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on these points. He had recently learned from Captain 

 Danewig, of Norway, that the soft clam (My a arenarid) 

 was very abundant on that coast, but that was not used 

 either for bait or as food. He inferred that the same 

 species was abundant on the British Coast if he were 

 mistaken on this point he should be glad to be corrected, 

 but he thought the inference was that there were large 

 quantities. In the United States they made very little 

 use of mussels, although there were large quantities of 

 them : the fishermen did not use them for bait, and the 

 people, excepting a few in the vicinity of New York, knew 

 nothing of their value as food. They substituted the soft 

 clam, of which the people of Norway and Great Britain 

 had not yet learned the value. Since coming into the 

 room, he had hastily put together a few facts concerning 

 the extent to which this species was used in the States. 

 In the State of Maine 318,000 bushels, or 1,000,000 Ibs. 

 of this mollusc were used for bait and for food. In 

 Massachusetts an equal quantity, if not more, and in the 

 middle states 406,000 bushels, making in all over 1,000,000 

 bushels, having a value to the fishermen of $458,000. He 

 had not the statistics for Connecticut, Rhode Island, and 

 some of the other States where these shell-fish were also 

 used in considerable quantities, but including them it 

 might be said that over ij million bushels, valued at 

 probably not less than $600,000, were used on the Atlantic 

 sea-board. Some fishermen on the coast confined them- 

 selves to the quarrying, as it was called, of these shell- 

 fish, for they had the habit of burying themselves two or 

 three inches deep in the mud or sand of the shallow bays 

 along the shore. This industry afforded employment to a 

 large number of fishermen at a time when there was nothing 

 else to be done. Some of the smaller vessels, not considered 



