324 



HISTORY OF con ASSET. 



the barrels. The details of this fishing industry, with the 

 manufacture of barrels and of salt, will be reserved for 

 a later chapter, when over twenty thousand barrels a year 

 was the catch of our fleet, and when eighty to a hundred 

 schooners were crowded into our Cove during the season. 



Besides these pickled fish, which the inspector was 

 required to report, there were cargoes of codfish which 

 were caught by our fishermen and not reported by the 

 inspector, because codfish were cured by drying and were 

 not packed in barrels that might conceal the quality of 

 the fish. 



There is no way of ascertaining the amount of codfish 

 taken and cured annually previous to the War of 1812, nor 

 indeed for much of the subsequent period, for no records 

 were kept by either the State or the town. 



We know, however, that from the beginning of New 

 England discoveries, before mackerel were thought worthy 

 of a hook, codfish by thousands were caught and dried 

 along the New England coast for the use of France and 

 England. The codfish which our fishermen brought 

 home to dry in the sun were spread out upon fish flakes 

 built upon Bassing Beach, — the beach of the famous 

 Threescore Acres. These " flakes " were small plat- 

 forms of woven twigs resting upon stakes driven into the 

 sand ; and there were acres of them upon Bassing Beach 

 at one time, within the memory of men,* holding the 

 salted codfish spread open to the sun. 



The place where the flakes stood is now submerged, 

 but the remains of the old stakes have been seen in the 

 water. 



But there was more than a fishing business done at our 

 Cove. It must not be supposed that the vessels built 

 here were wholly confined to fishing. Some of the 



♦Captain Elijah Pratt, of Scituate, says that Levi Tower used to send the William 

 & Nancy and others as " bankers " for codfish. The schooner used to unload 

 upon the steep side of Bassing Beach when he was a small boy. 



The William & Nancy was built 1816. 



