34 The Commercial Products of the Sea. 



In the mean time the inhabitants of the inner or eastern 

 side, protected from northerly winds, and favoured with 

 many bays of refuge, examine their shores day by day with 

 baited hooks, to discover if the precursors of the dense 

 shoals of cod have yet appeared in the West Fiord, and 

 great is the public exultation when the joyful news of their 

 arrival is announced. This important event takes place 

 generally in the latter end of December, but not before the 

 middle of January do the fish arrive in great masses. 



Codfish are taken by the Lofoden fishermen by three 

 methods : — (i) with hand lines ; (2) with set lines ; and 

 (3) with nets. 



Hand lines requiring little capital and producing small 

 results, are only employed by the poorest fishermen. These 

 are satisfied with 50 fish to each man per day, although 

 occasionally they will capture double that number. They 

 bait with herrings, salt or fresh, and when these are all 

 gone, with the roe of the fish they have caught. Sometimes, 

 when the shoals of cod are very thick and dense, the men 

 adopt another method also, with a single line requiring no 

 bait. Providing themselves with a long cord, armed with a 

 large and sharp hook at its extremity, they sink it into the 

 swarming masses below, having first attached to it, a couple 

 of feet above the hook, small fishes of tin, for the purpose of 

 attracting the cod by their glitter. The fishermen then jerk 

 the hook sharply upwards, occasionally securing a curious 

 fish, though cruelly wounding many others that are not 

 taken. 



Set-line fishing requires larger apparatus : a boat, a 

 crew, and from 500 to 3000 hooks baited at once. The 

 hooks are attached to fine snoods of hemp or cotton, which 

 in their turn are suspended on long lines ; each boat puts 

 out at least 24 of these lines, every line carrying more than 



