274 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [3S] 



one. But we cannot positively determine whether this phenomenon 

 was due to a sudden fiill of temperature of the sea, a submarine vol- 

 canic action, a lack of food, or some other of the many possible causes 

 assigned by different theorists. Therefore the best that can be done is 

 to consider, in their various bearings, the several theories which have 

 been advanced as the cause of this mortality. 



The theory that perhaps was most generally advanced by those who 

 studied the subject was that these fish (quite possibly at that time just 

 approaching the coast) met with a stratum of unusually cold water, 

 which paralyzed and rendered them helpless to such an extent that 

 they floated to the surface of the sea dead or in a dying condition. 

 The furious northerly gales which swept the region where the dead 

 fish were seen, and many hundreds of miles farther north, about the 

 last of February or first of March, may have caused, as was thought 

 by some, an unprecedented low temj^erature in the sea water in tbat 

 locality. No doubt the prevalence of these winds at the time men- 

 tioned may have had much influence in changing the temperature of 

 that part of the ocean, but if there was any material and unprece- 

 dented difference in this respect, it seems more than probable that it 

 was caused chiefly by the unusual accumulation of ice on the eastern 

 fishing banks off the coast of Newfoundland and along the southern 

 shores of Nova Scotia. Many of the Gloucester fishermen, who visit 

 these localities year after year, agree in saying that never before have 

 they seen such a large quantity of drift-ice on the coast of Nova Scotia ; 

 neither have they known of its being so far to the southwest. There 

 can be no question as to the influence exerted by this vast bod^^ of ice 

 on the surrounding sea, and it seems reasonable to suppose that the 

 polar current, flowing to the southwest, inside of the Gulf Stream, may 

 have carried this cold water to an unusual distance, accelerated, as it 

 undoubtedly was, by the force of heavy northerly gales. The statement 

 of Captain Lawrence, who seems to have been impressed with this idea, 

 is corroborative of the above. He says : " The current known as the 

 polar current is now [in March, 1883J running very strong. It's not 

 unlikely that the icebergs grounded oft" the banks may have made 

 the water so cold that they [the Tile-fish] couldn't stand it." Captain 

 Eich, too, ascribes the death of the Tile-fish to excessive cold. It is a 

 well-known fact that an extraordinary amount of cold will cause even 

 the hardiest of fish to float dead and helpless uj^on the surface of the 

 water in the same manner as the Tile-fish were seen. We know that 

 even the codfish, a species which can endure the cold of the northern 

 seas, when confined in the well of a smack and suddenly brought in con- 

 tact with very cold water, will quickly die and float, belly up, at the sur- 

 face. This is often observable in Fulton Market slip, New York, in 

 "winter, when the smacks, coming in from the fishing grounds with a 

 load of live codfish, meet with floating ice in the harbor; at such times 

 the fish will all be either dead or helpless in a few minutes. 



