186 GEOGRAPHICAL EEVIEW OF THE FISHERIES. 



pounds a day, codfish forming the largest part of the catch. For the past two seasons fish have 

 been scarce on the old grounds. Vessels have been compelled on that account to go to the cast- 

 ward and southward, and are away generally from four to six days on a trip. These trips have 

 not been attended with the success of form^f years. During the summer season most of the ves- 

 sels engage in the mackerel catch off the New England shore, supplying the Boston market with 

 fresh fish. The small boat or dory fishermen, on account of being obliged to go out further, are 

 introducing the lapstreak boat; this is usually schooner-rigged. 



Most of the vessels are built at Salisbury, Mass., and measure from 50 to 00 tons, and often 

 cost $10,000. They carry a crew of ten men, all, without exception, of American birth. The crew, 

 including the captain, have an equal share in the proceeds. All expenses are charged to the gross 

 stock, and one fifth of the proceeds goes to the owners. The captain and some of the crew usually 

 own a share in the vessel. The running expenses of a vessel are estimated by Capt. King Harding 

 to be about $1,000 a year. To pay the crew for their time the vessel should stock $10,000. This 

 is a fair stock. In 1877 and 1878 the average stock was below this amount. In 187G and the ten 

 previous years it exceeded it, in some years the "high-line" reaching $20,000. 



The cod fishery is prosecuted from the middle of October until May, the mackerel fishery the 

 remainder of the time. On an average, reckoning for twenty years past, the proceeds of the two 

 have been about equal. For ten years previous to 187G, the mackerel interest predominated. In 

 1877 prices were poor. " The Nova Scotia imports have a ruinous effect." 



But few lobsters are caught; thirteen men fishing with five hundred and twenty traps through 

 part of the season. Their catch is consumed at and near home, a few being sent to Boston. At 

 one time fishing vessels were built at this port, but none have been built here for the past fifteen 

 years. 



^ The fisheries of this place, in 1879, employed 320 men. The capital invested was about $50,000. 

 The value of the product was about $140,000, and included 10,807 barrels of mackerel, over 

 5,000,000 pounds of cod, haddock, and cusk, 40,000 lobsters, and about 5,500 gallons of fish oil. 

 Beside the 21 vessels, aggregating 682.48 tons, there were 21 lapstreak sail boats and SO dories 

 used in the fisheries in that year. 



LYNN. The city of Lynn is largely interested in the manufacture of boots and shoes and other 

 articles, and pays little attention to the fisheries. Four small vessels took out fishing licenses 

 in 1879, but none of them followed the business. One was sold and the three others remained idle, 

 except when engaged by pleasure parties for fishing. The only fishing done from Lynn during 

 1879 was by ten men fishing from dories near shore during part of the year and supplying the 

 summer houses of Chelsea Beach with cunners, eels, and ground fish. At Flax Pond Brook in 

 West Lynn about 100 barrels of alewives were taken during the year with dip-nets. About 50 

 barrels of alewives were caught by Lynn fishermen in the river in the adjacent town of Saugus. 



F. THE DISTRICT OF BOSTON. 



66. REVIEW OF THE FISHING INTEREST OF BOSTON DISTRICT. 



PRESENT CONDITION OF THE FISHERIES. The fisheries in the district of Boston, which 

 includes towns as far as Cohasset on the south shore of Massachusetts Bay, employ 92 sail 

 of vessels and 472 boats, besides a large number of nets and other apparatus. Of the vessels, 73 

 are engaged in the capture of food-fish, one fishes exclusively for lobsters, four follow the menhaden 



