62 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



iials would naturally be unable to accompany the departing schools. 

 Such fish would naturally grovel on the bottom in a helpless state and 

 might easily become impaled on the eel-spears, or might be thrown on 

 shore by the waves, as the Newfoundland fishermen relate. Even 

 healthy fishes might occasionally be accidentally detained. Mr. Peter 

 Sinclair a well-known fisherman of Gloucester, stated to Professor 

 Baird that some years ago a school of mackerel were detained all win- 

 ter in a small river in Nova Scotia, and were speared out of the mud. 

 This is doubtless hearsay testimony and is given for what it is worth. 

 I do not doubt that there have been individual cases of this kind, but I 

 maintain that no generalization should be founded upon them. 



The tlieory of extended migration discussed with reference to the habits of 



the maclcerel. 



88. The preceding paragraph is devoted to the refutation of the idea 

 that sea-fish hibernate. This is regarded as the least probable of the 

 three hypotheses stated in paragraph 85. In paragraph 84 it is stated 

 that the sea-herring and many other fishes have two kinds of migra- 

 tions : one bathic, or from and toward the surface ; the other littoral, or 

 coastwise. Now, in some species the former is most extended ; in oth- 

 ers, the latter. The anadromous species very probably strike directly 

 out to sea without coasting to any great degree, wliile others, of which 

 the mackerel is a fair type, undoubtedly make extensive coastwise mi- 

 grations, though their bathic migrations may, without any inconsist- 

 ency, be quite as great as those of the species which range less. 



Upon this point I cannot do better than to quote from a manuscript 

 letter from Professor Baird to the Hon. Hamilton Fish, Secretary of 

 State, dated July 21, 1873. Having expressed the views concerning the 

 migration of the herring and shad already quoted in paragraph 84, he 

 continues : 



"The fish of the mackerel family form a marked exception to this rule. 

 While the herring and shad generally swim low in the water, their pres- 

 ence being seldom indicated at the surface, the mackerel swim near the 

 surface sometimes far out to sea, and their movements can be 'readily 

 followed. The North American species consist of fish which as cer- 

 tainly, for the most part at least, have a migration along our coast 

 northward in spring and south in autumn, as that of the ordinary pleas- 

 ure-seekers, and their habit of schooling on the surface of the water ena- 

 bles us to determine this fact with great precision. * * * Whatever 

 may be the theories of others on the subject, the American mackerel- 

 fisher knows perfectly well that in the spring he will find the schools of 

 mackerel off Caj^e Henry, and that he can follow them northward day 

 by day as they move in countless myriads on to the coast of Maine and 

 Nova Scotia." 



It is difficult to estimate to what extent the advocates of the hiber- 

 nation theory have been influenced by patriotic motives in their efforts 



