AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 12!>9 



ring and fish oils. We export, on an average, annually, li 1,000 quintals 

 of dry codfish to Brazils and Mediterranean and West Indies. We also 

 export about 50,000 gallons of cod and seal oils. All of this oil goes to 

 English markets. We do not export any fish to the United States at 

 present, nor for three years. We have tried both herring and large 

 codfish (dry and green), and took great pains that it should give satis- 

 faction, and with all that it was sacrificed in the American markets. As 

 to the dry codfish that we prepare for the before-named foreign markets, 

 and which is of a superior quality, the American market would not pay 

 us what we pay for it here. 



5. The American free market is of no use to us at all. 



6. The great bulk of the codfish taken is got within three miles of the 

 shore. 



7. The right of fishing in American waters is of no value to us ; we 

 never go there to fish. 



8. From 1854 until the expiration of the period of licenses the Ameri- 

 cans fished in the Bay of Chaleur in great numbers for mackerel they 

 used generally to load their vessels. Since 1871 we have still seen 

 them, but not in such numbers, and we see them still ; they are here to- 

 day. An American captain told me yesterday that he caught over 30 

 barrels of mackerel off the light-house on the point. The mackerel 

 fishing in this bay generally begins about the 20th of this month. .Ac- 

 cording to reliable information, I believe the mackerel is now plentiful 

 in the bay, and lots are caught in the nets. 



9. I believe it is our interest to keep our fisheries to ourselves, and 

 not allow strangers to participate in them, as our population is increas- 

 ing, and if strangers are allowed to fish in our inshore waters many of 

 our young men will have to emigrate. 



10. Many of the American schooners use trawl lines in the prosecu- 

 tion of their cod-fishing, which causes great injury, it being most of the 

 mother fish they catch. They also do damage by the practice of throw- 

 ing over the offal. 



11. If the American Bank fishermen were prohibited from taking or 

 buying bait on shore, they could not carry on their Bank fishery suc- 

 cessfully, as the supply of bait on the Banks is not certain. 



I hereby swear that ihe above statement is, to the best of my knowl- 

 edge and belief, correct. 



J. MOURANT. 



The sard Joshua Mourant has sworn to the truth of the above affi- 

 davit at Paspebiac, in the county of Bonaveuture and Province of Que- 

 bec, this sixteenth day of August, A. D. 1877, before me. 



P. FORTIN, J. P. 



'So. 176. 



In the matter of the Fisheries Commission at Halifax, under the Treaty 



of Washington. 



I, FRANK LEBLANC, of Port Daniel, in the county of Bonaventure, 

 Province of Quebec, make oath and say as follows : 



1. I am fifty years of age. Since the age of 14, that is, for the past 36 

 years, I have been a mariner. 1 have sailed in the Gulf of St. Lawreuce, 

 on the coasts of the maritime provinces and Newfoundland, the Atlantic 

 coasts of America, to the West Indies, and to Great Britain, and for the 

 last 25 years I have been master mariner in command of a coasting 



