18 



sachusetts is now occupied for that purpose, and thousands of 

 shad are annually caught at that place. 



Before the erection of the high dam across the Merrimac 

 at Lowell, shad and salmon ascended that stream in great 

 numbers as far as Franklin, N. H. At this point the com- 

 pany parted. The shad invariably took the stream for Win- 

 nipisiogee lake, and the salmon took the other branch that 

 flows from the cold springs near the base of the White 

 Mountains. 



Prior to the building of the dams in the Connecticut river 

 to furnish slack-water navigation, in 1798, shad and salmon 

 were abundant in that stream, and furnished much of the food 

 for the people of the country at that time. The " Pleasant 

 Bard," * in his poem on " Shad Fisheries," says that those 

 who read his truthful rhymes, 



" Can scarce conceive what schools of shad 

 Made our old fisher fathers glad." 



and further adds : 



" A single haul would bring ashore 



Some forty, fifty, sixty score. 

 # * * 



When for some two and seventy pence, 



You might have drawn a cart load thence 

 Of just the finest shad that ever 



Swam this or any other river." 



Shad were formerly abundant as far up the Connecticut as 

 Bellows Falls, but never above that barrier. 



But salmon, which are a very strong and active fish, ascend- 

 ed the falls and were caught abundantly as far up as the head 

 waters of the Connecticut, and occasionally in its tributaries. 

 But the building of a dam sixteen feet high across the Con- 

 necticut just below the mouth of Miller's river in Massachu- 

 setts in 1798, effectually stopped the passage of both shad and 

 salmon. In a few years, as might have been expected , salmon 

 entirely disappeared from the stream. But not so with the 



* Joshua D. Canning, of Gill, Ms. 



