49 o TUB E-B LADDERED GROUP. 



large shoals, they follow the coast of Portugal, crossing the Bay of Biscay, till 

 they strike the coasts of Vendee in the month of April or May. Before day- 

 break the fishing-boats leave port to search for the shoals of sardines ; indeed, 

 many leave in the evening and anchor at sea. When a peculiar bubbling of 

 the water reveals the fish, the nets are immediately thrown. Each net is 

 from 900 to 1000 yards in length, about 3 yards in width, and black in colour. 

 On the upper part of the net are corknoats, and on the lower part leaden 

 sinkers to keep the net in an upright position. The oarsmen, generally two in 

 number, row always either against the wind or the tide. One man casts the net 

 as the boat advances, while another throws the roque into the water. This bait is 

 an important feature of the sardine catch, as it is expensive, and fishermen often lose 

 considerable quantities of it. It is made of the roe of cod-fish or mackerel mixed 

 with clay, and costs from 30s. to £3, 10s. a barrel, and it is thrown into the water 

 in small balls, which slowly dissolve and sink. At nightfall the boats return to 

 port, where they sell their fish to the canners at prices varying according to the 

 abundance of the catch and the size and freshness of the fish. Sales are made by 

 the ' thousand,' but this term does not always indicate exactly a thousand sardines. 

 For example, at Belle Isle 1240 fish are supposed to make a thousand. Factories 

 for preserving sardines are located at all the ports, for the fish spoil easily and 

 cannot bear transportation. The fishermen convey the sardines to the factories in 

 baskets. The process of canning is as follows : — The sardines are spread on boards 

 and salted, and the heads removed. They are then thrown into brine, where they 

 remain half an hour. They are next washed in clean water and dried on screens. 

 This work is done almost entirely by the wives and children of the fishermen, 

 their united wages during the season enabling the family to subsist during the 

 following winter. After the fish have been thoroughly dried they are cooked by 

 <lipping them for a few minutes in oil heated to 212° F. They are again drained 

 and handed over to workmen, who pack them in small tin boxes, which are filled 

 with pure olive oil and then soldered. The oil used is imported from the province 

 of Bari. Italy. The boxes are next thrown into hot water, where they remain for 

 two or three hours, according to the size of the boxes. When withdrawn, the boxes 

 are first cooled, then rubbed with sawdust to cleanse and polish them, and packed 

 in wooden cases of one hundred boxes for export : during their immersion in the 

 boiling water oil will escape from all boxes not properly soldered, and in such cases 

 the loss is sustained by the sold ere r, but so skilful are those in the craft that a good 

 workman rarely misses more than two or three boxes per hundred Periodically 

 the fish entirely disappear for a season or so from the coasts of Spain, France, and 

 Italy." 

 Fresh-Water Especial interest attaches to the Australian fresh-water herrings 



Herrings. (Dip/am i/stits), which differ from the typical genus in having a series 

 of bony plates similar to those on the lower surface between the back of the head 

 and the dorsal fin, since a similar type of fish has been long known in a fossil state, 

 having been obtained from the Cretaceous rocks of Brazil and Syria, and the Lower 

 Tertiary of the United States and Britain. The persistence at the present day of 

 this ancient type of herring in the fresh waters of Australia is an instance 

 of the survival of primitive forms of life in that region. 



