abont 40° or 45°, which can be attained very readily by means of this dry-air apparatus. I had an instance of that in the case of a refrigerator filled with peaches, grapes, salmon, a leg of mutton, and some beefsteaks, with a great variety of other substances. At the end of four months in midsummer, in the Agricultural building, these were in a perfectly sound and prepossessing condition. No one would have hesitated one moment to eat the beefsteaks, and one might be very glad of the chance, at times, to have them cooked. This refrigerator had been used between San Francisco and New York, and between Chicago and New York, where the trip has occupied a week or ten days, and they are now used on a very large scale, tons upon tons of grapes and pears being sent from San Francisco by this means. I had a cargo of fish-eggs brought from California to Chicago in a perfect condition. Another method is the hard-frozen process. You use a freezing mixture of salt and ice powdered fine, this mixture producing a temperature of 20° above zero, which can be kept up just as long as the occasion requires, by keeping up the supply of ice and salt. Q. How big is the refrigerator?-A. There is no limit to the size that may be used. They are made of enormous size for the purpose of preserving salmon, and in New York they keep all kinds of fish. Q. Now, to come to a practical question, is this a mere matter of theory or of possible use. For instance, could this inethod be adapted to the preservation of bait for three or four months, if necessary?-A. The only question, of course, is as to the extent. There is no question at all that bait of any kind can be kept indefinitely by that process. I do not think there would be the slightest difficulty in building a refrigerator on any ordinary fishing-vessel, cod or halibut, or other fishing-vessel, that should keep with perfect ease all the bait necessary for a long voyage. I have made some inquiries as to the amount of ice, and I am informed by Mr. Blackford, of New York, who is one of the largest operators of this mode, that to keep a room ten feet each way, or a thousand cubic feet, at a temperature of 20° above zero, would require about two thousand pounds of ice and two bushels of salt per week. With that he thinks it could be done without any difficulty. Well, an ordinary vessel would require about seventy-five barrels of bait, an ordinary trawling-vessel. That would occupy a bulk something less than six hundred feet, so that probably four and a half tons of ice a month would keep that fish. And it must be remembered that his estimate was for keeping fish in midsummer in New York. The fishing-vessels would require a smaller expenditure of ice, as these vessels would be surrounded by a colder temperature. A stock of ten to twenty tons would, in all probability, be amply sufficient both to replace the waste by melting and to preserve the bait. Q. Have you any doubt that some method like that will be put into immediate and successful use, if there is sufficient call for it?-A. I have no doubt the experiment will be tried within a twelvemonth. Another method of preserving is by drying. Squid, for instance, and clams, and a great many other kinds of bait can be dried without using any appreciable chemical, and can be readily softened in water. I noticed lately in a Newfoundland paper a paragraph recommending that in view of the fact that the squid are found there for a limited period of time, the people should go into the industry of drying squid for bait, so that it would always be available for the purpose of cod-fishing. I think the suggestion is an excellent one, and I have no doubt it will be carried out. Q. Now, what is the supply of bait for codfish on the American coast?-A. Well, as the codfish eats everything, there is a pretty abundant stock to call upon. Of course, the bait-fish are abundant, the menhaden and herring. The only bait-fish that is not found is the caplin. The herring is very abundant on the American coast, and the alewives enormously abundant. Squid are very abundant of two or three species, and, of course, clams of various kinds. Then we have one shell-fish that we possess. It is never used here, although it is very abundant, but it is almost exclusively the bait for trawling on the coast of Great Britain. This shell is known as the whelp or winkle. Q. From all you have learned, have you any doubt that, supposing the fishermen of the United States were precluded from using any bait except what could be got upon their own coast, they could obtain a sufficient supply there ?