696 GEOGEAPHICAL EEVIEW OF THE FISHERIES. 



m England : ' We arc here in a paradise. Though we have not beef and mutton, &c., yet (God be praised) we need 

 them not ; our Indiau corn answers for all. Yet here is fowl and fish in abundance.' They Lad had early proof of the 

 abundance of fish, for Governor Wiuthrop's journal informs us that just before the Arbella reached the harbor of Saleui 

 they caught with a few hooks, in two hours, no less than seventy-six codfish, 'some a yard and a half long and a yard 

 in compass.' All the accounts returned to England by the pioneer emigrants concurred in extravagant praise of the 

 new country, aud we now read their quaint and highly-colored narratives as amusing curiosities of literature. * * * 



" 'The abundance of sea fish' (says Mr. Higgiuson, 1629) 'is almost beyond believing, aud sure I should scarce 

 have believed it, except I had seen it with mine own eyes.' He had seen hundreds of bass seined at one time in our 

 own waters, and mentions lobsters as being so abundant that even boys could catch them. But of lobsters, he says, 

 as for myself I was soon cloyed with them, they wore so great, aud fat, and luscious.'" ' 



The curiug, culling, aud final disposition of the fish caught are described by Mr. Cheever: 



"Fish being the great staple of Salem, as of the colony, was of course the early object of the care and attention 

 of the legislature. Laws were passed protecting it as well as the fishermt' u. The curing of it seems to have become 

 at least a distinct business, left to those called shoremen who received the fish on return of the fishers and cured 

 and dried it. It then passed under the review of the cullers, who were sworn officers, certainly after 1700, and was 

 divided into merchantable, middling, and refuse; also, scale fish. The first two went to Spanish and the first-class 

 markets, the refuse to the slaves in the West Indies, and perhaps the poorer classes of Europe. The fish from Acadia 

 (Nova Scotia) (Cape Sable fish) was in great demand in Bilboa, Spain, as being a superior fish, and was largely shipped 

 there. Marblehead sent this description offish to Spain even after our American Revolution. In 1G70 the legislature 

 denounced the use of Tortuga (West India) salt on account of its impurity, and fish cured by it was made unmer- 

 chantable by law. Winter Islaud and the adjoining Neck seem to have been especially devoted in Salem to the 

 fisheries; Winter Islaud being in 1095, aud yet later, the headquarters, to judge by history, tradition, and old papers. 

 How far Salem may have been engaged in the wlialo-fishery is dubious. Some of her sons may have gone down to 

 Cape Cod on such au errand; for the Cape, as late as 1714, was so largely visited by cod aud whale fishers that the 

 general court that year made all the province lands there a precinct and the visitors to it (fishermen) support a 

 settled minister at 60 per annum by a tax of 4 pence a week levied on each seaman, to be paid by the master of the 

 In. at fur the whole company. This was in the days when no man was permitted to be absent from church a month, 

 it' in health, without presentation before the grand jury, and punishment by a Cue of 20 shillings." 2 



TLe same writer thus describes the fisheries and vessels used in the same, which, when developed further, led to 

 the elevation of Massachusetts as a State noted for its prominence in the fisheries: 



'The English had freely used the coast of New England for the fisheries before the settlement at Salem, and the 

 loyal charter reserved this right to Englishmen after the settlement, a right which was freely used, it seems. New- 

 foundland had an English settlement at the time. 



"The early fisheries were quite profitable, to judge from Levott's account of the trade iu 1623-'24, wherein hi: 

 says he has 'attained to the understanding of its secrets.' According to him, a ship of 200 tons, with a crew of fifty 

 men, the ordinary crew of such sized vessels in the fisheries, would be at au outlay of some 800, the cost for nine 

 mouths' victualing, &c. One-third of the catch, ' fish and train, 'being deducted as 'fraught' for the owners, another 

 as a share for the crew, aud the balance for expenses, the owner's one-third part of the cargo would yield 1,340 'for 

 disbursing of 8CO nine mouths.' The cargo sold iu Spanish, ports from 30 to <!4 rials per quintal. Our Salem fishing 

 craft wore not so large :is Lrvett's 'ship,' but were shallops of from 10 to 20 tons, say, ketches of from 20 to 40, and 

 finally schooneis from no to 130, or more, carrying not more than from four to eight or ten men, say. Small boats 

 \\ei-e pcrliaps used at first. Still the trade was profitable, Salem and Massachusetts being built up by it in the early 

 day. The fisheries and the timber trade gave Salem doubtless two-thirds or more of her early wealth." 



FISH AND FISHING, 161G TO 1635. Felt, referring to the abundant supply of herring in 1616 and previous to 

 that date, has recorded this statement, made more than two hundred and fifty years ago : 



''In Virginia they never manure their overworn fields, which are very few, the ground for the most part is so 

 fertile; but iu New Euglaud they do, striking at every plant of corn a herring or two, which cometli iu that season iu 

 such abundance they take more than they know what to do with." 3 



Felt tlieu adds (quoting another statement made somewhat later than the above): 



'After fish became scarce, though abundance were taken for food of the inhabitants and for exportation to foreign 

 flirts, the supplies of the hainyard and of the sea-shore were of course more depended on to strengthen our lands." 



The same author says : 



'A letter from ihe company iu London to Mr. Eudicott iu 16S9, among other things spoke of 'building shallops 

 for the fishing business, by sis shipwrights then here. One of these mechanics, Robert Moulton, was master work- 

 man. It proposed fishing iu the harbor or oil the banks. It requested, that if the ship, which had arrived with emi- 

 grants, should be scut to fish on the bank, aud not return hither immediately, ' the bark already built in the country,' 

 might Vie fitted out to bring back the fishermen.' We perceive from this that a vessel had been made, most probably 

 at Naiuukeag ; aud that the Desire, afterwards launched at Marble Harbor, was not the first vessel built in the colony, 

 as some have supposed. The fishermen just mentioned had been employed in England to reside here for teaehiug 

 and encouraging their business. A storehouse was erected for the shipwrights and their provision, by an Older of 

 April 17, and another for fishermen and their stores, by an order of May 28. Records were to be kept of their stock, 

 lirovisinus, and proceedings." 



i 

 1 EX.-CX liistitntu Hiat. Coll , vol. ii, y- 2. Ibid , vol. i [1859]. p. 1'J'J Annals of Salr.ni. vol. i, M eel . p. 243. 



