XV.-DESCRIPTION OF APPARATDS USED IN CAPTURING FISH 

 ON THE SEA-COAST AND LAKES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



MODES OF OAPTUEE. 



The methods by which fish are captured iu the United States are very 

 varied, aud in some of their modifications may be considered as superior 

 to those in use in other countries. 



The usual apparatus may be divided into : lines armed with hooks, nets 

 and weirs, although other methods are in less extensive use, of which it 

 is scarcely necessary to make extended mention here, these consisting in 

 the main of spears, harpoons, the bow aud arrow, poisoning, and exijlo- 

 sive compounds. 



PROJECTILES, EXPLOSIVES, AKD POISON. 



The spear is nsed more especially by the Indians in different parts of 

 the country for taking salmon, and is not so well adapted to other fish. 



The hoiv and arroiv are extensively employed among the Esquimaux 

 and the Indians of the northwest coast of America. 



For iwisoning fish, berries of the Cocculus indicus^ or some other stupe- 

 fying drug, are intimately mixed with bait and thrown into the water. 

 The fish, eating this became narcotized and fl.oated to the surface, where 

 they are taken. This method is of course available only iu still local- 

 ities, like mill-ponds, &c. 



The explosives used consist of cartridges or torpedoes of gunpowder^ 

 dynamite, nitroglycerine, &c., and sometimes, when set off in the vi- 

 cinity of a large school of fish, destroy great numbers. 



The harpoon is largely employed in the capture of the sword-fish off 

 the New England coast. This consists of a barb with jointed ears, and 

 fastened to one end of a rope of several hundred feet in length, to the 

 other end of which is attached an empty, well-bunged barrel, to serve 

 as a buoy. The end of a long handle carries a pointed iron stem, over 

 which the socket of the harpoon-head referred to, usually called the 

 lily-iron, is slipped. The fisherman stations himself at the end of the 

 bowsprit of a small sloop or schooner, supported by a sort of iron frame, 

 and when a sword-fish is seen resting idly upon the water the boat is 

 steered directly toward it so as, if possible, to bring the harpooner im- 

 meditely over the fish, when the weapon is driven down with great 

 force into the back of the neck ) and if the lily-iron is fastened in the 

 flesh, it slips off from the stem of the handle, which is pulled out as the 

 fish darts away, and the rope and buoy are thrown overboard. The 

 fish, of corns?, swims off with great velocity, diving to the bottom ; 

 but after a time, fatigued by the drag of the buoy, comes again to the 

 surface. One of the fishermen then follows iu a small boat, and, taking 

 hold of the rope, draws the fish close up to him and kills it by means of 

 a lance. 



