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seat of the most extensive herring fishery in America. This fish, well 

 smoked and of approved color, is a great luxury for the forenoon lunch 

 and for the tea-table ; and the time has been when a herring-box branded 

 "Digby," or with the name of a well-known curer there, passed as 

 current in our markets, without examination, as coin received at the 

 mint. This is high but deserved praise. The whole quantity smoked 

 in 1850 was but 2,000 boxes. The scenery in the vicinity of the "basin" 

 is truly beautiful; and the "basin" itself is one of the safest shelters 

 for boats and vessels required for the fishery that is to be found in 

 America. 



The mackerel fishery is in favor, and, compared with the cod and 

 herring fisheries, receives commendable attention. The present state 

 o(" this branch of industry is to be attributed to the recent change in 

 our tariff" of duties imposed on foreign-caught fish, and to the facilities 

 afforded by our warehouse system. This change, it hardly need be 

 said applies to dried and smoked fish as well as to pickled ; and, were 

 the causes just assigned the true ones, it might be concluded by those 

 who are not acquainted with the colonial character, that increased ex- 

 ertions would be ^vitnessed on all the fishing grounds. Explanation is 

 easy. The mackerel fishery is the least laboriou<i and the most jirofitahle. 



I know something of the energy and skill of our fishermen, and 

 appreciate them highly; but I feel quite certain that under a system of 

 ad valorem duties their competitors in Nova Scotia and elsewhere in 

 British America will, ere long, supplant them in our own markets. As 

 has been already remarked, the colonists may take every kind of fish, 

 in any desirable .quantities, at their very homes, and without the expense 

 of large vessels or extensive outfits ; while the pursuit in the more dis- 

 tant haunts of cod and mackerel is attended with less cost than from 

 the ports of Massachusetts and Maine — for the reason that the labor, 

 timber, iron, cordage, and canvass, necessary for the construction and 

 equipment of vessels, and the salt, hooks and lines, for their outfits, are 

 much cheaper. These advantages will be acknowledged at once, and 

 unless the observation of many years has led me astra3^ they are too 

 great to allow of the present reduced scale of impost. 



Severely as the late change of policy with regard to the admission 

 of foreign fish has been felt by all branches of our fisheries, the mack- 

 erel catchers have suffered the most. They still pursue the employment 

 in the hope of the restoration of specific duties, and because their local 

 position and other circumstances have not, as yet, allowed them to 

 adopt any other. As was said by Fisher Ames, soon alter the organiza- 

 tion of the present national government, when appealing for protection 

 to our fishermen, "they are too poor to stay — too poor to remove." 



It is even so. During certain months of the yenr our vessels seek the 

 mackerel in the waters of Nova Scotia and other British possessions ; 

 but as our treaty with Great Britain requires them to keep three miles- 

 from the land, the fishery in the narrow straits, by the means of nets and 

 seines, is in colonial hands exclusivel}^ The quantities of fish which the 

 colonists sometimes take in nets and seines are immense. It is not long 

 since forty thousand barrels were caught in three harbors of Nova Scotiaj 

 in a single season. This ny/nitify is more than one-tcvJh cftlic zc.'icls clt:;i:ied 

 by all the vessels of Massadmsetts in the most jyrosjierons year. Yet these 

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