254 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18 J 



extensive area inside of tbe Gulf Stream, between the latitudes of 

 the Chesapeake and jSTantucket, created a widespread public interest. 

 Such a phenomena had never before been known to occur oft* the north- 

 eastern coast of the United States, and the various phases of this 

 Avonderful event received much attention from the press, which recorded 

 a great deal of information concerning this remarkable mortality among 

 the fishes. 



The following, which is one of the earliest notices of dead fish having 

 been seen floating upon the surface of the ocean to the southward of Nan- 

 tucket, appeared in the Boston Advertiser of March 21, 1882. It will 

 be observed that the victims of the extraordinary fatality which is here 

 described were supposed to have been codfish : 



" It was reported yesterday that the Norwegian bark Sidon, which 

 had just arrived from Cardenas, had sailed, when in latitude 40° and 

 longitude 71°, through large quantities of dead codfish, which lay float- 

 ing upon the waters over a distance of 50 miles of the vessel's course. 

 The bark is now lying at Gray's wharf, at the North End, where she 

 will discharge her cargo of sugar. In a visit to her berth yesterday af- 

 ternoon the writer found the captain to be absent, but the mate and 

 one of the crew who were on board, verified substantially the fish story, 

 though they toned it down considerably in respect to the distance 

 sailed, which the seaman, who said he saw the fish, thought might be 

 10 or 12 miles. It was the mate's watch below at the time, and he 

 could say nothing from ocular knowledge, though he did not doubt the 

 testimony of all who were on deck at the time. The floating fish were 

 of large size, and were visible on both sides of the ship as far as the eye 

 could reach. An attempt was made to catch one of them with a boat- 

 hook, but the vessel was sailing so fast that it proved impossible to do 

 so. The mariners have no theory to account for this fish fatality, but 

 say they never saw or heard of the like before. The fact — for there is no 

 reason to doubt the story of the seamen — has certainly an interest be- 

 yond that of a mere momentary wonder, for it may serve to explain the 

 unwonted scarcity of fish complained of in some seasons. It has been 

 the fashion to accuse the ' trawlers' of being the guilty cause of these dis- 

 appearances offish, and it has been declared that the codfish will soon 

 become as extinct as the dodo unless this practice of trawling were given 

 up, and the old honest way returned to of fishing with a single line and 

 taking out from the sea one fish at a time. More recently lament was 

 made about the invention of a new sort of ' exterminator,' in shape some- 

 thing like a drag-net, which is hauled along the bottom of the fishing 

 vessel under sail, and scoops in thousands of fish in a few hours. How- 

 ever ruinous these practices, it would seem that they are quite eclii)sed 

 by the mode of destruction, whatever it may be, of which the mariners 

 of the Sidon saw proof." 



The following letter to Prof. Spencer F. Baird from Mr. Joseph O. 

 Proctor, one of the leading citizens of Gloucester, Mass., inclosing the 



