THE COD AND COD-FISHERY 



291 



chances of failure of cargo for the single schooner are in- 

 creased. There are simply not enough "best berths" 

 to go round when the list of schooners increases beyond 

 a certain point. Quite independently of man's interfer- 

 ence, the harvests of the sea, like those on the land, may 

 naturally swing in cycles. So long ago as 1775 there was a 

 complete failure of the cod-fishery along the north side of 

 Belle Isle Strait; yet this latest year (1908) the "crop" 

 has been unusually good. It may well be that the inshore 

 fishing is now in a period of relatively lean years, to be 

 followed by a period of fat years, the whole swing of the 

 industrial pendulum being utterly uncontrolled by the 

 relatively insignificant takings of the summer fleet on the 

 Labrador. Neither science nor the practical industry 

 has yet obtained sufficient knowledge of the sea to declare 

 the whole law which governs the annual, much less the 

 age-to-age, swelling or recession of the finny flood. 



In any event the cod seem to be as plentiful as ever in 

 deep water. The use of long lines by banking vessels along 

 the Labrador is growing steadily in importance. The 

 failure of many a schooner to find cargo may be due to the 

 fact that the trap-net is the only method of capture em- 

 ployed. The deepest water in which I have seen traps 

 set is eighteen fathoms. If for any reason the fish, though 

 as plentiful as ever, do not come right home to the rocks, 

 the captain outfitted with trap-net only might wrongly 

 report on this question of a possible diminution in the 

 numbers of the cod in Labrador seas. 



One important cause governing the nearness of the 

 approach of the cod in any year to the actual coast-line is 

 undoubtedly the temperature of the water. This may 