-A. Well, unless the American fishery should be expanded to very enormous limits, far in excess of what it is now, I can't see that there would be any difficulty. That is, of course, not very material, because it only goes to the point that we are not dependent upon catching bait within three miles of the British coast, anywhere. We have ways of using salt bait, and the use of all these scientific methods of preserving bait, which will, no doubt, be resorted to and experimented upon, and we may be quite certain that they will, in skillful hands, succeed. Nothing further upon that point need be considered by your honors. I now call your attention to mackerel. It is a word that we have heard before. It is a word that we have become familiar with, and one which I hope we shall not view with disgust or distaste for its frequency when we shall have left this hospitable coast, and scattered ourselves to our far distant homes. The mackerel, may it please your honors, is a deep-sea fish. He does not lurk about anybody's premises. He does not live close into the shore. He is a fish to whose existence and to whose movements a mysterious importance is attached. A certain season of the year he is not to be seen, and at other times they are so thick upon the waters that, as one of the most moderate of the British witnesses said, you might walk upon them with snow-shoes, I believe it was from East Point to North Cape. I do not know that I have got the geography quite right, but it is something like that. Mr. THOMSON. You are only sixty miles out of the way. Mr. DANA. Well, that is not very far for such tales as these. Still, the story is as improbable with the limitation that my learned friend puts on it as it was in the way I put it. However, I do not doubt that the number is extraordinary at times, and at other times they are not to be seen. We do not know much about them. We know they disappear from the waters of our whole coast, from Labrador down to the extreme southerly coast, and then at the early opening of the spring they reappear in great numbers, armies of them. They can no more be counted thau the sand of the sea, and are as little likely to be diminished in number. They come from the deep sea, or deep mud, and they reappear in these vast masses, and for a few months they spread themselves all over these seas. A few of them are caught, but very few in proportion to the whole number, and then they recede again. Their power of mul tiplication is very great indeed. I forget what Professor Baird told us, but it is very great indeed. Methods have been taken to preserve their spawn, that it may be secured against the peril of destruction by other fish and the perils of the sea. They are specially to be found upon the banks of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Bradelle or Bradley Banks, the Orphan, Miscou, Green, Fisherman's Bank, and off the coast of Prince Edward Island, and especially, more than anywhere else, about the Magdalen Islands; and in the autumn, as they are passing down to their uncertain and unknown homes, they are to be found in great numbers directly off the western coast of Cape Breton, near the highlands opposite the group of Margaree Islands, and near Port Hood; but in the main they are not to be found all over the deep sea of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The Gulf of St. Lawrence is full of ledges, banks, and eddies formed by meeting tides, which Professor Hind described to us, and there the mackerel are especially gathered together. The map drawn on the British side, in the British interest, shows this enormous field for the mackerel fisheries, and though very few comparatively of the banks and ledges are put down, yet, in looking over this map, it seems as if it was a sort of great directory showing the abodes of the mackerel, and also the courses that the mackerel take in passing from one part of this great sea to another. There is hardly a place where mackerel-fishing grounds are not marked out here, and they are nearly all marked out at a considerable distance from the shore, all around the Magdalen Islands, for many miles, and at a distance from Prince Edward Island and on the various banks, ledges, and shoals that are to be found; and it is there, as I shall have the honor to point out to the court more particularly hereafter, that they have always been caught in the largest quantities, and the best of them, by American fishermen. There are one or two experienced witnesses from Gloucester who have dealt with the subject carefully for their own interests, not testifying for any particular purpose, but having kept their books and accounts and dealt with the mackerel in their own business, whose words I would like to recall to the attention of the court for a few moments. Captain Maddocks, of Gloucester, on page 135 of the American Evidence, testifies as follows: From my experience my judgment leads me to think that our vessels would get full as many, if not more, by staying outside of the three-mile range altogether. By going inshore they may sometimes get a spurt of mackerel, but they are then liable to go farther into the harbors and lose a good deal of time; whereas if they would fish farther off they would save a good deal of time. I think that for ten or twenty years back they might have caught, well, somewhere from a tenth to a fifteenth part of the mackerel within the three-mile range. I don't know but they have. I don't think anything more than a tenth part certainly. Joseph O. Proctor, of Gloucester, on page 196, says: From the best of my judgment, the knowledge I have where my vessels have been, and conversation with the masters of the vessels, I believe that not one-eighth of the mackerel have been caught within; I should say less, and I should not say more. is nearer a tenth than an eighth. It Q. Do you know where the bulk is caught?