160 Big Game Fishes 
the water filled with silvery fragments which 
sank like stars in the blue sky of the ocean, to 
be picked up by hungry dogfishes attracted by 
the slaughter. The bluefishes seemed, like 
“jacks,” to eat what they wished, then, crazed 
by the excitement of the chase, amused them- 
selves by biting the fleeing victims for the mere 
wanton pleasure of killing. Such a killing can 
often be recognized from a distance by the fly- 
ing foam and the vociferous notes of gulls which 
hasten in that direction. The enormous numbers 
of bluefishes off the American coast in mid- 
summer are beyond computation. Professor 
Baird refers to a thousand millions, and to afford 
some idea of their voracity he says that if each 
one eats ten small fish per day, then ten thou- 
sand millions of small fry are needed to supply 
the daily commissariat of this fast-moving army. 
The fisherman in “ Pericles” who wondered how 
the fishes of the sea lived, doubtless had never 
been a bluefish fisherman. 
Considering the vast number of bluefish very 
little is known regarding its spawning. On Cape 
Cod and at Nantucket the fishermen believe that 
it spawns in midsummer, depositing its spawn 
on the clear sandy bottoms. G. Brown Goode 
