

120 FISHERIES OF THE PROVINCE OF QUEBEC 



submit the above to your consideration, and have the honour 

 to be with the most profound respect, &c., &c., 



(Signed) C. ROBIN & CO." 

 Paspebiac, 4th September, 1822. 



The Robins and Mr. Christie were not by any means the 

 only ones to complain of the alleged invasion of the Canadian 

 Fisheries by the Americans. 



Mr. E. I. Man, of Ristigouche, stated in 1823 that great 

 complaints were made that the Americans encroach on our 

 shores contrary to law. He claimed to have seen a repre- 

 sentation signed shortly before at the Baie des Chaleurs by a 

 large number of respectable merchants and inhabitants con- 

 cerned in the cod fisheries, fully explaining the various abuses 

 of those fisheries in the Gulf of St. Lawrence ; which repre- 

 sentation, he understood, was submitted to His Excellency 

 the Governor-in-Chief. 



Mr. James McTavish testified about the same time of the 

 grievances caused by the Americans to the fishermen of the 

 North Shore. He said that the Treaty of Ghent allowed the 

 Americans to fish within a league of the shore from the Gulf 

 of St. Lawrence including the Banks as far as Mont Joli on 

 the North Shore, and Fox River on the South Shore; but 

 they go beyond these limits as far as River St. Johns on the 

 North Shore, to the injury of the lessees of the Mingan 

 Seigniory Company. He said that they had even entered the 

 Natashquan River in 1822 to take salmon. He asked that a 

 regulation should be made to prevent the Americans from 

 anchoring and fishing on the Banks of the principal rivers 

 on the Seigniory of Mingan, because by doing so they prevent- 

 ed the salmon from entering these rivers, while their practice 

 of throwing the offal from the cleaning of the cod fish over 

 the side of their vessels was particularly destructive to salmon. 

 He added that the Americans had been in the habit of carry- 

 ing on this trade for the twenty preceding years, that from 

 twenty to twenty-five vessels were engaged in it, often making 

 two trips a year. These vessels were schooners from 60 to 



