154 A summer's cruise to northern LABRADOR. 



when highly colored are always of some shade of red is 

 not yet well understood, but such is the case with holo- 

 thurians, starfish, sandstars, crabs, and shrimps, as well 

 as polyps and molluscs, whether living at the depth of 

 looor 1,000 fathoms. This evening a trader came into 

 port, which had been in eleven harbors since leaving us 

 at Salmon Bay. 



The 1 2th was another of the long, long, weary days 

 of the fortnight spent in watching and waiting for our 

 release from this now detestable harbor, more like a 

 rocky cage than a haven of rest. I went a-dredging 

 and lost my dredge at the first haul on a rocky bottom, 

 which added to the aggravations of the weather, and 

 left but one other for the rest of the summer's work. 



The bay was now full of capelin ; cod were also be- 

 ing netted as well as salmon, which is said to disappear 

 from here about the 15th of August. Salmon, by the 

 way, were here worth 40 cents apiece ; at Henley Harbor 

 we paid fifty cents for one. The cod are now breeding, 

 as the spawn is full and ripe, and their livers are poor 

 and lean. Now the " stages " presented busy scenes, as 

 there was a " spurt o' fishing " ; one day seven quintals of 

 cod were pitched out of the boats upon the wharf ; here 

 the men leave them, turning them over to the tender 

 mercies of their wives and sweethearts, and it is to be 

 hoped that the gentler sex on this coast are not in other 

 respects so fierce and sanguinary as when left alone with 

 the cod. The " headers," in petticoats tucked up so as 

 to show their homespun stockings and stout shoes, their 

 sleeves rolled up and in their hand a formidable knife, 

 in an instant seize the cod's lifeless corse, and with a 

 dexterous stroke behead it ; the body is thrown to the 



