Fishing port

“ The whale-fishery has been fairly beaten out of the field by oil-spouting rocks. Why should we brave the perils of the Arctic circle when by sinking a tube in Pennsylvania we may strike a fellow of a thousand barrels, and wax rich while asleep? New London, Nantucket, New Bedford, and Edgartown have answered. The cod and mackerel fisheries have dwindled into like insignificance, say Marblehead, Gloucester, and all fishing ports along shore. ”

“ The port, which is protected from the west winds by the height known as the Côte de Grâce, consists of the tidal harbour and four floating basins—The West basin, dating from the 17th century, and the Centre, East and Carnot basins. A reservoir affords the means of sluicing the channel and supplying the basins. The surface available for vessels is about 27 acres. Numerous fishing and coasting vessels frequent the harbour. ”

“ In this necessary employment of fishing, we frequently saw a woman with two or three children in a miserable boat, the highest part of which was not six inches above the surface of the water, washing almost in the edge of a surf, which would frighten an old seaman to come near, in a good and manageable vessel. The youngest child, if very small, lies across the mother's lap, from whence, although she is fully employed in fishing, it cannot fall ”

“ The fishing is conducted in boats, each carrying five men; hundreds of these boats may sometimes be seen engaged at the same time three or four leagues from the coast, the nets being only drawn when they are fully charged, when the fish are arranged bed upon bed in osier baskets, each boat returning habitually to port when it has secured twenty-five thousand fishes. ”

“ But the fishery interest pervades the whole town, dwarfing everything else. The main street winds about the head of the harbor, bending with the sinuosities of the shore, and from it other streets, without much regularity, go down to the wharves. Fishing-boats are everywhere, with new ones building, and on most of the open spaces are "cod-flakes," or drying-places, where the fish are piled when first landed, preparatory to being cut up and packed in the extensive packing-houses adjoining the wharves. Here many hundreds are employed in preparing the fish for market, both men and women working. ”

“ The importance of fisheries in the food-supplies of nations, inland as well as maritime, and as offering a remunerative return for labor, can scarcely be overestimated. One great peculiarity of this source of wealth is that the sea harvest is ripened without trouble or expense for the fisher, who only requires to provide the means of gathering it.
Means of Capture. Lines. The principal means of capturing fishes are nets and the hook and line. The hand-line is much used for ordinary fishing, but where this is carried on extensively at sea, a ‘set’ or ‘long’ line must be used. ”

“ Lower still is the old quay, five centuries old, with brown fishing nets hung up to dry, and with a half-score or so of trawlers moored to old corroded guns embedded in the masonry, their tall masts swaying idly on the long swell that now, at high tide, fills the little harbour. The fishermen are still busy over their gear. When all is stowed they will make their way up here, to the wall yonder, or to this bench, to talk over the doings of the day. Here the old captains, grey-headed, storm-beaten sea kings, sit, night after night, and spin over and over their well-worn yarns. ”

“ One always knows when the fishing-boats are arriving by the crowd that assembles on the quay; that peculiar population that seems natural to all ports, young, able-bodied sailors, full of interest about the run and the cargo—old men in blue jerseys who sit on the wall, in the sun, all day, and recount their experiences—various officials with gold bands on their caps, men with hand carts waiting to carry off the fish and fishwives—their baskets strapped on their backs—hoping for a haul of crabs and shrimps or fish from some of the small boats. ”

“ Some are cautiously spread by the men in one boat, according to directions signalled to them by a second, from the side of which a diver hangs by one arm, listening intently to the motion of the fish, and judging with marvellous accuracy the direction which they are taking. Lines of all sorts, hooks of every imaginable shape, all the tricks and devices, which have been learned by hundreds of years of experience on the fishing grounds, are employed by the people of the East Coast to swell their daily and nightly takes of fish. ”

