1156 MISCELLANEOUS. 



away. Towards the close of September, fishing is suspended, and 

 the vessels depart for France or the West Indies. 



The Grand Bank fishery is pursued in vessels of between one and 

 two hundred tons burden, with two strong chaloupes, or boats, to each. 

 From sixteen to twenty men compose a crew. The vessels proceed 

 first to St. Pierre, land the shore-fishermen and "curers," and thence 

 take position on the banks, anchoring in seventy or eighty fathoms of 

 water. Everything in readiness the chaloupes are launched and sent 

 out at night to place the "ground-lines," to which are attached some 

 four or five thousand hooks. When not too boisterous, these lines are 

 examined every day, and the fish attached to the hooks split, salted, 

 and placed in the hold of the vessel. Meanwhile, the fish caught on 

 board by the men not assigned to the boats are treated in the same 

 way. The first fare is usually secured in June, and carried to St. Pierre 

 to be dried. .The second fare is cured at the same place; but the 

 third if fortunately there be another is commonly carried to France 

 "green." 



This fishing is difficult and dangerous. It requires expert and dar- 

 ing men. It is prosecuted in an open, rough, and often a stormy sea, 

 and frequently involves the loss of boats and their crews. 



The third fishery, at St. Pierre and Miquelon, is similar, in some 

 respects, to that between Cape Ray and Cape John, on the coast of 

 Newfoundland. Boats, instead of vessels, are, however, employed in 

 it. The boats of the two islands are between three and four hundred 

 in number, and require two men to each. They go out in the morning 

 and return at night. Thus, as in all shore-fisheries, the fishermen 

 always sleep at their own homes. As this is the only business of the 

 islands nearly all the men, women, and children are engaged in catch- 

 ingor curing. The season opens in April, and closes usually in October. 



We have seen the importance attached by France to her immense 

 American domains and with what pertinacity she maintained her pre- 

 tensions to the monopoly of the fishing-grounds. It remains to speak 

 more particularly than has yet been done of the two lone, bare, and 

 rocky islands that remain to her as monuments of the vicissitudes of 

 human condition and of national humiliation. 



The situation of St. Pierre and Miquelon commands the entrance of 

 the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The growth of wood is insufficient even 

 for fuel. They produce no food, and the inhabitants are dependent on 

 France and other countries for supplies. The population of St. Pierre 

 in 1847 was 2,030, of which about one-quarter was "floating" or non- 

 resident. The population of Miquelon at the same time was 625. 



There are several Catholic churches and schools, priests, monks, 

 and nuns. In 1848, a hospital, sufficiently commodious to receive 

 upwards of one hundred sick persons, was erected. The dwellings are 

 of wood. The government-house is of the same material, and plain 

 and old-fashioned. The streets are narrow, short, and dirty. The 

 official personages are a governor, a commissary or minister of marine, 

 a harbor-master, and some inferior functionaries. The military, lim- 

 ited by treaty to fifty men, consist of about thirty gens d'armes. Upon 

 the station is a single armed ship, though other armed vessels are 

 occasional visiters. The present light-house was erected in 1845, at a 

 cost of 80,000 francs, and, well built of brick, is a substantial edifice. 



Such are the TWO ISLANDS TWO LEAGUES IN EXTENT which 

 remain to the power that once possessed the whole country bordering 



