BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 77 
the Gloucester fleet visiting the coast of Iceland for halibut during the 
present season, the Davy Crockett was the first to arrive there. She 
reached the fishing grounds on April 8, nineteen days after leaving 
Gloucester. The second vessel to arrive was the schooner Annie M. 
Jordan, after a passage of twenty-three days. Halibut were reported 
as abundant, though it was said that the only fishing by the natives was 
for sharks. Capt. John Cousins, of the schooner Annie M. Jordan, 
writes that on the passage, while in latitude 59° 20', longitude 30° 10', 
he sailed through vast quantities of dead fish, extending a distance of 5 
miles. The fish were strange to the crew, differing from any heretofore 
seen by them. They were from 12 to 16 inches long, some of them resem- 
bling rock cod. 
The schooner Paul and Essie, of Swampscott, arrived home from 
Pensacola, Fla., where she had been engaged for four months in the 
red-snapper fishery, having stocked $4,400. She reported having found 
new and valuable fishing grounds off the Florida coast. 
The southern mackerel fleet received daily additions to its numbers 
during the month, though fewer vessels have been engaged in the fish- 
ery this season than are ordinarily employed. The catch was far from 
satisfactory, owing largely to unfavorable and foggy weather during a 
large part of the time. Only a few of the vessels have caught any con- 
siderable quantity of fish, many of them having but a few barrels, and 
others have returned to refit without having caught a single fish. The 
total catch of mackerel by the southern fleet, from the beginning of the 
season up to the end of May, aggregated only about 5,000 barrels of 
salt mackerel, sea-packed, and about 8,000 barrels sold fresh. The 
mackerel are now well to the northward, and the body of fish seem to 
have disappeared for the time being. The mackerel vessels are widely 
scattered. A large part of the fleet is cruising between Fire Island and 
the Bay of Fundy, going as far to the eastward as George’s Bank ; quite a 
number remain in the vicinity of Block Island, and the remainder are 
cruising off the Nova Scotia shore. Large schools of pollock are re- 
ported off Cape Cod, and the fishermen claim that they have kept the 
mackerel away from the shores. 
The catch of small herring in the vicinity of Eastport has been unusu- 
ally light, and the sardine factories located there are reported to have 
packed only 2,000 cases up to the end of May, against 50,000 cases to 
the corresponding date in 1886. 
The weir and trap fishing along other portions of the New England 
coast has fluctuated considerably. At times large catches have been 
made in certain localities, and again only small quantities have been se- 
cured, but enough bait has been taken to supply the fishing fleet at 
reasonable prices. Salt-clam bait, however, has proved very successful 
in the Western Bank cod fisheries, and the vessels from this port making 
the quickest trips and securing the largest fares have used salt clams 
exclusively. The schooner John W. Bray, which sailed from Gloucester 
