THE SALTGATE REGISTER OF VESSELS
Being the Harbour-Master's Roll of All Bottoms Berthed at Saltgate, Kept Continuously Since the Year 1490.
A found paper. Copied out fair by the Harbour-Master's clerk, as required, every fifty years, from the roll before it. The clerk is not required to comment and does not.
A NOTE ON THE KEEPING OF THIS ROLL. The Harbour-Master keeps it because the tolls are levied by the ton and the Crown wants its money. It has been kept without a break for four hundred years, which makes it the oldest unbroken record in the Kingdom of Sogmarsh — older than the castle's own accounts, older than the Committee, older than the ledgers at Murkminster.
Nobody has ever read it end to end. It is a tax document. Why would you.
THE ROLL, IN SUMMARY, BY THE HALF-CENTURY
| Year | Vessels berthed | Largest vessel | Rig | Longest voyage recorded that half-century |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1490 | 61 | The Constance of Saltgate — 340 tons | Full-rigged, three masts | Beyond the mists. Returned. Two years, four months. |
| 1540 | 58 | The Brave Endeavour — 310 tons | Full-rigged, three masts | Beyond the mists. Returned. |
| 1590 | 54 | The Widow's Hope — 280 tons | Three masts | Beyond the mists. Did not return. |
| 1640 | 49 | The Perseverance — 210 tons | Two masts | To the deep water, and back. Eleven months. |
| 1690 | 44 | The Good Intent — 160 tons | Two masts | To the deep water. Nine months. |
| 1740 | 38 | The Sufficient — 95 tons | Single mast, decked | To the far fishing. Five months. |
| 1790 | 31 | The Adequate — 60 tons | Single mast, decked | To the far fishing. Three months. |
| 1840 | 26 | The Handy — 34 tons | Single mast, half-decked | Coastwise. Six weeks. |
| 1890 | 22 | The Little Sister — 19 tons | Single mast, open | Coastwise. Nine days. |
| This year | 19 | The Two Brothers — 14 tons | Single mast, open | Coastwise. Four days, and back before the weather. |
THE HARBOUR-MASTER'S REMARKS, AS REQUIRED BY THE CROWN
On the decline in tonnage. The Crown has enquired, twice, why the tolls are down. The Harbour-Master replies, as his father replied, and his father before him: the boats are smaller.
On why the boats are smaller. Because that is the size of boat we build.
On why that is the size of boat we build. Because that is the size of boat we need. A boat that goes out four days and comes back is a boat that a man can crew with his brother, and mend himself, and pay for. A boat of three hundred tons wants sixty men, and a yard, and rope-walks, and a shipwright who has served seven years, and there has not been a shipwright in Saltgate since the yards went over to repair.
On when the yards went over to repair. They did not go over on any particular day. There is no order in this office instructing it. They simply stopped laying down new keels, at some point, over a long time, and everybody was perfectly content about it, and nobody remembers deciding.
On the loss of the greater voyages. There is no loss to report. Nobody has been prevented from sailing beyond the mists. Nobody has been forbidden it. Nobody has asked to.
AN ENTRY FROM 1490, COPIED FAIR AS REQUIRED, IN A HAND THAT IS NO LONGER USED
The Constance is home, and the whole town on the quay, and Master Weir says the far country is green and the people there are kind and they have a word for us which means "the ones from the wet".
He is to go out again in the spring, and take his boy, and there is not a family in Saltgate has not asked to go, and he cannot take the half of them.
God be praised. We are not so far from anywhere after all.
AN ENTRY FROM THIS YEAR, IN THE PRESENT CLERK'S HAND
The Two Brothers is home. Fourteen tons. Four days out, coastwise, and a fair catch.
Old Weir's people still keep the name, up the hill. There is a boy in that house who asked me last week what the word was — the one the far country had for us — and I did not know it, and I asked about, and nobody knows it.
I told him it was likely nothing. He seemed satisfied.
There is talk of the herring moving. Nothing else to report.
THE ROLL IS THE ROLL. THE TOLLS ARE CORRECTLY LEVIED. NOTHING FURTHER IS REQUIRED OF THIS OFFICE.