248 
BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
I could go on and read much more of that, hut I will not take the time of the Senate. 
Now from the same letter : 
Also, to give you au idea liow sensitive large mackerel are and how easily frightened and driven from Uieir grounds, I 
have often seen large bodies of mackerel, when first coming uimn them, any wl'.ere from one to lifty schools .at one time m.ay 
he seen from the masthead, the fleet would in a few hours break up and drive from sight the whole body of fish. They 
would not be seen on th.at ground for days after, and proh.ably not again during the season. Again, vessels sailing along 
leave a n.arrow strip of boiling and foaming water after them for many minutes. We sailors call it the w'ake. 
He claims that wake in itself, heiug made through the schools of mackerel, frightens them off. 
This is from Mr. H. S. Fisher, of New York: 
The mackerel caught south early in the season are the poorest fish known to the trade, as you and all other de.alers 
know. They .are sold fresh, mo.stly in this market, and controlled by three or four fresh-fish dealers. When the market is 
overstocked, if the fish are sound, they are split and salted. The largest receipts of fresh mackerel ever known hero was in 
the month of April, 1885, and a largo iiart of them were in verj' poor condition. The good— that is, the sound ones— brought 
fair prices, hut the poor — soft and broken — were sold for any price they could get, even as low as 25 cents a cart load. 
They are ctilled cheap food for the people. I thiuk all such food should he coudemued. They 
lay there hy millious on the docks and were carried away in that jiromiscuous manner. 
Here is a letter from J. C. Young, agent of Commercial Wharf Company, Welllleet, Mass. : 
But now, since the vessels go out so early, say the middle of March, tho.y find the mackerel, break up the schools, 
drive them from their old spawning grounds, and when caught, xuit on the market a poor and sickly quality of fish, that is 
ruinous both to the consumer and lu’oduccr, and is ruining the whole business, as you well know. 
Mr. Miller. This wonderful witness seems to have found mackerel on the spawning ground. 
This particular one seems to have found them on the spawning ground in the middle of March. 
Wh.at becomes of the theory that they go up the coast of Maine, and perhaps to the Bay of Fundy, 
and do not spawn till June or July ? The witness and the committee disagree on this question. Here 
the man finds the spawning ground away down south in the middle of March, and says they are 
frightened away. 
Mr. Palmer. I do not know how many explanations I shall have to make to the Senator from 
New York to give him a clear insight into this mackerel migration. I 'will say now, and I hope it will 
be for the Last time, that they aiipoar in March off Cape Hattoras; they keep up along the shore 
harassed and annoyed by those sail vessels till the first of July, when they commence to deposit their 
spawn. The gentleman seems to be a little confused as to what the spawning season is. He thiuks 
it is the last climax of that effort of nature. It is the whole gestativo period from the first of March 
to the first or last of July, and if he will take into consideration that that time includes about four 
months, it will save me or other gentlemen a great deal of confusion hereafter in answering any 
objection. 
Mr. Miller. The Senator could have saved himself and myself a great deal of trouble if he had 
drawn this bill so as to cover that period of four or five months. 
Mr. Palmer. Is that clear? 
Mr. Miller. Not yet. The first question I asked was. If this wonderful witness found these fish 
on the spawning bods, as ho tells us, on the first of March, and if the Senator tolls us they do not spawn 
until July, must they carry the spawning bed with them? I think so. 
Mr. Palmer. I thiuk I have made it clear that the spawning season is from the first of March to 
the last of July. What was the other question the Senator asked? 
Mr. Miller. I hope the reporter will get this scientific discussion carefully down, because if the 
si>awuing period of mackerel is extended from the first of March to the middle of July the scientific 
world will be surprised, and they will want to have this discussion very carefully reported. 
Mr. Palmer. It is getting late and I hope the gentleman will not interrupt any further except 
as to some jioint that ho has not been informed on. We have here any number of letters and any 
amount of testimony in regard to the numbeis of mackerel thrown away every year. None make it 
less than 75,000 barrels. 
The Senator from New Jersey [Mr McPherson] siioke of some professor on the coast of Scotland 
who had given his time and efforts to the herring fishery, to determine ivhether anything man could do 
could deplete the ocean. I will say that Profes.sor Huxley, if ho is the gentleman to whom the Senator 
refers, does Say that nothing man can do in the way of the spoliation of the sea of fish will amount to 
anything, but Professor Huxley had never seen a purse soiue. 
In the testimony before the committee I asked Mr. Blackford, a very intelligent geutlemau, the 
fish commissioner of New York, if the methods were as destructive in the herring fishery, and ho said 
