THE SEA FISHERIES OF EASTERN NORTH AMERICA, a 
the latter; in the height of the season a single shad weighing from 6 to 
8 pounds is sold in the market of the District for 6 cents. Herrings, 
however, are sometimes taken so plentifully that they are given away 
or hauled on the land as manure for want of purchasers.” Some idea 
may be formed of the importance of these fisheries from the following 
statement : 
Number of fisheries on the Potomac, about..2.... 2.2... 222.-2--2-.---ee 150 
Number of laborers required at the landings. ....-.--. 22.22.22... 22. 6, 500 
MEMNEOnVESSe ISOM plOVved .22\os AU soit. haem. Sees Sara s aay ag SA : 450 
HambexoL men to navicate these vessels... .-.-\ 22-2. s5-2.0ecce eens 1, 350 
Number of shad taken in good season, which lasts only about six weeks. 22,500, 000 
Number of herrings under similar circumstances ..._...........--.---.. 750, 000, 000 
Quantity of salt required to cure the fish......-.---.--.......- bushels. - 995, 000 
Nimber ol barrels bo containsthe fish \.5325-).-0.-s526ses 2 tele ee 2k 995, 000 
In further illustration of the former extent of the fresh-water fisheries 
of the Potomac River, I give an extract from Burnaby’s Travels in 
North America, referring more particularly to the sturgeon, although 
incidentally to the shad and herring.* At the present day fhe yield of 
these fisheries has decreased enormously, although enough are left to 
encourage the hope of a great improvement whenever the proper means 
for protection and the artificial propagation of fish are entered upon. 
In the year 1873 the shad, herring, and bunch fish canght in the Po. 
tomae and sold in the avagnintton market amounted to 8,541,851 
pounds ; in 1874 the total sales at Alexandria, Washington, and George- 
town, from the same river, amounted to about 16,122,533 pounds, a by 
no means indifferent presentation. 
(2) Catadromous jish.—Species of fish which are born in the sea, 
ascend the rivers and reach their maturity in two to four years, and 
then, when mature, descend to the ocean to spawn, and possibly never 
leave it again. 
The Eel is the only species to which we can at present assign this 
peculiar habit. 
(3) Inshore fishes, more especially, fishes found inshore during the 
summer season, coming in apparently to breed. They are more or 
less closely related to the bottom, seldom or never schooling at the 
*In the first report of the U. 8. Fish Commission I have given numerous quo- 
tations from early authors in reference to the abundance of varicus fishes in the 
rivers and along the coast of the United States. Burnaby (Travels through the 
middle settlements of North America in the years 1759 and 1760, London, 1775), in 
speaking of the Potomac River, remarks as follows (on page9): ‘‘ These waters are 
stored with incredible quantities of fish, such as sheepsheads, rock-fish, drums, white- 
pearch, herrings, oysters, crabs, and several other sorts. Sturgeon and shad are in 
such prodigious numbers that one day, within the space of two (2) miles only, some 
gentlemen in canoes caught above 600 of the former with hooks which they let down 
to the bottom and drew up at a venture when they perceived them to rub against a 
fish; and of the latter, above 5,000 have been caught at one single haul of the seine.” 
It is probable that the seines used in the Potomac waters over a hundred years ago 

_ were much smaller than those now employed, one of one hundred yards being, doubt- 
less, of remarkable magnitude. 
