MACKERELS. 
135 
the whole coast of Sufiblk was estimated at 
£14,000. In 1823, the number of Mackerel 
taken at Yarmouth was computed at 1,420,000, 
The capital employed in the Devon and Corn- 
wall fishery was, some years ago, estimated at 
£ 200 , 000 . 
Two principal modes of net-fishing are em- 
ployed for the capture of the Mackerel. The 
first is by drift-nets, A number of nets, twenty 
feet wide and twenty fathoms long, are attached 
by one side, in succession, to a stout rope, called 
the drift-rope, which is well corked. The boat 
being at the distance of some leagues from 
shore, throws overboard the end of the rope, to 
which is affixed a large buoy. She is then put 
before the wind, and as the rope runs out over 
the stern, the successive nets are carried over- 
board with it, and hang down perpendicularly like 
a long wall, to the depth of twenty feet from the 
floating rope. When all is run out, the rope is 
shifted from the stern to the bows, the sails are 
taken in, and the boat rides by the rope instead 
of her cable, which is thus kept taut, and in 
the line of the wind. The meshes of the nets are 
made sufficiently large to admit the head of the 
Mackerel, but no more ; so that the fish, swimming 
against the long wall of nets, are caught by the gill- 
covers and prevented from advancing or retiring. 
After remaining out, commonly, all night, the 
nets are hauled in by means of a capstan ; each 
net is taken off in turn and its produce secured. 
A single haul has been known to yield fish of 
the value of nearly £70. 
The second mode is by the ground-seine^ A coil 
of rope, about two hundred fathoms in length, with 
