EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [116] 



to take in the Plymouth colonists with them ; and if none offer, to admit 

 strangers. 



The profits of the hire which accrued to the colony were sometimes 

 distributed to the schools. (Mass. Hist. Collections, iii, 220.) 



A writer in the Historical Society's collections gives the following de- 

 scription of these fisheries (vol. iv, 2d series, p. 232): "The aborginal 

 name of this fish (the mackerel) is Wawunnebeseag, a plural term sig- 

 nifying fatness — a very descriptive and appropriate name. The mode 

 of taking these fish is while the vessel is under quick way and the helm 

 secured, when all are engaged at the long veered lines, of which it is 

 said that one man will attend three, and it may be more. The first 

 manner of taking mackerel was by seining by moonlight. This perhaps 

 was first practiced by Mr. Isaac Allerton and his fishing company at 

 Hull as early as 1626. After half a century the mode of fishing was 

 changed to that of drafting with long lines while the vessel was under 

 easy way; and this mode has been changed within these last twenty 

 years (1811-1831). The mode of fishing generally practiced now is to 

 invite the fish around the vessel while lying to by throwing out great 

 quantities of fish cut in small pieces, and to take them with short lines 

 held in the hand and drawn in with a single motion of the arm. By 

 this method it is thought that thrice as many fish may be taken in a 

 given time as by any other method. They are a capricious and sportive 

 fish. In cloudy and even wet weather they take the hook with most 

 avidity. They are very partial to the color of red; hence a rag of that 

 hue is sometimes a bait. A small strip of their own flesh taken from 

 near the tail is used with most success." 



Seining mackerel with drag seines is still practiced extensively in 

 the British provinces. That the practice was in vogue in Massachusetts 

 less than fifty years ago is shown by the following item : 



"Last week twenty barrels of mackerel were seined at one haul at 

 San<ly Point by Captain Baker. His seine is 500 yards long. A few 

 weeks ago he inclosed a multitude of fishes, principally menhaden shad. 

 It is estimated that their number was 200,000."— (Gloucester Telegraph, 

 June 30, 183S.) 



In his history of Scituate, pp. 25-27, Samuel Deane writes: "In 

 early times the shores of our bays were skirted with forest trees quite 

 near to the Avater's edge. In the month of June, when all nature is in 

 bloom, the volatile farina of the forest trees then floats in the air, and 

 occasionally settles on the smooth surface of the seas. Then it is that 

 this playful fish, attracted by this phenomenon, leaps and bounds above 

 the surface of the water. So again, at a later season, in July and 

 August, winged insects, carried away by the southwest winds, settle 

 and rest on the bosom of the ocean, a welcouae herald, it is said, to the 

 mackerel-catcher. Such are the habits of many fishes; and hence the 

 use of the fly as a bait by the angler of the trout streams." 



Douglas, in 1717, says: "Mackerel, split, salted, and barreled for the 



