THE SEA FISHERIES OF EASTEEN NORTH AMERICA. 125 



by which a rapid rotation or whirling motion is caused when drawn 

 through the water. Not unfrequently >an eel-skin or similar substance 

 is stretched over the shank of the hook, and answers an excellent pur- 

 pose. A bait of white cloth is sometimes quite sufficient in taking 

 mackerel. The efficiency of a piece of red flannel fastened to three hooks, 

 placed back to back, in taking frogs is well known to boys in the 

 country. 



Vegetable substances are not much used, as few fish are attracted by 

 them. Bread crumbs, corn, cabbage leaves, &c, may be employed in 

 the capture of carp and other vegetable feeders. 



Animal matter is generally employed as bait to attract fishes to the 

 hook or into a net, other substances being considered of little account 

 in comparison, almost every animal of any kind or description being 

 available to a greater or less extent for the purpose. In sea fishing 

 mammals are not used very extensively. Portions of meat of almost any 

 kind are used by the fresh-water angler for the capture of catfish, eels, 

 the percoids, &c. At sea the flesh of the porpoise and other cetaceans 

 is not unfrequently relied upon for the capture of cod and halibut when 

 other bait fails. 



Few persons realize the extent to which birds are sometimes employed 

 as bait in the great offshore fisheries, the banker, when other bait 

 fails, being able frequently to take large numbers of fish by the use as 

 bait of the Procellaria, including petrels, fulmars, &c, as also of gulls, 

 murres, &c. Most of these forms are easily caught on the hook, some- 

 times as many as a thousand birds, and especially of the petrel family 

 generally (Puffinus major), have been taken and used for bait by a single 

 vessel on the Grand Bank. The gannets, penguins, cormorants, &c, are 

 also taken in some parts of the world for a similar purpose. 



On this subject, Capt. J. W. Collins says: U A few years ago, when 

 many of the Grand Bankers went " shack fishing" and depended to a con- 

 siderable extent on catching birds for bait, many thousands ( mostly Puf- 

 finus major) were caught and used by the crew of each vessel on a single 

 trip. As these trips were sometimes three or four months in length, 

 and it was often possible for the crew to catch several hundreds in a 

 single day — indeed I have known of one man taking nearly a hundred 

 in a few hours — it will readily be seen that an enormous amount of these 

 birds must have been utilized in a single summer for this purpose." • 



There is but little, if any, use of the reptiles in the sea fisheries of the 

 United States, although the frog is called into play in certain forms of 

 fresh-water fishing. 



The various kinds of marine vertebrates constitute the chief portion 

 of the sea-fisherman's bait, partly in consequence of their more ready 

 availability, and partly because the fishes sought for are more accus- 

 tomed to fish as food, and are more readily attracted to it. The other 

 kinds of bait just mentioned come into play as substitutes, but can hardly 

 be considered as representing the regular resources of the North At- 



