THE HERRING AND ITS AT LIES. 
39i 
quantity, rush ravenously through the closely-crowded schools, cutting and 
tearing the living fish as they go, and leaving in their wake the mangled 
fragments. Traces of their carnage remain for weeks in the great “ slicks ’ ’ 
of oil so commonly seen on smooth water in summer. Prof. Baird, in his 
well-known and often-quoted estimates of food annually consumed by the 
blue-fish, states that probably ten thousand million fish, or twenty-five 
million pounds, daily, or twelve hundred million million fish and three 
hundred thousand million pounds are much below the real figures. This 
estimate is for the period of four months in the middle of summer and fall, 
and for the coast of New England only. 
Such estimates are professedly only approximations, but are legitimate 
in their way, since they enable us to appreciate more clearly the luxuriance 
of marine life. Applying similar methods of calculation to the Menhaden, 
I estimate the total number destroyed annually on our coast by predaceous 
animals at a million million of millions ; in comparison with which the 
quantities destroyed by man, yearly, sink into insignificance. 
It is not hard to define the place of Menhaden in nature. Swarming in 
our waters in countless myriads, swimming in closely packed, unwieldy 
masses, helpless as flocks of sheep, near to the surface and at the mercy of 
every enemy, destitute of means of defense and offense, their mission is 
unmistakably to be eaten. 
In the economy of nature certain orders of terrestrial animals, feeding 
entirely upon vegetable substances, seem intended for one purpose—to 
elaborate simple materials into the nitrogenous tissues necessary for the 
food of other animals, which are wholly or in part carnivorous in their 
diet; so the Menhaden feeding upon otherwise unutilized organic matter 
is pre-eminently a meat-producing agent. Man takes from the water every 
year eight or nine hundred millions of these fish, weighing from two hun¬ 
dred to three hundred thousand tons, but his indebtedness does not end 
here ; when he brings upon his table bluefish, bonitoes, weak-fish, sword¬ 
fish, or bass, he has before him usually Menhaden flesh in another form. 
The commercial importance of the Menhaden has only lately been 
rightly appreciated. Thirty years ago and before, it was thought to be of 
very small value. A few millions were taken every year in Massachusetts 
Bay, Long Island Sound, and the inlets of New Jersey. A small portion 
of these were used for bait; a few barrels occasionally salted in Massa¬ 
chusetts to be exported to the West Indies. Large quantities were plowed 
