have been told that; and there was a document made out, but I did not sign it. I have got no notice about the matter since then, because we knew that we had to carry on the fishing in the same way. 1211. Have you ever paid liberty money?-No, I never had anybody to pay it for, and I never paid for myself. 1212. Have you ever asked to have the price of your fish fixed at the beginning of the season?-No. 1213. Is there not a feeling among the men, that that would be a better mode of dealing than the present?-We durst not go in for anything of the kind. 1214. Would it not be a better plan in the Faroe fishing?-We could not do anything of the kind there, because the merchants don't know what the price of the fish will be until they can be sold. The market may rise. 1215. You take your chance of the markets there-Yes; whatever chance the merchant gets, we get too. We run shares with the merchants in that fishing. 1216. You are not paid at so much per cwt.?-No; we have shares. One half of the fish that are brought in by the vessel belongs to the crew, and the other half belongs to the owners. 1217. Then you are not serving for wages there at all?-No; they give us wages if we have to go to Iceland in the fall of the year but they give no wages for the summer fishing at Faroe. It is just a partnership that is made up for the fish that are caught.