966 A Brief Biography of the Halibut. ' October, 
succumbs and is pulled into the boat. It is often the case, how- 
ever, that considerable difficulty is experienced in effecting the 
capture of a large fish, and it is by no means an unusual circum- 
stance for one to escape. 
A fisherman related to me an incident which he witnessed in 
the shallow water near Miquelon beach, Newfoundland. Two 
men were out hauling a trawl in about seven fathoms of water, a 
short distance from the vessel. They worked along quietly for a 
while, when suddenly the dory started off at a tremendous speed, 
towed by a big halibut which had been started from the bottom, 
and which, in its efforts to escape, darted about wildly, pulling 
the boat after it and careening her at a considerable angle. By 
dexterous management it was, after a while, brought to the sur- 
face ; the man aft quietly pulled up on the ganging until the fish 
broke water, when an iron gaff was driven into its head. The 
doryman had made the mistake of gaffing his fish before it was 
stunned, and as a result, no sooner was the gaff in the halibut 
than the latter made a tremendous splurge, twisted the implement 
out of the fisherman’s hand, and, getting a fair start, made a run 
to the bottom. Another quarter of an hour was required to 
again get it alongside of the dory. This time there was no 
gaff, and to serve in its place the doryman had cast off the trawl 
anchor from the buoy-line. When he got the halibut’s head 
above water he drove the fluke of the sixteen-pound anchor into 
the fish, which he made sure he would hold that time. But he 
was mistaken. The halibut, as before, escaped, taking with it 
the anchor, almost pulling the man out of the boat, which was 
nearly capsized, and going off with the hook, too, which this time 
it tore from the trawl. 
The halibut, in its turn, is the prey of seals, of the white whale 
and of the various large sharks, especially the ground shark, or 
sleeping shark, in the stomachs of which they have sometimes 
been found ; their sides, I am told by Captain Collins, are often 
deeply scarred, probably by the teeth of the sharks, or in their 
aie: lives by mouths of larger individuals of their own kind. 
_ Spawning—There is great diversity of opinion regarding their 
: speinaing season. Some fishermen say that they spawn at Christ- 
‘mas time, in the month of January, when they are on the shoals. 
Others declare that it is in summer, at the end of June. Capt. 
A Johnson, of the schooner Augusta H. Johnson, of 
