186 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. f 
lower price, and they are considered by the Southern people a much superior article — 
of food. 
Q. Is it preferred to mackerel as a salted fish ?—A. The persons familiar with maé¢k- — 
erel and with mullet from whom I have made inquiries—I never tasted salt mullet— 
give the preference to mullet. It is a fatter, sweeter, and better fish, and of rather 
larger size. They grade up to 90 to a barrel of 200 pounds, and go down to three- 
quarters of a pound, and as a salt fish the preference is given by all from whom I 
have inquired to the mullet. 
Q. Do you think the failure of the mackerel market in the Southern and Southwest- 
ern States is largely attributable to the introduction of mullet ?—A. I cannot say 
that, but I imagine it must have a very decided influence. 
Q. Can the mullet be caught as easily as mackerel?—A. Moreeasily. Itis entirely 
a shore fish, and is taken with seines hanled up on the banks by mén who have no 
capital, but who are able to command a row-boat with which to lay out their seines, 
and they sometimes catch 100 barrels a day per man, and sometimes as many as 500 
barrels have been taken at a single haul. The capital invested is only the boat, the 
seine, perhaps 100 or 200 yards long, the salt, necessary for preserving the fish, and 
splitting boards and barrels. 
Q. Can pounds be used ?—A. They have not been used, and I doubt whether they 
could be used. Pounds are not available in the sandy regions of the South. 
Q. They are taken by seining ?—A. Yes, seines can be used. This work is entirely 
prosecuted by natives of the coast. and about two-thirds of the coast population are 
employed in the capture of these fish. 
Q. Then the business has grown very much ?—A. It has grown very rapidly. 
Q. When was it first known to you as a fish for the market ?—A. I never knew any- 
thing about it until 1872. 
Q. Then it has been known during only five years ?—A. I cannot say; if has been 
known to me that length of time. 
Q. During that time the business has very much increased ?—A. Iam so informed ; 
I cannot speak personally. All my information of it is from reports made to me in 
replies to circulars issued in 1872 and 1873. I have not issued a mullet circular since 
that time, when I issued a speeial circular asking information regarding the mullet. 
Q. Then it is your opinion that the mullet has become, to some extent, and will be- 
come, an important source of food supply ?—A. It is destined, I suppose, to be a very 
formidable rival and competitor of the mackerel. I know in 1872 a single county in 
North Carolina put up 70,000 barrels of mullet, a single county of five States covering 
the mullet region. 
Q. Repeat that statement.—A. I say 70,000 barrels of mullet were packed in Car- 
teret County, North Carolina, in 1872—one county in the States of Virginia, North 
Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, where mullet comes in great abun- — 
dance during twoor three months of the year. It is during the spawning season of the 
mullet that it is taken in this quantity, and mullet roes form a special delicacy over 
which every Southerner exults. It is a separate business, the roes being smoked and 
salted and sold in large quantities. 
Q. Perhaps a reason—to get into the region of political eeconomy—why mullet- 
fishing was not prosecuted formerly, was that the Southern people were not fishing- 
people under the slave system ?—A. They probably had not a proper method of taking 
them. They used more casting nets than seines. : 
Q. State to the Commission what mode of fishing and what kinds of fish are caught — 
on the south of the New England coast, south of Cape Cod. Is it not a great region 
for fish 7—A. The variety of fish taken on the shores south of Cape Cod is very great, — 
and constitutes a very important element in the food resources of the country. Many ; 
of them are fish of very great value as food, some selling as high as ong dollar per 
pound, every pound of that fish that can be brought into market bringing never less 
than 60 cents aud up to one dollar per pound. Other fish range from 20 cents, 35 — 

