620 



SCOMBEROID^:. 



The following extract will show the numbers, and 

 the fluctuation of the prices. " In May, 1807, the 

 first Brighton boat-load of mackarel sold at Billings- 

 gate for forty guineas per hundred, seven shillings 

 each, reckoning six score to the hundred, the highest 

 price ever known at the market. The next boat-load 

 produced but thirteen guineas a hundred." Then for 

 the contrast : " Mackarel were so very plentiful at 

 Donn in 1808, that they were sold sixty for a shil- 

 ling," one four hundred and twentieth part of the price 

 of the first boat-load at Billingsgate just the year 

 before. " At Brighton, in June of the same year, the 

 shoal of mackarel was so great, and one of the boats 

 had the meshes of her nets so completely occupied 

 by them, that it was impossible to drag them in ; the 

 fish and nets, therefore, in the end, sunk together ; 

 the fishermen thereby sustaining a loss of nearly CO/., 

 exclusive of what the cargo, could it have been got 

 into the boat, would have produced. The success of 

 the fishery in 1821 was beyond all precedent. The 

 value of the catch of sixteen boats off' Lowestoffe on 

 the 30th of June, amounted to 5,2o2/. ; and it is sup- 

 posed that there was no less an amount than 14.000/. 

 altogether realised by the owners and men concerned 

 in the fishing on the Suffolk coast. In March, 1833,on 

 a Sunday, from Hastings, boats brought on shore ten 

 thousand eight hundred mackarel ; and the next day, 

 two boats brought seven thousand fish." Yarrell's 

 British Fishes, vol. i., p. 125, 126. 



The mode of capturing fish, which sometimes 

 fetch so v,ery exorbitant a price, and are at other 

 times caught in such numbers, and sold so cheap, is 

 a matter of considerable interest. The method of 

 capturing them in the wholesale way, and out at sea, 

 is by means of drift-nets, that is, nets which are 

 allowed to drive with the current of the water, in the 

 same way as is done in the capture of herrings on 

 the grand scale. They are also both caught in the 

 same way in the net, that is, in the meshes, and not 

 by having the net drawn round them, so that the 

 individual mackarel are caught each in a mesh, in the 

 same way as herrings are, arid not by enclosing the 

 shoal as is done in the case of pilchards. The net is 

 twenty feet in depth and six times as much in length, 

 well buoyed up with floats against its own weight 

 and that of the fish, that it may entangle, but it has 

 no weights at the bottom. A number of these nets 

 are often tied together, and the boat remains at the 

 end of the drift-rope, or head-rope of the net, to serve 

 as a sort of anchor. They are usually shot in the 

 evening, and drawn once, and shot again during the 

 night, or left undisturbed till the morning, according 

 to circumstances ; the management of a fishing ground 

 being a matter of local experience, which none ever 

 do so well as those who have been regularly trained 

 to it. When the net is drawn, a capstan is ready in 

 the boat for the purpose of hauling it home, and the 

 fish are either rowed to port in the boat, or the boal 

 remains on the station, and another vessel removes 

 the fish, according to circumstances. This is the 

 method of fishing on those parts of the mackarel 

 grounds which are most distant from the land. 

 Nearer the shore a kind of seine is employed with 

 smaller meshes than those of the draught net, and the 

 net is worked by the crews of two boats, whose object 

 it is to surround the fish, and secure them in the 

 bight of the net. Mackarel are also taken by hook, 

 and this indeed is the usual mode upon those parts 

 of the coast where mackarel .*re not very plenty, and 



where, in consequence, the fishing is not carried on 

 upon a large scale, or very systematically. Mackarel 

 are so very voracious, that the kind of bait used for 

 them is not a matter of much consequence. A slip 

 of mackarel itself, with the shining skin on, a bit of 

 red cloth, any thing, in short, that makes a conspicuous 

 appearance in the water will do, and it is all the 

 better if the fishing-boat is kept in rapid motion, and 

 that the surface of the water or the state of the atmo- 

 sphere is such as not to admit too much light. A 

 " mackarel breeze," which just breaks the surface into 

 ripple without any long waves, is understood to be 

 the most advantageous, and if it is accompanied by a 

 " mackarel sky ;'' that is, an atmosphere dappled with 

 clouds something resembling the colours of a mackarel, 

 so much the better. Under these circumstances, the 

 mackarel seldom fail intakingthe bait, and if they take 

 it, they are sure to be caught ; for, whatever the bait 

 may be, they take it so greedily, that they are sure to 

 be fastened on the hook beyond all possibility of ex- 

 tricating themselves. It is generally necessary to use a 

 weight as a sinker on the line, or rather on a sort of 

 head line to which that carrying the hook and bait is 

 attached, and floats at some distance in rear of the 

 weight. We may remark in passing, as rather a curious 

 instance of uniformity of words among fishers, that the 

 shoal of mackarel, herrings, and all other fishes which 

 come to the shores in great numbers for their seasonal 

 purposes, is pronounced as if it were written " school," 

 both in Cornwall and in Caithness. 



The muzzle of the mackarel is very much pointed ; 

 the lower jaw is longer than the upper, and the teeth 

 are in a single row in each jaw, conical in their shape, 

 but having their points inclined toward the pharynx. 

 The whole structure and curvature of the mouth show 

 that these fishes take their food only as it swims in 

 the free waters, and never on the banks. The pec- 

 toral and ventral fins are both in advance of the 

 dorsal, the vent is opposite the beginning of the second 

 dorsal ; and the h'nlets behind both the second dorsal 

 and the anal are few in number. The grand colour 

 of the back is rich green, mottled with blue, and with 

 trans verse bars of dusky white, which are generally said 

 to be straight in the males, and wavy in the females. 

 The males have, also, the gill-covers longer and the 

 body thinner in proportion to its length than the 

 females ; but the proportions of the parts of the body 

 to each other are much the same in both. The colours 

 of the lower sides and under part are not very easily 

 described, and they speedily change after the fish is 

 exposed to the air. Silvery, with clouds and reflec- 

 tions of golden bronze, of many varying shades, may 

 be described as the general colour of those parts. 



Scomber colius (The Spanish mackarel) is a rare 

 fish on the British coasts as compared with the com- 

 mon mackarel. It is a thicker fish than the common 

 mackarel, with the eyes larger and the gape wider, 

 but the teeth not so large. The under part is beau- 

 tifully mottled with golden and silvery metallic lustres 

 interspersed with yellow spots. It is by no means 

 rare in the seas of the south of Europe, and great 

 quantities are taken on the coasts of the south of 

 France. 



Scomber lar (the lar mackarel) is a native of the 

 Pacific, and fished for by the inhabitants of several 

 of the islands which spot that ocean, especially by 

 those of New Ireland. It is larger than the macka- 

 rel of the European seas, and an exceedingly beautiful 

 fish in its colours. The upper parts are mottled with 



