PLANTING AND FISHING. 101 



Herring voyages have been prosecuted since 1856, to sup- 

 ply oar cities witli clieap food and our fisliing-vessels with 

 bait, the herring having been caught by the fishermen of 

 Newfoundhmd and sold to our vessels, where they are frozen, 

 and in that state brought home in bulk, like potatoes, by the 

 cargo. After the award on tlic Washington Treaty, an 

 attempt was made by American fishermen to catch their own 

 bait with their own seines, and, having got them full the 

 only day that they had " struck in," their seines were de- 

 stroyed and their voj'agcs broken up by a mob of tlie natives; 

 and the business has been wholly abandoned except by pur- 

 chase, and but few vessels engaged, compared with wliat there 

 had been. Keccntly, vessels there from the Banks after bait, 

 while catching squid in one of tlie coves, were mobbed by 

 some two hundred and fifty natives, and their lives threatened 

 if they did not desist ; in one case injuring two of the crew 

 and driving off the vessel, and in another, while the master 

 was ashore to buy bait, taking possession of the vessel, heav- 

 ing up her anchor and hoistmg her sails, when she narrowly 

 escaped shipwreck, being saved from the rocks only by the 

 utmost exertions of her crew, who had hid below, and her 

 master, who, seeing there was trouble, had returned. The 

 mob, becoming frightened at the danger of the vessel, had, 

 iu tlic mean time, left her to her fate. 



jNIany think that the American fishermen are always get- 

 ting the nation into trouble. Hoio feio Icnoiu that the nation 

 it is that is tjettlng the fishermen into trouble ! Right here let 

 ns look at the matter ; for it is a serious one to the nation, as 

 well as to this industr3^ 



Before the war of the Revolution, by the treaty of Paris 

 in 1763, the fishermen of all the British colonies had " equal 

 rights" granted them with those of Great Britain to fish in 

 any waters, except around a few islands reserved by the 

 French, and to land upon the shore for curing fish, drying 

 nets, etc. Then folloAved the Revolutionary war, when, by 

 the treaty of 1783, a division of the countiy was made with 

 Great Britain, and all the rights heretofore enjoyed by 

 American fishermen were continued to the fishermen of 

 the United States with slight and unimportant alterations. 

 They had obtained what they were entitled to after seven 

 long years of struggle ; viz., independence of Great Britain, 

 and equal rights with her in the sea-fisheries of America. 



