2386 AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 



Q. What did you go for? A. To ride out two hurricanes, two or 

 three of the hardest winds ever I saw blow. That was in I don't rec- 

 ollect exactly the year. It was in September. 



Q. Perhaps the Commission may all know, but from what size to what 

 size do you catch these halibut? I don't mean you to take an extraor- 

 dinary case, but how do they run ? A. They run about 60 pounds, 

 dressed ; that is, the head and tail off, and the " innards" taken out. 



Q. Do you take a good deal of pains to clean them? A. Yes; very 

 much pains. We get all the blood out of the backbone, and every- 

 thing. 



Q. How do you do that ? A. We scrape it out with knives, and wash 

 them with scrub-brooms. We scrub the blood out of the back bone 

 very particularly to keep them. 



Q. If you are going to keep halibut in ice for a long time your suc- 

 cess depends very much upon the pains you take in fully cleansing 

 them ? A. Yes. 



Q. So with the success in keeping bait a long time? A. Just the 

 same. We clean every bony fish. We take every tish when we want 

 to keep them a long time, and scrub the blood right out of the back- 

 bone after the head is off, and wash them very clean. That leaves 

 nothing but the fish and the bone. 



Q. How long do you think you could keep your ice; for instance, on 

 the Grand Bank, if you wanted fresh bait for codfish, how long could 

 you keep the bait fresh ? A. I can't tell ; because I never went on a 

 salt-fishing cruise in my life. I have never been aboard a salt fishing 

 vessel. 1 can't tell anything about that. 



Q. How do you catch halibut ? Do you use trawls ? A. We use 

 trawls and hand-lines. I call my two hands a trawl. I calculate my 

 trawl would be equal to any other in the vessel. 



Q. Which do you think the most of for success generally, the hand- 

 lines or the trawls? A. Hand lines wherever we have fished. I have 

 got the marks to show about my trawls right on my hands. 



Q. flow is the number now and the quantity compared with what it 

 was any 20 or 40 years ago ? A. There is plenty this year by what I 

 have heard and seen of our smacks. I haven't been halibut fishing. 



Q. How does this year for halibut fishing on the coast of the United 

 States I mean the small banks, the Xantucket Shoals, and all around 

 that region compare with other years ? A. They are plentier than 

 they have been for 35 years. 



Q. When your vessels from your town of Xoank have got through the 

 halibut fishing, what do they do ? A. Some of them haul up and some 

 go south. I have always hauled up when I have got through the hali- 

 but season. 



Q. About pound-fishing off the coast of Nantucket and along Rhode 

 Island and Massachusetts, can you tell us about that? A. I may tell 

 you the best way I know. I have been in the pound business the last two 

 years on the east end of Long Island. Last year at Elizabeth Island. 

 All we had to contend with was Mr. Forbes, a big man from Boston. 



Q. Well, he owns the island ? A. Yes. 



Q. Yon didn't have a hard time after all ? A. We. had a tip-top time 

 after he found out we didn't want to steal his deer or sheep. 



Q. He accommodated you, didn't he, a good deal? A. His sons came 

 aboard, and they were very polite. We furnished them with bait and 

 everything they wanted. They were very accommodating. All we had 

 to do was to send up to the farm-house and get our milk generally. We 

 furnished them with all the fish they wanted to eat for the summer. 



