336 



ABDOMINAL SOFT-FINNED FISHES. 



In the months of April and May herrings begin to appear off the 

 Shetland Islands, and towards the end of June, or in July, they 

 arrive in incalculable numbers, forming vast and dense shoals, which 

 sometimes extend over the surface of the sea for several leagues, and 

 are hundreds of feet in thickness. The Herring-fishery is of great 



FIG. 267. HERRING. 



importance ; it occupies every year entire fleets, and formerly was 

 carried on with still greater activity. About the middle of the 

 17th century, the Dutch employed not less than 2,000 vessels ; and 

 it is estimated that 800,000 persons in Holland and West Friesland 

 derived their living from this branch of industry alone. 



Herrings are generally caught by means of nets, five or six hundred 

 fathoms in length, the lower edge of which is loaded with lead, 

 while the upper edge is made to float upon the surface, by means of 

 buoys of cork. The meshes are just large enough to receive the 

 head of a herring as far as the gills, but not to allow the pectoral fins 

 to pass. The fish, in endeavouring to overcome the obstacle that 

 this great vertical net opposes to its passage, is thus meshed, and 

 not being able to advance or to recede, owing to the gills and the 

 fins, he remains a prisoner until the fishermen draw the net on 

 board. This is termed a gill-net. The number of herrings taken in 

 this way is sometimes so great that the net bursts under their weight. 

 Generally, this fishery is carried on at some distance from the shore, 

 and the herrings are salted on board. 



The Sardine (Clupea Sardina) is a small species of Herring, 

 celebrated for the delicacy of its flesh. It inhabits the Baltic, the 

 Atlantic, and the Mediterranean. During the winter, it keeps in the 

 depths of the sea, but about the month of June, it draws near the 

 shore in immense shoals. As many as forty or even fifty thousand 



