NATIONALITY AND GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 27 



15. THE FISHERMEN OF MOBILE, ALABAMA. 



BY SILAS STEAENS. 



Mobile smack and oyster fishermen are as a class so mixed in nationality that there are hardly 

 two individuals of the same general character. Among them one finds a majority of southerti 

 Europeans, while the minority are natives of the United States and northern Europe. There are 

 very few negroes in their number, and when such an one is employed it is as cook on some small 

 oyster-boat or bay fishing-boat. There are but few cases where, the profession is hereditary, and 

 in such cases the man is quite sure to be of Spanish, Italian, or Greek descent. The older men 

 in the business are, as a general rule, of foreign birth, but the young aud middle-aged ones are 

 Americans. Their health is good, and they are a strong, hardy class of people; I think there is 

 far less sickness among them than among the planters and laboring men on land, who are troubled 

 with all the forms of malarial diseases. 



Consumption has claimed many of the smack fishermen during the last four or five years, but 

 whether the disease is brought on and aggravated by cold and exposure or by dissipation is hard 

 to say. Rheumatism is a common affliction among the fishermen, and many of them are nearly 

 helpless with it. The fishermen of this section, wheu not broken down by dissipation, live to a 

 considerable age, retaining active mental and physical powers to the age of eighty or ninety yeais. 

 The women, marrying joung and rearing large families, are worn out in early life and seldom live 

 beyond their fiftieth year. As the greater number of the fishermen have their homes in the city, 

 they live in about the same manner as other laboring men and mechanics do. Those who have 

 enterprise enough to make a home are of the better-behaved class, and they live quite comfortably, 

 though in summer, when not much fishing is done, the family have a hard time to obtain the neces- 

 saries of life. The majority of the fishermen do not marry at all, and spend their time ashore in 

 carousing and in the "lock up." 



Yery few have any education, and it rarely occurs that a fisherman is found who can r£ad or 

 write. Their children, if their parents live in the city, have good school advantages, and will 

 probably make a better class of citizens. Nearly all who profess any religion are Catholics. 



It is impossible to learn the exact profits of active fishermen, but a close estimate can be made. 

 Some months they make $40 or $50 and there are many months when they make nothing. Several 

 intelligent men tell me that they average $1 per day above their own expenses of board throughout 

 the yeir, with which they clothe themselves and care for their families, if tj»ey have any. 



16. THE FISHERMEN OF NEW ORLEANS. 



BY SILAS STEAENS. 



The New Orleans fishermen and oystermen are nearly all descendants or' the Mediterranean 

 coast fishermen and sailors, who came to this country years ago to engage in the fishing or fruit 

 trade. 



Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Minorcans arc probably in the majority, the balance being made 

 up of Italians, Portuguese, Sicilians, Corsicans, Greeks, and there are even a good many Malayans 

 in their numbers. In nearly every case the fathers and forefathers were fishermen or sailors, and 

 these men follow in their footstep.'! as nearly as they can in a country so different from that of their 

 ancestors. They even preserve the old style of rigging their boats — a style seen nowhere else in this 

 country. 



