THE RIVER FISHERIES OF MAINE. 693 
In other localities experience and practice vary a little from those of Damariscotta. At 
Woolwich they use clam-worms for bait; at Waldoborough, clam-worms, smelts, eels, fresh beef, 
and minnows. At Saeo there are more ambitious houses, 6 feet long and nearly as wide, with 
walls, 5 feet 9 inches high, and costing $17 to $20; in such a house a man uses six lines made 
fast to a bar overhead and dropping through a hole 6 feet long; fishing mainly at night, he places 
a kerosene lamp with a white paper shade, at each end of the hole to attract the smelts, and in 
one corner stands a coal stove. 
The hook fishery is pursued by people of many different callings, who find a lack of employment 
in the winter—farmers, laborers, and mechanics of various trades, comparatively few of whom are 
engaged in fishing at other seasons. Some of them are strictly amateurs and catch merely for 
their own tables; many others dispose of their surplus in the local markets, but a very large 
oumber follow the occupation steadily and send their fish to distant markets, mainly Boston and 
New York. Altogether there is no branch of the river fisheries that contributes so much to the 
comfort and well-being of the local population as this. 
MARKETING SMELTS.—Smelts are all marketed and consumed fresh. It is the common 
practice to freeze them, and then forward to market in boxes and barrels. It has been recently 
liscovered that a partial freezing, leaving the fish flexible, is a better preparation for transportation 
than freezing them stiff; besides, a much larger quantity of the flexible smelts can be put into a 
barrel or a box of given dimensions. It is also a recent discovery that without freezing smelts can 
oe shipped to Boston or New York in a tight fish barrel filled with iced water, a large lump of ice 
Jeing placed in the middle. This is a very satisfactory method to the dealers, the fish opening in 
ine condition with a very fresh appearance and meeting with a ready sale; but it involves the 
sransport of a great deal of water and ice, and for that reason is not much employed except in 
‘ime of warm weather when freezing cannot be effected, and dry packing is not safe. 
Probably the quantity of smelts consumed in Maine does not exceed 10 per cent. of the total 
sxatch. Of the remainder nearly all find a market in Boston and New York, the latter taking 
nore than half. Thus, of 254,000 pounds shipped to those two points from Bath, Woolwich, 
Waldoborough, Warren, and Thomaston, 138,000 pounds went to New York, and 116,000 pounds 
(0 Boston. 
STRIPED BASS (ROCCUS LINEATUS.) 
NATURAL HisToORY.—The data for a complete account of the natural history of this species 
lo not exist, and as there is a special lack of knowledge of its life in Maine rivers, the present 
10tice will properly be very brief. The bass is found in substantially all the brackish waters of 
she State, and ascend the rivers a short distance at various seasons of the year. On the Kennebee 
t used to ascend the main river as far as Waterville, and the Sebasticook a short distance above 
ts mouth; but since the building of the dam at Augusta that place has been the limit of its migra- 
ion. The principal run is in the month of June, at which time it feeds greedily, apparently 
iscending the rivers for that purpose. It continues to feed in weedy coves and bays till Novem- 
yer. In the winter great numbers of young, 2 or 3 inches long, are found in the rivers, and many 
of them fall into the bag-nets and are captured along with smelts and tom-cods. Larger indi- 
viduals appear in many cases to retreat to quiet bays and coves of fresh water in the lower parts 
f the rivers, and pass the winter in a state of semi-hibernation. 
There are some facts that favor the view that bass spawn in the rivers. For instance, a male 
vith ripe milt has been observed on the Kennebec as far up as Augusta about the Ist of July. The 
ishermen of Merrymeeting Bay think that they spawn in the summer, because they are to be found 
