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all over this vast country. It seems probable that Mr. Thomson, or 

 some one else, did something more than erect a frame about the time 

 the act was passed for his encouragement, for a writer of that period 

 who was in the country in 1639, mentions Cape Ann as a place 

 " where fishing is set forward, and some stages builded ;" and anoth- 

 er early writer calls "Cape Ann a place of fishing; being peopled 

 with fishermen till the Reverend Mr. Richard Blindman came." Of 

 the company who came with him, and of other settlers who came 

 about the same time, it does not appear that any engaged in the fish- 

 ing business. It is certain that nearly if not all of them sought the 

 most favorable spots for agriculture they could find, though it is quite 

 probable that a few, who were located around the harbor, may have 

 engaged to a very limited extent in shore fishing in small boats. In 

 a case of litigation, in 1651, about a piece of a net, mention is made 

 of "the bote and voyg ;" and about that time there appears to have 

 been a fishing stage at Annisquam. A few years later Peter Duncan 

 carried on a small trade at the Point, in the Harbor, where it is sup- 

 posed that Mr. Thomson erected a building or a frame for the pur- 

 poses of his fishery in 1639, and, in company with others, owned a 

 shallop. One man, in 1663, agreed to pay a debt of fifty pounds in 

 " good merchantable fish and mackerel," and at this time we find 

 "fish and mackerel" among the articles in which the salary of the 

 minister was to be paid ; but not till many years after the settlement 

 of the town can any evidence be found that a vessel of sufficient size 

 to resort to distant fishing banks was owned in it. In two instances, 

 in 1680, a sloop is found as part of the property of deceased settlers, 

 anf 1 ., in 1693, a tax-list on record at the State House in Boston, shows 

 that all the personal estate of this description, then held by the people 

 of Gloucester, was composed of six sloops, a shallop and a boat ; 

 and one or more of these, there is reason to suppose, was employed 

 in wood-coasting. In 1695 the sons of Jeffrey Parsons had a fishing 

 stage at Fisherman's Field, and one of them, who died in 1714, had 

 one third of a fishing vessel, one half a shallop, and one half of an 

 open sloop, all valued at 54 ; and another, who died in 1722, had 

 three "scooners," part of two sloops, and shop goods and stores for 

 fishing. At the last named date this business seems to have become 

 firmly established in the town, though to what extent it was pursued 

 can be a matter of conjecture only ; but it seems quite certain that 

 persons were engaged in it at the Harbor and at Annisquam, at the 

 latter place more extensively, perhaps, than at the former, for one 

 merchant, whose vessels sailed from 'Squam River, died in 1734, leav- 



