MYTILUS. 175 



liaddocks, cod, ling, holibut, plaice, skate, whiting, &c. 

 In Newhavcn alone there are fonr large deep-sea fishing 

 boats, which generally go out three times a week, and fish 

 for about thirty weeks in the year, excluding Sundays and 

 bad weather. Each of these large boats carries eight men, 

 with eight lines of 800 yards in length, which, at a low 

 calculation, take 1200 mussels to bait, each time they are 

 used ; so that each large boat will use 28,800 mussels per 

 week, equal to 864,000 per annum. But there are about 

 sixteen other smaller boats, which go out daily, or rather 

 at twelve o'clock every night for about the same number of 

 weeks in the year. Each carries four men, with four lines 

 800 yards long. Their consumption of mussels will come 

 to 8,456,000. The total consumption of mussels for bait 

 annually in Newhaven alone may be reckoned at 4,820,000. 

 As there are nearly as many used at Musselburgh and 

 Fisherrow, Buckhaven, Elie, Anstruther, Pittenweem, 

 Crail, and other places on the Frith of Forth, we may 

 calculate that thirty or forty millions of mussels are used 

 for bait alone by the fishermen of this district each year. 

 Numbers come from the river Eden in Fife, and are sold at 

 25s. per cask. The best mussels at Newhaven are got 

 directly north of the Pier, in three fathoms water, and are 

 sold at 8d. per basket, each containing nearly a bushel." 

 The beds are private property, and some of them having 

 been injudiciously or avariciously exhausted, the number of 

 mussels in the Forth has decreased, and the price increased 

 with the last ten years, 



Mussels are kept in many places in artificial beds, to be 

 used when required for bait. At Anstruther, in Fifeshire, we 

 have seen these " mussel gardens," as they are called, — little 

 plots of sea-shore between tide-marks, edged in by stones, and 

 held as private property. In Northumberland, Mr. Alder 