-A. At the Magdalenes, or between the Magdalenes and Cheticamp. Capt. Ezra Turner, of Gloucester, page 226, testifies: Q. Have you ever fished off Prince Edward Island?-A. Yes; I have fished all round the east side, wherever anybody fished. Q. Did you fish within three miles of the shore there?—A. No; it is a rare thing that ever you get mackerel within the three miles. When they come within three miles they rise in schools, and we never calculate to do much out of them; but from four to six and seven miles off is the common fishing-ground there. The Commissioners will recollect the testimony of Mr. Myrick, an American merchant, who had established himself on Prince Edward Island. The inshore fishery, he said, is not suited to American vessels. Our vessels are large; they are built at a distance; they are manned by sixteen or seventeen men; they cost a great deal; they require large catches, and dealing with fish in large quantities; they deal at wholesale altogether, and not at retail. Retailing would ruin them. Anything short of large catches, large amounts, would be their end, and compel all the merchants to give up the business, or to take to boat-fishing, which, of course, Gloucester, or Massachusetts, or New England, or any part of the United States could not undertake to carry on here. It has been stated to the tribunal, by experienced men, as you cannot but remember, that our fishermen object to going very near shore in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. There are perils of weather connected with the coast which cannot be set aside by ridicule. Gloucester is a town full of widows and orphans, whose husbands and parents have laid their bones upon this coast, and upon its rocks and reefs, trusting too much to the appearance of fine weather, as we all did last night, waking up this morning in a tempest. Gloucester has tried to provide for these bereft people, by every fisherman voluntarily paying a small percentage of his earnings to constitute a widows' and orphans' fund. Even the tempestuous Magdalen Islands are safer for vessels than are the inshore coasts of those islands, where we are now permitted to fish; their harbors are poor, their entrances are shallowed by sand-bars, which are shifting, which shift with every very high wind, and sometimes with the season. They are well enough after you get inside of them, but they are dangerous to enter to persons inexperienced, dangerous to any by night; and if a vessel is caught near the shore by a wind blowing inshore, against which she cannot beat with sails, for none of them carry steam, then she is in immediate peril. They therefore give a wide berth to the inshore fisheries in the main. They resort to them only occasionally. They are not useful for fishing with our seines. We find that the purse seines are too deep; that they are cut by the ground, which is rocky; that it is impossible to shorten them without scaring the mackerel, which must be taken by seines run out a great distance, for they are very quick of sight, and very suspicious of man; and they soon find their way out of the seines, unless they are laid a considerable distance off. We need not catch our mackerel bait, any more than our cod bait, within the three-mile limit. On the contrary, the best mackerel bait in the world is the menhaden, which we bring from New England. All admit that. The British witnesses say they would use it were it not that it is too costly. They have to buy it from American vessels; and they betake themselves to an inferior kind of bait when they cannot afford to buy the best bait from us. And another result is that the Americans have shown for many years that what are called the shore mackerel, that is, those that are caught off the coast of Massachusetts and several other of the New England States, are really better than the bay mackerel. The evidence of that is the market prices they bring. It is not a matter of opinion. We have not called as witnesses persons who have only tasted them, and might have prejudices or peculiar tastes, but we have shown the market value. James H. Myrick, page 433 American Evidence, in answer to the question, "For a few years past, which have sold for the highest price, number ones from the bay or number ones from the American shore!" says, "O, their shore mackerel have been the best quality of fish.” Benjamin Maddocks, of Gloucester, page 134, says: Q. Well, I take No. 1 then. How do those marked as No. 1 shore mackerel compare with those marked as No. 1 bay mackerel ?-A. Well, the bay mackerel, at least I should say the shore mackerel, has been a great deal better than the bay mackerel the last seven or eight years. Q. That is not simply an opinion, but the market prices are better? How much more do the No. 1 shore mackerel bring than the No. 1 bay mackerel?