466 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Oct. 



of study as well as work might be to him, you 

 may vest assured, that I, for one, would never quit 

 the farm. Perhaps you will answer this by asking 

 me how much time the poor mechanic or laborer 

 in the city gets for study ? If so, I should answer that 

 they can get at least three hours daily, with the 

 assistance, also, of libraries, lectures, and that which 

 is derived from association. Whereas on the farm, 

 the ten hour system is not yet ; libraries are not 

 considered as things needful, lectures are few, far 

 between, and poor at that, and associations for the 

 benefit of the farmer, are among the things heard 

 of, but not seen. With such thoughts as these, is 

 it strange that the farmers' boys are restless, and 

 their maidens sigh ? 



Now that I have given you a knowledge of my 

 situation, likes and dislikes, I shall wait patiently 

 for your advice, whether I had better "stick to the 

 farm," or something else, until I have a knowledge 

 as well as a purse sufHcieut to enable me to farm 

 as farming ought to be done. 



Yours respectfully, A Farmer's Sox. 



JVorth Bridgewater, Aug. 21, 1856. 



EELS AKD EEL CATCHERS. 



One curious in eels as exposed for sale in the 

 Fulton market, might follow up a portion of these 

 esteemed fish, to Moriches Bay, on the south side 

 of Long Island. There sixty miles from New York, 

 and sixty rods from the 'Atlantic, in an almost 

 fresh water bay about fifteen miles long, and from 

 half a mile to three miles wide, these wiggle them- 

 selves by thousands into the traps set for them. 

 The eel pot is a round basket 20 inches long, with 

 a hinged lid at the top and a hole in the bottom. 

 This bottom runs upwards, as do the bottoms of 

 champaigne and other wine bottles, fraudulently 

 presenting size and space, but sadly diminishing ca- 

 pacity. This cone-shaped base, however, is a part 

 of the trap. In the spring of the year small fish, 

 taken near the Fire Island inlet, (the outlet of Mo- 

 riches Bay) make bait for eels. In hot weather, 

 the "horse-shoes" are rather the coarse appetizers 

 man offers them. Those, without apology or per- 

 ceptible hesitation, are chopped with axes into four 

 parts. A pile of these quartered dead being heaped 

 up in the bow, the boat is pushed out for the pots. 

 High stakes set upright in a line, filty feet apart, 

 sustain the pots, which hang from them under wa- 

 ter by ropes. The fisherman pulls up the pot in- 

 to the gunwale of his boat, flirts open the lid, and 

 if old as Methusaleh in his business, is sure to yield 

 to curiosity, and peak in before he empties it. Out 

 come eels and little fish, and the shelly or uncon- 

 sumed part of the bait. The hole at the top of the 

 conical bottom lets the eels in. The sides at the 

 bottom, and the bottom's real bottom, (involution 

 worse involved) prevent their getting out. Fresh 

 bait is then thrown into the pot, the lid is quickly 

 fastened, and the trap is dropped overboard. The 

 eels meanwhile glide and crawl about the bottom 

 of the boat in a fashion so snake-like, that a lands- 

 man involuntarily lifts his boots from their approach. 

 From stake to stake rapidly goes the fisherman, 

 and empties and resets the traps. This he does 

 twice a day. Forty traps will keep an active man 

 busy during the season. Upon the statement of a 

 grand-child of Neptune, to us made on Wednesday 

 last, (his hands then affirmatively placed on an eel 



trap,) twenty-five dozen eels a day are the custo- 

 mary catch for a fisherman. These are placed in 

 tank, till a large wagon load is collected. They 

 !then go to an "agent," the first of the middle-men 

 ; who stand between the consumer and the produ- 

 cer of these fish. This man has them skinned. 

 : riled round the operator the eels are stirred into 

 the sand, partly to make them gritty to the grasp, 

 but chiefly we suppose to spoil the proverb of "slii> 

 pery as an eel." The throat, with one quick gash, 

 is cut through to the skin on the back of the neck, 

 the belly is then slit, and with a nice use of the 

 j thumb nails, and an artistic jerk with both hands, 

 that eel's skin is oflf. It is a marvellously fast pro- 

 t cess. "Smart" skinners will take the epidermis off 

 'thirty dozen in an hour. A cent a dozen is the 

 ; price paid for this queer labor. The peeled fish 

 are packed while yet wriggling, in ice, and taken 

 by rail to New York. There they go into the hands 

 of a "commission merchant" attached to some mar- 

 Iket. He sells and pockets ten per cent, of the 

 I gross receipts, and remits the balance to the 

 "agent." This one deducts freight, charges for ice, 

 I and cost of skinning, then scales off" six j er cent, 

 ifrom the balance as his commission, and divides 

 {the residue among the fishermen. These net for 

 'their labor, according to the quality of their catch, 

 and the season of the year, but from six cents to 

 eighteen cents a dozen for the eels. 



Three hundred dozen eels, miniu; their skins, are 

 the ordinary daily shipment from Centre Moriches 

 to New York, by the Long Island road. How 

 ;many besides are daily sent from all other points 

 I in the circle of the north and south shores of the 

 Island, the curious in fish statistics may cypher out. 

 When they have finished, if the atmosphere before 

 them does not undulate and wiggle with skinned 

 eels, as the air waves and vibrates in summer 

 against a heated wall — indeed if all Long Island is 

 not undulating with a snake-like movement towards 

 New York and the Fulton market, those statisti- 

 cians have only figures of arithmetic in them — 

 that's all. — Evening Journal. 



To CoREESPONDENTS. — We must beg the indul- 

 gence of correspondents for delaying the publica- 

 tion of some of their articles. Our paper is now 

 so widely extended, and there are so many persons 

 feeling a lively interest in the cause, and desirous 

 of relating their views, or describing their experi- 

 ments, that even the hurried season of summer and 

 harvest finds us with an unusual press of matter. 

 Articles on "A selection of 12 best varieties Straw- 

 berries," on "Wanted — less land or more labor," 

 "Mineralogy," "Lunacy," "Reclaiming Bog Mea- 

 dows," "Education of Farmers," "Mental and Mor- 

 al Improvement," "Nuts for a Farmer's Son to 

 crack," "The advantage of small farms," "Influences 

 of clearing and draining on the atmosphere," "Green 

 corn for soiling," "Corn fodder," and many others, 

 are on hand, and for which we hope to find room 

 soon. Short articles usually find a place sooner 

 than long ones. We now have some numbering 

 ten or twelve closely-written pages. The insertion 

 of these would exclude variely, which we must give, 

 in order to meet the wants of the general reader. 



