Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 November 1891 — Bait Fishing. [ARTICLE]

Bait Fishing.

A very important trade in the small villages scattered along the coast of Newfoundland is that of selling bait, and in many cases the catching of it forms the sole employment of the majority of men in those localities. Very early in the year the first bait purchased by the cod-fishers is frozen herring. The fish are caught iu seines, by the liviers, as the natives call the bait dealers. They are frozen and placed in the vessel’s hold, where they are covered up and thus kept fresh for three or four weeks until the weather becomes too warm to allow of their use. Theii it becomes necessary to pnt ice on the bait, which is placed in pens in the hold, a layer of chopped ice being spread between each layer of herring. About the middle of June a change in baiting is made, capelin—a small fish greatly resembMng the smelt—being used. These are captured in small drag-seines made especially for the purpose. They are stowed away in the same manner as the herring, large quantities of ice being broken into small pieces and spread over them in the bait pens. The most popular form of bait, however, is the squid. The liviers first begin angling for them in the latter part of July and continue until they disappear in Ofctober. At the beginning of the season they are taken in enormous quantities, so many being caught that in a single day a vessel can secure 30,000 or 40,000 of them without stopping in the harbor long enough to make it necessary to haul down her sails. The method of procuring this variety of bait is quite interesting, the only apparatus being a kind of hook called a jig. This consists of a stout line secured to a lead cylinder three inches long, fastened to which are several stout pins bent upward. fro bait is used, the jig being let down into the wadsr and kept constantly in motion in imitation of a small fish. A squid will throw its long tentacles around, the jig and immediately become canght in the pins, when it is dextrotasly hauled into the boat. Squids have a very unpleasant habit when being thns landed of discharging a stream of salt water into the faces of their captors, and this is almost instantly followed by a jet of dirty, black, ink-like substaflee. As a matter of course this is decidedly disagreeable, even to a weather-beaten squid-fisher. Occasionally giant squids are caught, some specimens beiDg so bnlky as te furnish bait for two vessels—an amount equal to 60,000 to 70,000 of the small variety. Salted clams are very frequently utilized for baiting purposes, and very often birds —such as the hagdon or great puffin, noddy and stormy petrel —serve the same purpose. These birds are caught with a hook and line, and upon being pulled on beard are killed with clubs. When bait runs short, fish entrails—called “gurry" by the fishermen—are called into requisition. In addition to these, lady-fish, lant, fish eggs, alewives, porgies, pickled menhaden, jrellow fish and salmon are used by both the trawlers and hand-line fishers on the Banks. When the time comes for ns to wake out of the dreams of the world’s sleep, why should it be otherwise than out of dreams of the night? Singing of birds, first broken and low, as, not to “dying eyes,” but to eyes that wake to life, “the oasement slowly grows a glimmering square,” and then the gray, and then the rose of dawii; and last the light, whose going forth is to bo the ends of the heaven.— RusMn. Wool— Mv cook left to-day in spite of all I could do. Van Pelt—What was the trouble ? Wool—The children annoyed her; I offered ,to kill the children, but she was afraid the authorities would detain her as a witness. The difference between an ordinary balloon and a “flying machine” is that the former does ascend and the latter does not.