958 A Brief Biography of the Halibut, [October, 
taken at Five islands in the Basin of Minas, but that this is of rare 
occurrence. 
I am indebted to Captain Ashby for the following facts about 
the southern limits of the distribution of the halibut: He has 
never known them to be found south of Sandy Hook, where 
large ones are occasionally taken in winter. In May, 1876, 
the schooner Cartwright, fishing ten miles south-east of Montauk 
point, caught many halibut, In February, 1876, some Noank 
_ smacks caught a few halibut about eight miles from land, off the 
south-east point of Block island. Within the last.forty years one 
or two halibut have been taken off the outer shore of Fisher’s 
island. He has never known any to be taken in Long Island 
sound. Halibut are sometimes taken in three fathoms of water 
among the breakers off Nantucket, in “ blowy weather.” Forty 
years ago they were abundant about Gay head and Noman’s 
land. There has been no systematic fishing there lately, but 
some individuals have probably been taken. 
The local papers chronicled the capture, on May 1, 1876, off 
Watch hill, Rhode Island, of an eighty-pound halibut, the first 
taken in that locality for many years. 
A halibut is occasionally taken along the shores of Maine and 
Massachusetts, but so seldom that a capture of this kind by 
one of the inshore fishermen is always mentioned in the local 
papers. 
Abundance.—Half a century ago the halibut was extremely 
_abundant in Massachusetts bay, and striking stories of their great 
plenty and voracity are narrated by some of the early fishermen 
of Cape Ann. Of late years, however, few have been found ex- 
cept in deep water on the off-shore banks. 
Captain Chester Marr says that in early days halibut were ex- 
ceedingly abundant on George’s bank. He has seen a “ solid 
= school of them as thick as a school of porpoises” feeding on 
© “Jant.” At another time “ the whole surface of the water as far 
_ . as you could see was alive with halibut; we fished all night and 
= we did not catch a single codfish. The halibut would not let 
_ the hook touch the bottom ; we caught 250 in three hours; the 
crews of some vessels vould go and cut the fins off the fish and 
let their bodies go. No wonder that they were broken up. We 
thought they were always going to be so. Never made no 
lations s that we were going to break them up. The southern 
x 