-A. Well, there has been $7 or $8 difference between them. I have seen the time when the bay mackerel was equal to our shore mackerel. It has not been for the last seven years. It is also true, a matter of testimony and figures, that the American catch, the catch upon the American shore, is very large, and has increased, and is attracting more and more the attention of our people engaged in fishing, and it is only this year that the shore fishing proved to be unprofitable, and the confiding men who were led to send their vessels to a considerable extent, though not very great, into the gulf, by reason of the British advertisements scattered about Gloucester, have come away still more disappointed than they had been by the shore fishing, because they had employed more time and more capital than their catch compensated them for. There are some statistics which I will read, taken from a prominent and trustworthy man, as to the American catch. David W. Low, on page 358 of the American Evidence, states the figures as follows: 1869.-194 vessels in gulf, average catch 109 barrels.. 151 vessels off shore, average catch 222 barrels. Mackerel caught by boats and some eastern vessels packed in Glou cester... Mackerel inspected in Gloucester.... 1875.-58 vessels in gulf, average catch 191 barrels.... 117 vessels American shore, average catch 409 barrels.... Barrels. 40,546 33,552 19,028 93,126 11,078 47,853 58,921 The average catch is based on the average catch of 84 vessels from 17 firms in 1869; and 28 vessels in bay and 62 vessels off American shore from 20 firms in 1875. These firms have done better than the rest. The statistics of John H. Pew & Sons, put in by Charles H. Pew, p. 496, for the last seven years, from 1870 to 1876, inclusive, show that the total, for that time, of bay mackerel that their own vessels caught, amounted to $77,995.22, and the shore mackerel for the same period was $271,333.54. Your honors will recollect the statistics put in, which it is not necessary for us to transfer to our briefs, showing the exact state of the market on the subject of the proportion of American fish caught on the shores and the proportion caught in the bay. We have introduced a large number of witnesses from Gloucester, and I think I take nothing to myself in saying that the greater part of them, those who profess to be engaged in the trade or business at all, were men of eminent respectability, and commended themselves to the respect of the tribunal before which they testified. You were struck, no doubt, with the carefulness of their book-keeping, and the philosophical system which they devised, by means of which each man could ascertain whether he was making or losing in different branches of his business; and as the skipper was often part owner, and usually many dealers managed for other persons, it became their duty to ascertain what was the gain or loss of each branch of their business. They brought forward and laid before you their statistics. They surprised a good many, aud I know that the counsel on the other side manifested their surprise with some directness; but, may it please the court, when the matter came to be examined into, it assumed a different aspect. We made the counsel on the other side this offer. We said to them, "There is time enough, there are weeks, if you wish it, before you are obliged to put in your rebuttal; we will give you all the time you wish; send anybody to Gloucester you please, to examine the books of any merchants in Gloucester engaged in the fishing business, and ascertain for yourselves the state of the bay and shore fishing as it appears there." You say that bay fishing is as profitable as the shore fishing; that it has made a great and wealthy city of Gloucester, and you assume that it is owing to their having had, for the greater part of the time, a right to fish inshore. It would seem to follow from this reasoning that, whenever we lost the right to fish inshore, Gloucester must have receded in its importance, and come up again with the renewal of the privilege of inshore fishing. Nothing of that sort appears in the slightest degree. But they say "The bay fishing must be of great importance, because of the prosperity of Gloucester." Now, the people of Gloucester have no disposition to deny their prosperity, but it is of a different kind from what has been represented. Gloucester is a place altogether sui generis. I never saw a place like it. I think very few of your honors failed to form an opinion that it was a place well deserving of study and consideration. There is not a rich man idle, apparently, in the town of Gloucester. The business of Gloucester cannot be carried on as mercantile business often is, by men who invest their capital in the business and leave it in the hands of other people to manage. It cannot be carried on as much of the mercantile business of the world is carried on, in a leisurely way, by those who have arrived at something like wealth who visit their counting-rooms at 10 o'clock in the morning and stay a few hours, and then go away to the club, return to their counting-rooms for a short time and then drive out in the enticing drives in the vicinity, and their day's work is over. It cannot be carried on as my friends in New Bedford used to carry on the whale fishery, where the gentlemen were at their counting-rooms a few months in the year, and when the off-season came they were at Washington, Saratoga, or wherever else they saw fit to go, and yet they were prosperous. No; the Gloucester |