342 NEW ENGLAND FISHERIES 



section contains valuable references to sources of informa- 

 tion, and, while it is in no sense a bibliography, it remains 

 the most comprehensive survey of the early fisheries that 

 has been written. In another section, the different fish- 

 eries are treated separately and the work is well done. 



The principal defect in the work is the lack of a com- 

 prehensive view of the fisheries of the country in their 

 relation to the development of the people. No mention is 

 made of the effects of territorial expansion, the increased 

 means of communication and transportation, the wars 

 subsequent to the Revolution, and other important matters. 

 The subject of international disputes finds little place; 

 little mention is made of the value of bounties to fishing 

 vessels or the abolishment of the same; and the reader 

 can gather no adequate idea of the development of the 

 fisheries as a whole, of the improvement in apparatus 

 used except as it relates to the separate industries, or of 

 the gradual betterment of the condition of the fisherman 

 through the necessity of constructing schooners of a bet- 

 ter class. Lastly, the size of the work is a serious defect 

 for the average reader. It has not been placed in a form 

 convenient either for the reader or the student, and while 

 it will always remain invaluable to the latter it never 

 has been and can never be, in its present form, what it 

 should have been made, a history of the fisheries for 

 the people. In all probability, not one fisherman in a 

 hundred knows of the existence of the work. 



The principal source of statistics and historical material 

 of the fisheries during the last thirty-nine years has been 

 the publications of the United States Fish Commission, 

 which is now designated the Bureau of Fisheries. In 1871, 

 the Fish Commission began the issue of Annual Reports 

 of the Commissioner, and these have continued as bound 

 volumes to the year 1902. By legislative enactment, the 

 volume known as the Annual Report of the Bureau has 



