The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1858-12-21

TRAwLING.-This is a fisherman's term. saws tho
Boston Recorder, applied to a method of fishing
Mnlcn threatens TO rum the whole business of fish
ing on our sea coast. 1t is sort of wholesale an
CLING. A cable is laid out on the surface of the
water over the fishing grounds and buoyed nm 80
as to be Kept on the surface To this liable, fish
i,hes with hooks and bats are attached, and let
down for hsh. Through the whole length of the
cable, at intervals of foot or more these lines are
attached. After remaining certain length of time
IN the WATER the whole series of lines are taken nm
win perhaps hundred of fish at single turn-i
30 lar IT seems very etfectual method of fishinr
but there are incidents of it not so desirable These
lines remain long in the water and some of the
hsh oreak away from them in a wounded state and
pass down to the feeding grounds, and die The
result is, that these grounds to which the fish re-
sort are strewed with the dead and the DIVING -
And the result of that is that the fish are frightened
away from the grounds where they have usually
been caught. And so, for the last two years, the
business OF our coast fishermen has been diving ont
and Is now nearly ruined Nor is the evil confined
to the coast in this vicinity 1t is done here NOT
by the regular fishermen who have lived bv fishing
on the coast, but by lrishmen going out from Bos-
ton, and on the fishing banks it is done by the
French Canadians So that in both localities It has
been done to an extent which has rendered the req
uar business of fishing Improbable. And if it CON
tlnues, the whole work will have to be abandoned
1t is serious question whether there is any rem
edy for this state of things. The Swampscot fish
ermen last winter sent petitions to CONGRESS- that
some laws might be made for their protection But
HARD TINES AT THE WEsT.-The late commercial
revusion laid its hand heavily upon MANY of the
cities and towns of the west where the credit svs
TEN was expanded to an enormous extent, and now
nothing Is heard from them but a terribly earnest
cry of 'hard times.' The CITY of CbicaGo which
has been the great headquarters of speculation at
the west, and where store lots two wears apo were
worth almost untold gold, feels the reaction with
great severity Business is emphatcally down To
the 'hard pan. What trade there exists is limited
to the actual necessities of commerce. and the Sim
provements' which depend on flush times arc
greatly retarded. The price of labor building ma
terlas and produce of all kinds has fallen one hun
dred per cent in a year and half. Real estate is
Kept up by making no sales except forced ones-
Mortgages are not foreclosed by land AGENTS for
the reason that 1t would prove loss to the holder
as not enough has been paid by the purchaser to
make up the difference of depreciation in yalue since
the purchase was made, to the present time
Hence it is for the interest of the creditor to Obtain
another payment on the land. The number of un
occupied stores and houses, already counted nv
hundreds, is increasing daily
At st. Paul, Minnesota, rents have declined from
twenty-five to fifty per cent, while real estate has
on an average, lost one-third of last years valua
ton. Outside the city the decrease has been great
er. Wages have partaken of the downward ten
dency, and laborers who last year obtained 81 so
per day, this year forced to be content with 90
cents. From Iowa, too, there is general cry of
hard times. We hear of young men who have gone
from this section to the West during the last six
months, to seek employment, who came back with
very different notions of the resources of the West
from what they had when they started, and purses
sadly depleted.-Bostoa Journal.
STEAM Tues IN THE STRAITS OF MAGELLAN-Mr
N. +. Nye an American residing in Chile proposes
to that Government to form a Company to run
steam tugs through the Straits of Magellan. He
calculates that there would be saving in favor of
the foreign trade of Valparaiso of S257 76 and to
the trade of San Francisco and other Pacific ports
OF SS59, ,254. He considers that the establishment
OF such line by Chile would give her "a prepon-
deratlng influence in Patagonia which she has long
coveted. Settlements would be made along the
STRAITS and trade in wood provisions, beef hides
and tallow, and cattle from Chile and the Falkland
Islands would spring up. The coal mines at Punta
Arenas, would also be worked to supply the team
ers and the markets of Buenos Ayres and Monte
video.
He proposes to the government to guarantee the
sum OF Sl250OO per annum for the term of ten
years from the commencement of the enterprise
and further appropriation of $4,000 per annum
for an additional term of ten years; to grant at a
nominal rate a lease of all the deposits of coal in
the neighborhood of Punta Arenas, for the term of
ten years from the commencement of this enter
prise, tracts of land for stations, of woodland &c.
and to allow eighteen months in which preparations
should be made.