“ The development of steam fishing—trawling and drifting—has resulted in the re-grouping of the fishing industry into two well-marked divisions. Fisheries, whether trawling, drifting or lining, that are carried on in deep water far from shore in large steamers,52 for the most part owned by limited liability companies, are known as offshore fisheries. ”

“ Lovers of deep sea fishing grow best from small beginnings. They yearn from tide flats to the spar buoy in the harbor channel, thence through Hull Gut to the rocky bottoms about the Brewsters. After that the sirens sing to them from every wash of white waves over ledges far out to sea, caution drowns in the temptation of blue water, and they fish no more except it is "down outside." ”

“ Then the little harbours with their fleets of strong fishing boats, rich brown sails, ‘hard coils of cordage, swarthy fishing nets,’ and piles of barrels and baskets, bear witness to the staple industry of the inhabitants. The men are square, strongly built, and bronzed with exposure to sea-air. The women may be seen sitting in groups at their doors, mending nets or baiting the lines for next night’s fishing. ”

“ The tide was out and the littered fore-shore was lined with fishing-boats drawn up in picturesque confusion, and in the shallow water out among the rocks bare-legged native women were collecting shell fish and seaweed into great baskets fastened to their backs, while naked children splashed about them or stood with their knuckles to their teeth to watch the thrashing paddle wheels of the little steamer as she churned slowly away from the quay. ”

“ Trawlers, seine boats, and other small fishing craft line the long wharves and docks or sway at anchor a short distance offshore. Before the fishing season begins, the water front is intensely active; nets and boats are mended and the air is heavy with the smell of tar and oakum. Many of the boats fish for salmon in the Sound and Straits ”

“ Rich gives a lively description of the old fishing days, when “all Yankees fished with hand-lines from the vessel.” “The model fisherman keeps his craft snug and taut. He has tested her temper and strength through storm and calm. He will defend her sea-going and fast-sailing almost with his life. A larger fleet and finer manœuvring have never been seen than in a fleet of fishermen. Sometimes three or four hundred sail, from forty to perhaps one hundred and forty tons, all sea-going, well equipped and well-manned, haul aft their sheets in a freshening breeze to reach a windward harbor. ”

“ There is no need to begin with the vast herring-fishing industry, with its distant markets at Billingsgate, Liverpool, and Manchester. The reform might begin at once on a modest scale. Beside the herrings, one sees every morning other fish lying on the quay—skate, cod, ling, whiting, rock-salmon—brought in by the smaller and less venturesome boats by dozens, not by lasts of ten thousand. ”

“ The exports consist chiefly of corn, salmon, cod-fish, and granite, for which the quarries of this coast have been so long known and appreciated. It is also a favourite fishing-station, and possesses a numerous fleet of boats engaged in the herring-fishery, which is here prosecuted during the season with great activity and success; an occupation that has been the means of training up a larger number of hardy seamen, and thus contributing to the naval supremacy of our country in a greater degree than any other branch of the coasting-trade. ”

“ And he concludes his discussion of the subject, in § 2373, by affirming the exemption of the coast fishery, and pointing out the distinction in this regard between the coast fishery and what he calls the great fishery, for cod, whales, or seals, as follows: 'The privilege of exemption from capture, which is generally acquired by fishing vessels plying their industry near the coasts, is not extended in any country to ships employed on the high sea in what is called the great fishery, such as that for the cod, for the whale or the sperm whale, or for the seal or sea calf. ”

“ The bait is cast as far as possible toward the school as it is running past the point of an inlet or the end of a pier, and reeled in slowly, but rapidly enough to keep the bait on or near the surface, no sinker being employed. If the fishing is done from a pier, a very long-handled landing-net must be provided. The best plan is to fish from a small boat moored to the pier, as the angler is not so likely to be seen by the fish, and they are more easily landed. ”

