[SHIVERS] 



THE NORTH ATLANTIC SEAL FISHERY. 



where they entered the ice again, and when they got in it was Sunday. They were surrounded by 

 seals. They would not touch them Sunday, but Monday they got 250 seals, and Tuesday they 

 got 60. They got a few afterwards, which made up 450, and got out of the ice again. Afterwards 

 they fell in with a Newfoundlander, and bought 40, and came home. When they got home the oil 

 and the pelts did not fetch more than they had paid for them. They made about $13 to a share, 

 having been gone six weeks, while the owners lost considerably by the venture. Two members of 

 the crew, James Dyer and Joshua Nickerson, are living in 1879, the former seventy-two and the 

 latter seventy-seven years old." 



Mr. Earll obtained the information that the schooner~Ca1eb, 54 tons, with standing fore top- 

 sail, engaged in sealing in 1829. She belonged at Deer Isle, Me., and took the seals at Magdalen 

 Islands. The pelts and oil were brought home. Samuel Havelock and his brother each fitted a 

 vessel at Mount Desert in 1829, and engaged in the seal-fishery at Magdalen Islands or Newfound- 

 land. 



The above vessels are the only American craft, other than whaling vessels, that engaged in 

 the hair seal fishery prior to 1870. In the latter year the steamer Monticello, 526 tons, manned 

 by one hundred and seventy men, was sent out from Bay Roberts, Newfoundland. This steamer 

 was owned by parties in New York City and Capt. Lorenzo Wilson, of Eastport, Me. She 

 sailed three years to the seal-fishery from Newfoundland, the first year from Bay Roberts, under 

 Captain Ludlow, but landed only 2*50 skins. The crew " panned " about 10,000 seals, but did not 

 succeed in putting them on board because of an accident to the propeller. An action was taken 

 in court to recover the missing seals, but the crew not being in a position to prove the claim the 

 suit was abandoned. The second year, 1871, she sailed from Bay Roberts, under command of 

 Capt. A. Bartlett, and captured about 22,000 seals, the oil of which was shipped to Boston and 

 the skins to London, the catch being valued at $90,000. In 1872 she sailed from Catalina under 

 Captain Murphy, and captured 3,000 seals. Her stem and stern posts and propeller being broken 

 by the ice, she was obliged to abandon the voyage, and after arriving at Saint Johns, and finding 

 the dock capacity not sufficient to take her up, she cleared for Boston, via Sydney, Cape Breton, 

 with passengers, and while crossing the gulf she foundered. The passengers and crew were taken 

 off' by a fishing schooner and landed at St. Pierre. 



The Monticello was not built for the seal-fishery, and not at all suited for such a voyage, being 

 very flat on the floor, hollow bowed, with a very fine stern, which was the principal cause of the 

 accident to the propeller. 



Concerning this sealing steamer, the annual report for 1871 of the St. John's, Newfoundland, 

 Chamber of Commerce, is reported, by a correspondent of the New York Weekly Post, to state 

 that " the fitting out of the Monticello from a port in Newfoundland was clearly illegal ; but the 

 special and obnoxious condition of the enterprise was that she brought her seals into this port, 

 manufactured them here, and was enabled to land the produce in the United States free of duty, 

 while oils, the produce of British fisheries, are subjected there to a tax of from 20 to 40 per cent, 

 on their value. This unjust state of things seems to the chamber to demand every effort of the 

 public for its removal. Fair reciprocity in trade with the United States this colony desires, and 

 would make all reasonable concessions to obtain ; but it ought not, the chamber feels, be willingly 

 tolerated that all shall be free to Americans here, while they persistently maintain these trade bar- 

 riers against us." 



An official correspondent in Newfoundland writes, under date of July 11, 1881, as follows: 

 " There is no obstruction to either American steamers or sailing-vessels participating in the seal- 

 fishery within 3 miles of the coast, and I consider that a large and profitable business could be 



