238 GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW OP THE FISHERIES. 



1850, it is probable that more tban 100,000 bnsbels a year were laid down in the harbor; some say 

 150,000. One consignment alone of 80,000 busbels was remembered by Mr. S. R. Higgius, wbo 

 kindly gave me the many facts noted above. Tbe favorite ground was at tbe mouth of Herring 

 River. 



"This great business gave employment to many men and vessels, and was eagerly welcomed 

 by the Wellfleet people. Responsible men were accustomed to meet the incoming vessels and take 

 contracts to bed the oysters. The ordinary price was 9 cents a bushel. They hired help at day's 

 wages, and often made a good profit. Fifty men would thus often be busy at once. 



"During the summer partly, but chiefly iu the fall, these great deposits, which would perish 

 during the cold winter, but were now well grown, were raked up and sent to the warehouses iu 

 Boston, Portland, and minor ports, in freight vessels and iu packets. Usually the oysters were 

 owned and bedded by dealers, who used them iu their regular trade, but some were owned by 

 speculators, who took them to market or sold them to dealers as they lay upon the beds, the pur- 

 chaser taking all risks. The measure used for oysters in those days was a half barrel holding a 

 bushel, called a 'bushel-barrel.' 



"The war of the rebellion, however, interfered somewhat with the oyster trade, and it began 

 to decline, so far as Wellfleet was concerned. Then the various dealers in northern ports, having 

 learned something, began to bed near home iu their own harbors, and so saved freightage. Finally 

 the steamers from Norfolk and the railways entered into so serious a competition, that fully ten 

 years ago Wellfleet Bay was wholly deserted by the oystermen, as a bedding-ground, though her 

 vessels still continue to carry cargoes in winter from Virginia to Boston, Portland, Salem, Ports- 

 month, and the Providence River, to supply the active trade and till the new beds, which the 

 dealers at these various ports had learned could be established at home. 



"The reader thus discovers how important a part Wellfleet has played in the history of the 

 oyster trade of New England. A hundred thousand bushels of the bivalves once grew fat along 

 her water front, and thousands of dollars were dispensed to the citizens iu the industry they cre- 

 ated. Now, a little experimental propagation, of the value of a few hundred dollars, and about 

 G.OOO bushels of bedded oysters from Virginia, worth perhaps $5,000 when sold, form the total 

 active business. The oyster fleet, however, remains, though greatly diminished and carrying its 

 cargoes to Boston, Portland, and elsewhere, instead of bringing them to be laid down in the home 

 harbor. It will be long before Wellfleet and its neighbor, Proviucetown, lose the prestige of old 

 custom as oyster-carriers." 



70. FISHING TOWNS FROM EASTHAM TO DENNIS. 



EASTHAM. Eastham Township occupies the entire section of Cape Cod between the towns of 

 Wellfleet and Orleans, a territory about 6 miles in extent, north and south. The Cape at this part 

 is uniformly about 3 miles wide. The township contains the post-offices Eastham and North 

 Eastham, but only a small number of houses are grouped about them, the majority being scattered 

 irregularly along the principal roads. The principal kinds of apparatus in use here are weirs, 

 gill-nets, and seines. Six weirs one of them a deep-water weir, the others shoal-water weirs are 

 located in the bay, within the limits of the town. An additional shoal-water weir, located at 

 Billingsgate Island, near the light, is owned in Eastham. Each of these weirs is tended by about 

 four men. The catch consists almost exclusively of blueflsh, sea-herring, and, in some years, men- 

 haden. The main dependence, however, is placed upon the bluefish, and the profit accruing is 

 almost entirely from this species. The first weir used on the north shore of Cape Cod was erected 

 in North Eastham. 



