LEGISLATION FOR THE PROTECTION OF MACKEREL. 303 



There is hardly anything which possesses life that has so little instinct as not to become very shy 

 under such barbarous inflictions. It is obvious that all which are hooked in this manner are not 

 taken on board; the gig frequently tears out, and thousands, millions of these fish are lacerated 

 by these large hooks and afterwards die in the water."* 



The following protest appeared in the Gloucester Telegraph, Wednesday, August 7, 1839, it 

 being a quotation from the Salem Register : 



"All the mackerel men who arrive report the scarcity of this fish, and at the same time I 

 notice an improvement in taking them with nets at Capo~Cod and other places. If this specula- 

 tion is allowed to go on without being checked or regulated by the government, will not these fish 

 be as scarce on the coast as penguins are, which were so plenty before the Revolutionary war that 

 our fishermen could take them with their gaffs? But during the war some mercenary and cruel 

 individuals used to visit the islands on the eastern shore where were the haunts of these birds for 

 breeding, and take them for the sake of the fat, which they procured, and then let the birds go. 

 This proceeding finally destroyed the whole race. It is many years since I have seen or heard 

 one except on the coast of Cape Horn. In 1692 the General Court passed an act prohibiting the 

 taking of mackerel before the first day of July annually, under penalty of forfeiting the fish so 

 taken. In 1702 this act was revived with additional penalties besides forfeiting the fish and 

 apparatus for taking, 20 shillings per barrel, and none to be taken with seines or nets. 



"A FISHERMAN. 

 "MARBLEIIEAD, August 3, 1839." 



1859. Protests against the use of seines. "A petition is now before the committee on fisheries, 

 in the House, to abolish the catching of mackerel in seines on our coast. As mackerel can now 

 be caught only in this way, and many of our people are interested in this business, it becomes 

 highly important that any such stupid petition should be prostrated at once. Mr. Gifford has 

 asked for a delay in the petition, and Mr. Atwood has written to show the nature of the business 

 upon our coast. One thing is certain, if we do not take the mackerel in seines or nets we ehall 

 get none at all." t 



1870-1882. Opposition to tJie purse seine. Since the general adoption of the purse-seine no 

 year has passed without a considerable amount of friction between fishermen using this engine of 

 wholesale destruction in the capture of mackerel and menhaden and those engaged in fishing with 

 other forms of apparatus. Petitions to Congress and State legislatures have been made from both 

 sides, and in some instances laws have been passed by State legislatures prohibiting the use of 

 menhaden seines within certain specified tracts of water, such as the Chesapeake Bay. These 

 laws, while especially antagonistic to menhaden fishing, were aimed chiefly at the purse-seine as 

 a means of capture, and would doubtless have been equally prohibitory of mackerel fishing with 

 purse-seines had this been attempted within the limits. In 1878 a delegation of fishermen from 

 Portland, Me., and Gloucester, Mass., visited Washington for the purpose of securing the passage 

 of a law prohibiting the use of purse-seines in the mackerel fishery. In 1882 the clamors of shore 

 fishermen, especially on the coast of New Jersey, led to the appointment of a committee of the 

 United States Senate, which took considerable testimony regarding the effect of the purse-seine 

 upon the menhaden fishery, and incidentally upon other fisheries of the coast. The labors of this 

 committee will probably result in the recommendation of some form of legislation which will apply, 

 in part at least, to the mackerel fishery. 



In the summer of 1882 a serious commotion was caused among the mackerel fishermen by the 



* Newburyport Herald, Gloucester Telegraph, September 23, 1838. 

 t Proviiiceton Banner, February, 1859. 