“ At this moment a brace of fishing schooners, called smacks, were the largest craft in the harbor. The dispersion of the shipping has been like to that of the inhabitants. I have seen those old whale-ships, with their bluff bows and flush decks, moored in a long line inside the Golden Gate. There they lay, rotting at their anchors, with topmasts struck, and great holes cut in their sides, big enough to drive a wagon right into their holds. To a lands-man they looked not unlike a fleet in array of battle. ”

“ She has a cabin aft, and a roomy forecastle, though such are the democratic conditions of the fishing trade that part of the crew bunks aft with the skipper. The galley, a little box of a place, is directly abaft the foremast, and back of it to the cabin, are the fishbins for storing fish, after they are cleaned and salted or iced. Nowadays, when the great cities, within a few hours' sail of the banks, offer a quick market for fresh fish, many of the fishing boats bring in their catch alive—a deep well, always filled with sea-water, taking the place of the fishbins. ”

“ They embark on board flat-bottomed boats, each provided with a well, which they allow to drift along slowly, while one of them, stationed at the bow, throws into the water enormous balls of rice. The fish hasten in immense shoals to enjoy the banquet; and the fishing-birds, flocking round the boats in great numbers, dive and reappear immediately, each with a fish in its bill. As fast as they [130] fill their pouch, the boatmen empty it into the interior of the bark, leaving to each winged fisher just enough to satisfy its appetite and encourage its ardour. ”

“ The wholesale fishery is carried on by small fishing smacks or “bangers,” as the fishermen popularly term them, each of which is constructed with a large deep well, into which the fresh sea-water is allowed to enter by means of a grating. This is for a double purpose, viz., to keep the fish alive after taken as long as possible, and also to enable the cod-smack to remain at sea as long as may suffice to catch a good supply of fish before proceeding to that part of the coast where there may be a market for them. ”

“ Surf-fishermen line up on the more accessible beaches to cast their lines into the Atlantic for striped bass, bluefish, and flounder, while others seek secluded spots to try their luck.
Charter fishing boats work out of Chatham, Orleans, Wellfleet, and Provincetown. Besides the fish cited above, you might catch halibut, haddock, and mackerel.
No license is required for saltwater sport fishing, but there are size and number limits and a state license is necessary for fishing in the many freshwater ponds. Commercial fishing is not permitted within the National Seashore. ”

“ A boat-fishery, therefore, seems to be the mode of fishing best adapted to the peculiar situation of Scotland, the fishers carrying the herrings on shore as fast as they are taken, to be either cured or consumed fresh. But the great encouragement which a bounty of 30s. the ton gives to the buss-fishery, is necessarily a discouragement to the boat-fishery, which, having no such bounty, cannot bring its cured fish to market upon the same terms as the buss-fishery. ”

“ In the middle of this fleet we rounded to, the anchor was let go, and we were hard and fast upon the Fishing-Banks.
The first thing done, on these excursions, by those who come to fish,—which includes nearly all the men,—is to establish a claim somewhere along the railing of the steamer, by attaching to it a strong whip-cord fishing-line, with a leaden sinker and hook of moderate size,—the latter lashed on, in most instances, with a disregard for art which must be intensely disgusting to any man whose piscatorial memories are associated with the wily salmon and the epicurean trout. ”

“ Crockery and glassware are easily destroyed in a cruising craft, in spite of the ingenious racks and lockers invented to preserve them.
Don't omit to include fishing tackle among your stores. There is lots of sport in catching blue-fish or mackerel when under way, and many a weary hour when your craft is becalmed may be beguiled with hook and line. Besides, a fish fresh from the water forms an agreeable and appetizing change from the monotony of canned goods. There is no necessity to purchase expensive tackle for sea-fishing. All that is wanted is strong and serviceable gear. ”

“ Should the weather be favourable, the boats keep constantly streaming from the harbour-mouth; and if a fresh breeze prevails, a very short time will suffice to fill the bay with hundreds of the handy little craft, gaily ploughing their eastward course to the fishing-ground. ”