228 
THE BOOK OF FISHES 
A BIG FELLOW: A GULF OF ST. LAWRENCE HALIBUT 
WEIGHING ABOUT 300 POUNDS 
The sailors I refer to are the crews 
of the beautiful fishing schooners that 
sail out of the fishing ports of New¬ 
foundland, the Maritime Provinces of 
Canada, and the New England States of 
America; and the ports which claim 
most of them are Lunenburg, in Nova 
Scotia, and Gloucester and Boston, 
in Massachusetts. 
THE SEA IS BEFORE HIS EYES 
FROM INFANCY 
Physically, your American deep-sea 
fishermen are strong-muscled and able 
to endure hardship. They are not slum 
or city products, but are mainly raised 
in sea-coast villages of the Canadian 
provinces and Newfoundland. 
At an early age they learn to handle 
an axe, to work on the land, 
and to rig and bait fishing 
gear. In the summer months 
the boys usually go shore¬ 
fishing or lobster-trapping. 
The sea is before their eyes 
from infancy; the roar of it 
in their ears and the smell ol 
it in their nostrils. 
At sea the Banks fisherman 
manifests his distinctiveness, 
and the splendid inherited 
qualities of the type are seen 
to advantage—daring, initia¬ 
tive, skill in seamanship, and 
ability to endure long hours 
of heavy labor and the rigors 
of seafaring in small vessels 
during the varying conditions 
of weather on the North 
Atlantic. 
It may be said that he is 
no different from the Euro¬ 
pean fisherman in this respect; 
but comparisons will show 
considerable differences. The 
deep-sea fisherman of Europe 
has practically outgrown sail, 
and works on powerful steam- 
trawlers, where ability to 
run a winch, haul and heave 
a trawl-net, use a netting 
needle, and dress and box 
fish are practically all that 
is required of him. On the 
few sailing smacks operating 
nowadays in European waters 
the trawl-net is also used as 
well as hook and line and 
All the work is done on board 
drift-net. 
the vessel. 
In the North American fisheries the 
fast-sailing and seaworthy schooner still 
remains as the prime means of produc¬ 
ing fish from the Western Atlantic 
“banks,” and the greater part of the fish¬ 
ing is done from small boats, known as 
dories, which are carried by the schooner 
and launched upon the fishing grounds. 
It is this dory fishing which makes the 
American fisherman, and by that term I 
include Canadian and Newfoundlander, a 
distinct type from his colleagues in other 
countries, and adds to his vocation a 
hazard and labor which calls for certain 
sterling qualities to surmount. 
But while backward in changing over 
to steel and steam, our fishermen have 
