THE HERRING FISHERY. 403 



Clupea harengus, Linn. The herring fishery begins 

 iQ the Strait of Belle Isle during the middle of August, 

 .after the cod fishery is over. The fact elicited from 

 several intelligent fishermen, that the herring does not 

 spawn abundantly upon the coast of Northern Labrador, 

 that is, above the Mingan Islands, but visits the coast in 

 schools after the breeding season is over, while it breeds 

 abundantly on the coast of New Brunswick, at BayCha- 

 leur, the Magdalen Islands, and on the southern coast of 

 Newfoundland, affords excellent data for limiting the 

 southern boundary of the Arctic fish fauna on tbe.eastern 

 Atlantic coast. This line agrees with what we have de- 

 fined* as the southern limits of the " Syrtensian Fauna,"_ 

 which as an assemblage peoples the coast of Labrador, 

 and extends around the northern shore of the continent 

 into Hudson's Bay ; and southward, follows the line of 

 floating ice, thus partially excluding Anticosti, embracing 

 the Banks of Newfoundland, the banks lying off Nova 

 Scotia and New England, such as Jeffries and St. 

 George's , Banks, and more faintly indicated on those 

 banks of New Jersey which are swept by the southern 

 extension of the Labrador or Polar current. An outlier 

 of it is also found at the mouth of the Bay of Fundy. 

 On the southern shores of Newfoundland, which are 

 partially protected from the Polar current sweeping by 

 to the eastward, upon which the Gulf Stream slightly 

 impinges, though with a much diminished force, the 

 lierring breeds, as here the species is surrounded by 

 physical and climatic conditions very precisely corre- 

 sponding to those of Nova Scotia and Maine, thus con- 



* Canadian Naturalist and Geologist. Dec, 1863. 



