1706 Fishes. 



25th of November, 1834. The fishermen were engaged in tucking, 

 or taking the fish out of the seine, from the 26th of November 

 (Sundays excepted) to the 5th of December. In that period one hun- 

 dred and twenty boat-loads were landed, one boat-load was sunk, 

 and several loads were lost in tucking. The whole quantity 

 taken up and carried to the cellars was 3600 hogsheads, which with 

 the lost fish would have been at least 4000 hogsheads, each contain- 

 ing fifty wine gallons, or about 3000 pilchards, (as the fish were not 

 large), making altogether the enormous quantity of 12,000,000 fish." 

 To render the density of the fish still more intelligible, I should 

 observe that a seine is about 160 fathoms in length, and from eight to 

 twelve fathoms in depth, so that the 12,000,000 pilchards were en- 

 closed in a circle not fifty-four fathoms in diameter; and in this case 

 but seven fathoms deep. On the same occasion other seines were 

 "shot," but in consequence of a legal dispute, some of the fish were 

 not taken off the nets for some days, and for security the seines were 

 drawn a few fathoms towards the shore and anchored. It was subse- 

 quently thought best, however, to land the fish first, and decide the 

 dispute after. But on tucking, all the fish were discovered to be dead ; 

 the slight alteration in the depth of the water on such a dense mass 

 had suffocated the whole. These are striking, but not singular 

 instances of the density of the masses into which the pilchards fre- 

 quently congregate. As they pass in such immense shoals parallel to 

 the shores, discolouring the waters and filling our bays, large 

 quantities are frequently pushed on shore by the moving hosts 

 behind. Their course can be daily watched from the hills, after they 

 have once approached the land. In October of 1846, the shoal 

 passed into St. Ives, and while on the western shores of the bay, 

 30,000 hogsheads were enclosed in a few hours : now if we suppose 

 2500 only to the hogshead, we here have 75,000,000 fish enclosed in 

 a single port in one day, while large quantities remained at liberty 

 beyond. Of this catch about 23,000 hogsheads or about 57,500,000 

 were landed. The winter shoals are remarkably punctual in their ap- 

 pearance; they generally arrive at St. Ives about the third week in 

 October, varying to the first week in November. In 1844 they 

 passed the whole length of the Cornish shores to St. Ives on the 

 north in about four days, and from this circumstance they were ex- 

 pected round Cape Cornwall and the Land's End daily ; but they 

 took three days to make the circuit of St. Ives Bay ; still on passing 

 Clodgy Point, its western boundary, they resumed their rapid pro- 

 gress, and in two days made their appearance in Mount's Bay and 



