49 ° 
TUBE-BLADDERED GROUP. 
large shoals, they follow the coast of Portugal, crossing the Bay of Biscay, till 
they strike the coasts of Vendee in the month of April or May. Before day¬ 
break the fishing-boats leave port to search for the shoals of sardines; indeed, 
many leave in the evening and anchor at sea. When a peculiar bubbling of 
the water reveals the fish, the nets are immediately thrown. Each net is 
from 900 to 1000 yards in length, about 3 yards in width, and black in colour. 
On the upper part of the net are corkfloats, and on the lower part leaden 
sinkers to keep the net in an upright position. The oarsmen, generally two in 
number, row always either against the wind or the tide. One man casts the net 
as the boat advances, while another throws the roque into the water. This bait is 
an important feature of the sardine catch, as it is expensive, and fishermen often lose 
considerable quantities of it. It is made of the roe of cod-fish or mackerel mixed 
with clay, and costs from 80s. to £3, 10s. a barrel, and it is thrown into the water 
in small balls, which slowly dissolve and sink. At nightfall the boats return to 
port, where they sell their fish to the canners at prices varying according to the 
abundance of the catch and the size and freshness of the fish. Sales are made by 
the ‘ thousand,’ but this term does not always indicate exactly a thousand sardines. 
For example, at Belle Isle 1240 fish are supposed to make a thousand. Factories 
for preserving sardines are located at all the ports, for the fish spoil easily and 
cannot bear transportation. The fishermen convey the sardines to the factories in 
baskets. The process of canning is as follows :—The sardines are spread on boards 
and salted, and the heads removed. They are then thrown into brine, where they 
remain half an hour. They are next washed in clean water and dried on screens. 
This work is done almost entirely by the wives and children of the fishermen, 
their united wages during the season enabling the family to subsist during the 
following winter. After the fish have been thoroughly dried they are cooked by 
dipping them for a few minutes in oil heated to 212° F. They are again drained 
and handed over to workmen, who pack them in small tin boxes, which are filled 
with pure olive oil and then soldered. The oil used is imported from the province 
of Bari, Italy. The boxes are next thrown into hot water, where they remain for 
two or three hours, according to the size of the boxes. When withdrawn, the boxes 
are first cooled, then rubbed with sawdust to cleanse and polish them, and packed 
in wooden cases of one hundred boxes for export: during their immersion in the 
boiling water oil will escape from all boxes not properly soldered, and in such cases 
the loss is sustained by the solderer, but so skilful are those in the craft that a good 
workman rarely misses more than two or three boxes per hundred Periodically 
the fish entirely disappear for a season or so from the coasts of Spain, France, and 
Italy.” 
Fresh-water Especial interest attaches to the Australian fresh-water herrings 
Herrings. (_ Diplomy stus ), which differ from the typical genus in having a series 
of bony plates similar to those on the lower surface between the back of the head 
and the dorsal fin, since a similar type of fish has been long known in a fossil state, 
having been obtained from the Cretaceous rocks of Brazil and Syria, and the Lower 
Tertiary of the United States and Britain. The persistence at the present day of 
this ancient type of herring in the fresh waters of Australia is an instance 
•of the survival of primitive forms of life in that region. 
