FISHERMEN'S OWN BOOK. 43 



This trip was made from Gloucester in the sch. Mary Elizabeth, one of the 

 old-time Bankers, commanded by Capt. George Davis, of Annisquam. The 

 Mary Elizabeth was owned by Robert Elwell of Gloucester, and was a new 

 topsail schooner of one hundred and thirteen tons, built upon the Merrimac 

 river just above the Haverhill bridge. She carried a crew of twelve men, in 

 addition to the skipper, as follows : Benjamin Marble, Joseph Jones, James 

 Sawyer, all of Fresh Water Cove; Samuel Davis of Ferry Lane; John 

 Wharff, Enoch Center, of Fox Hill ; Samuel Wharff, William Bennett, Ben- 

 jamin Curtis, near Dodge's Mill, Riverdale ; William Marsh, Robert and 

 George Davis of Annisquam, the two latter sons of the skipper, Robert be- 

 ing the cook, and George, now living at Annisquam in the eighty-sixth year 

 of his age, being our informant in regard to the incidents of the trip. 



They started about the first of April and were gone ninety days. They 

 fished with hand lines, on board the vessel, and caught seventeen thousand 

 codfish in number. 



Having arrived on the Bank they made everything as snug as possible, 

 taking down the topsail and topgallant yards and lashing them across the 

 stern. Halibut were very numerous, and they could have soon loaded with 

 them had they desired. They caught a great many of them, but only saved 

 the fins and napes, which they salted in barrels, and fietched and smoked 

 quite a lot of the best pieces overhead in the cabin. One day they caught 

 a very large one, with a haddock in his mouth, the only haddock they saw 

 during the trip. They had very good weather, met with no disaster, and 

 arrived safely in Gloucester, and landed their fare at Fresh Water Cove, 

 making 2,500 quintals dry fish, the crew realizing as their share $24 for 

 each thousand fish caught. Our informant states that the water stood upon 

 her lower deck when she left the Bank, but naturally, from the 'shrinkage 

 of the fish and the pumping off of the pickle, she was considerable lighter 

 when she reached port. Her outfits were principally ship-bread, beans, rice, 

 a little flour, some beef and pork, molasses, tea and coffee, and some rum. 

 Fish and beans and beef, with ship-bread, were the principal articles of 

 diet, but on Sunday morning they would have fried pancakes — about half a 

 bushel being required to go the rounds — as a sort of holiday treat, as they 

 invariably refrained from fishing on Sunday. The Mary Elizabeth had the 

 high quarter-deck peculiar to the Bankers, divided below into three com- 

 partments, the forward part used for the storage of fishing gear, etc., the 

 middle compartment as a pantry and kitchen, in which they cooked and 

 ate, and the after part called the steerage, where they lived and slept. 



