RHODE ISLAND: NEWPORT COUNTY, INCLUDING BLOCK ISLAND. 295 



from Church's Poiut to West Island, a distance of 3i miles. Shore fishing is carried on south of 

 Church's Point. 



For pound-net fishing the shore is divided into twenty-one sets or sections of Co fathoms. 

 Some of the sets are much better than others. No one can draw for a set unless he has all the 

 gear required for fishing. If one man has nearly all the apparatus he cauuot draw, but a second 

 party can go in with him under a firm name. This is to give a poor man a chance. Thus a rich 

 fitter will furnish what is lacking and the poor man will do the fishing. No one can set nearer 

 than C5 fathoms to another. When three draws occur in succession in one bay the one having the 

 middle set is allowed to run his leader out till he gets abreast of the other two, but no further. 

 The fishermen are all Americans. Two-thirds of them leave home by the loth of June and ship 

 on the menhaden steamers and follow that fishery the season through. Most of them are said to 

 be more intelligent than fishermen generally, and many of them are laud owners and quite well 

 to do. 



Fishing is generally done on shares, rarely any other way. One-third of the gross amount 

 goes to the fitter and the balance, after deducting board, is distributed among the men. 



Before the law required a close time many of the men used to go home on Saturday night and 

 stay over Sunday, but if there were any runs of fish during this time those who staid were the 

 only ones who shared ;. those who were away got nothing of the Sunday's catch. In one instance 

 all were away from one gang but three men, and they got $100 each for the day's catch. 



Traps have been fished here for 30 years or more. On the same place where there are now 

 seven traps there have been as high as eighteen. 



In the latter part of March notices are posted up in the town of Tiverton that on a certain day 

 and place the subject of the Sakonnet fisheries will be discussed and the draws for the sets made. 

 If there were more than twenty-one applications the distance would be divided into shorter sets, 

 but there has. never yet been over eighteen applications. 



It is said that in 1879 the run of scup was very great, and came in larger bodies than ever 

 before known. The theory is that the spring of 1879 was cold and backward, and that for this 

 reason the fish did not appear until 3 weeks later than usual. The first scup come in schools at 

 different times, some days apart, and when they strike the cold water they seem to stop. Other 

 schools follow, and they keep coming till bye and bye the water gets warm and the whole body 

 "strike on" the shore at once. This accounts for the enormous runs of 1879. One trap took as 

 high as 3,000 barrels. Traps were so full that they could not be raised, 1,200 to 1,500 barrels being 

 taken at a time. 



One year with another, the scup are not as abundant as formerly, though in 1879 they were 

 more numerous than at any other time during the last fifteen years. Fish seem spasmodic in their 

 movements. The year 1880 compares only with an average year, while 1879 was an unusual one. 

 Many of the fishermen think the great runs of fish sometimes get by before the traps are set. 



In 1879 seven traps were set south of Church's Point, and some heart-seines around Foglaud 

 Poiut. The fishing is carried on chiefly by traps that are set for several miles along the river, com- 

 mencing just north of the point. The net and leader are floated by means of corks strung together. 

 The following are the dimensions of the traps used here: Leader, 100 to 200 fathoms long, of 5-inch 

 mesh; the trap itself is of box shape, 10 fathoms wide, 15 fathoms long, from 4 to 7 fathoms deep, 

 and of 2i-iuch mesh. They cost, when new, from $1,000 to $1,200 each. They are put down 

 between April 25 and May 10, and taken up about June 15, during which interval the scup are 

 running along the eastern shore. In lifting a net of this kind three boats, called working boats, 

 poiuted at each end and capable of holding forty barrels offish, enter the month of the net; each 



