APPENDIX. 151 



eugaged in fishing pollock. They caught them out at the Eace in the month of May, but we had 

 no such thing as a seine. We fished every year just about the same from one year to another. 



In 1818 1 was eleven years old. In November of that year we moved to Long Point and fished 

 from the shore there. Nobody lived there then. I went to school a little while when I was over 

 here, but not much. I was in the fishing boat most of the time excepting a short period in tbe 

 winter. 



In 1819 we carried on the fishery as in the two preceding years. Up to this time I had staid 

 ashore, although I now felt anxious to go to sea, but my father thought I could do better to go with 

 him in the boat and help him. I said I wanted to go to sea, but he would not go to ship me, but 

 said I could go if I wanted to. There was then a vessel fitting out for Labrador, the Dexter, 

 Joseph Sawtell, master, and he wanted a cook. Father said I might go over and ship with him. 

 I asked $40 for the run — that is, for the voyage. I finally traded with him for $37.50 to go to the 

 coast of Labrador as cook. 



We sailed from Provincetown on the 6th of June. All but two of the crew belonged there. 

 There is one man of them still living. The rest are dead. We went to the coast of Labrador, but, as 

 it happened, we were unfortunate in getting codfish. Our men were not the best of fishermen, so 

 that we got a very small share. We carried, I think, 160 hogsheads of salt, and we brought back 

 about 30 hogsheads, and were so much short on the fare. I don't know now how far we went 

 north. We went to what was familiarly known to us as Grosswater Bay. It is not down on the 

 chart. On my return home I found that I had made more than any man on the voyage. Our 

 mode of fishing then was to let the vessel lie in the harbor and send the boats out. We at that 

 time had no vessel on the Grand Bank, and but two or three small vessels went to the Gulf of 

 Saint Lawrence fishing for mackerel. All our fisheries were at Labrador at that time. We 

 carried four boats. We used one boat to get capelin for bait. When fish were plenty during the 

 capelin school the bait boat would seldom go fishing. The fishing boats were baited out of her. 

 We had one of the crew to throat, one to head, one to split, and a salter in the hold of the vessel, 

 salting the fish as they came down. On our arrival on the coast of Labrador few codfish were to 

 be caught until the capelin schools came in, and then the cod came in with the capelin schools. The 

 capelin school lasted about three weeks. If you had some salt when the capelin school was over 

 you might get some herring for bait and fish with them. But we picked up fish very slowly after the 

 capelin went away. When the capelin came on the coast the first that arrived were males. You 

 can tell the male from the female by external signs, so as to distinguish the sexes perfectly well. 

 When the males had been on the coast about a week, then came a mixture of females. They look 

 very much like a smelt, and are soft and full of spawn. We did not use them for food. On an 

 average about one-tenth of the capelin were females. When they had deposited their spawn the 

 males deposited their milt and made the whole water white. Then the females went off. Soon 

 after the fishing slacked off, and we used to say they were capelin sick. 



On my return from that voyage, having been absent sixteen weeks and two days, I went to 

 Long Point and was very glad to see another house being erected close by my father's, so that we 

 had two families there in the following winter. In the winter I weut in the fishing boat, as I 

 was then old enough to stand the winter. The voyage of the Dexter was in the summer of 1820. 

 After fishing through the autumn and winter and in the shore fisheries the next spring, I shipped 

 for another Labrador voyage. My father shipped me on the schooner Favorite, Captain Paine. 

 We had ten shares in all, and I had three-fifths of a share. I thought as I was thirteen years old 

 1 would not like to go again as cook, and I shipped as a hand before the mast. One of the prin- 

 cipal men had a brother about my age, and he was not willing that his brother should cook more 



