Morning journal and courier., 1883-01-20

possible it is intended to have the entire government exhibit properly set up in the positions it will occupy in London before leaving the Museum, but this will be very difficult to accomplish, as the whole must be l away from here by the middle of March, and | there are dozens of branches to be perfected 1 and lots of things to be made that will occu- ! py quite all the time until then. Some little 1 idea of the scope of this exhibit may be gained from the fact that there will be eight | certainly and probably ten screens eight feet 1 broad and seven feet high, covered with har- poons, lances (hand and gum and guns. The 1 collection will be of great historical value | and highly interesting to the ethnologist and l archaeologist. All parts of the country from Maine to Florida, from California to Northern Alaska have been levied upon and ] have all contributed nobly.
 1 There are harpoon lines beautifully made | of long smoothly and evenly cut walrus 1 hide of the same pattern that has been for centuries and is still used by the Esquimaux
 of the northern coasts. To get the greatest 1 length, the largest piece of suitable hide is 1 selected and the line cut in circular manner, much as a cobbler makes leather shoestrings. l The harpoons attached to these lines are | themselves of great interest. The points of ! the oldest are usually of stone, either flint, | slate or sometimes jadeite, but are sometimes 1 of metal, indicating period since the na- | tives have been under the influence of higher civilization. These points so ad- justed that, as soon as the ''strike" is made, the handle becomes detached and can be picked up again for future use, this, of
 course, being of very great importance to the l Esquiniaux by reason of the terrible scarcity 1 of wood in his country. From these l same regions come hand lines of animal sinews that are even as if made on the latest improved machinery of New England ! The full history of long line and hand line | fishing and the whale, walrus and seal fisher l ies is traced with great elaboration, and each step is illustrated in the most graphic man. ner imaginable.
 In the exhibit of the government is a se- ries of nets that is probably unique. Ger tainly nothing so elaborate has ever been prepared to illustrate the history of the nst and seine fisheries in North America It be- gins with a small hand net from the north
 west coast (probably Alaska) made of rough strands of sinew hide, with an uneven mesh and crude knots, and reaches its climax
 in the model of amackerel schooner equipped with purse seine and seine boat. Schooner,
 seine boat and seine are all on scale of
 half inch to foot, and perfect in every de-
 tail. The schooner is five feet eight inches
 long, from jib- boom end to outer end
 of main boom, and the model of the seine is
 IS feet in length and four feet in depth, or
 1 ,152 feet long and 96 feet deep in full size
 The model of the seine boat is about fifteen
 
 triced up between the schooner's mast, while
 the net is piled up on deck. On getting in
 the midst of a school of nlackerel the seine
 boat takes one end of the purse seine and
 spreads it in a circle as rapidly as possible.
 As one side is weighted just enough not to
 counteract the buoyancy of the corks on the
 other side, the seine forms sort of fence as
 it is paid out and encompasses greater or
 less number, according to the fisherman's luck. When the circle Is completed the tricing lines on the head and foot are
 sthauled away" the foot being drawn little faster than the head. In few minutes the
 bottom is drawn together and huge basin Is
 formed, in which at times as many as two and three hundred barrels of mackerel have been caught at one haul. This seems in- credible, yet have 1t on undoubted euthori ty, and an inspection of the seine will read fly convince anyone of it's possibility.
 The series of fishing craft of North Amer ica is also very complete. For this particu- lar exhibit the resources of the Museum and the Smithsonian Institution have been drawn on very largely to furnish 8 full series of models of canoes, kyaks and all the various kinds of wood, bark and skin canoes used by the Indians and Esquimaux. Then the series of vessels that have been sent from ports in New England to the cod, herring, mackerel and other fishing grounds off the coasts of northeastern North America, and to the whaling grounds of both oceans, is very in- terestiro- It ss surprising ta ssate fha e,seet changes that have been made in the hull, spars and rigging of these vesssls, particular ly the fishing schooners These started with the full bowed, heavy craft of a hundred and more years ago. The pattern gradually be- came sharper at the bows, Gin this respect following the style of architecture used in modelling the Cape Horn clipper ships and fatter on the floor until decade or two ago they reached climax when the characteris- tics of Gloucester fishing smack were long, sharp bows, broad, flat floor, and long, over hanging stern, the hull having a very slight hold on the water, tall masts, raking very much, long bowsprit and jib boom, and gen orally rigged like yacht or as if there were no such thing on the banks as heavy weather | Since that climax, builders have come to ap preciate the necessity of giving to fishing 1 smacks shape and form more like that of deep sea vessels, and as consequence the | lines of the recent models are quite different 1 from those of the ''extreme clipper"
 In whale ships there has been less change in the past century than in any other class of vessels. This is not surprising when one con siders that in the vessels themselves there has been little or no need of speed, while ca- pacity has been the desideratum. Hence in the whaler of to day one sees the bluff bows straight sides, broad bottom, heavy, square stern that characterized the whaler of the earliest days of this century. But in the i'm plements of whale fishing or hunting Gas you like) there have been enormous strides. Yet here, again, there has been at times little too much haste and after o'erleaping itself vaulting ambition has gone back to the older style I allude particularly, now, to the har- poons, which were improved" step by step until revolution was promised on the per lection of gun harpoons, but it was soon found to be impossible to make proper al- lowance for the defection of the harpoon by the rope, and the whalemen soon went back to the hand harpoon. In these, however, great Improvements have been made in the shape and adjustment of the barb, which is now moveable and so nicely hung on pivot that the strongest thrust will not misplace it, while | the slightest movement of the animal struck | trips it and throws it across the shank, mak l ing the boat 'tall fast'' at once. Gun lances | have been found not only practical but of | great service, as when once fast to a whale it | is only necessary to shoot them into it, one l after another until either a vital spot is | touched or the whale succumbs through loss | of blood. In the guns themselves simplicity | has been the ultimate object, and the latest 1 improved guns are made of brass, with steel | in only the most essential parts They quite short, being only about 24 feet to g | feet in length, but massive, as the cartridges used are very heavy.
 1 find I have overrun my allowance of | space already, and must stop. I have some thing to say about New Haven's connection with the early whale fisheries, but that must wait until next time, as we'll as the further account of the exhibits now being prepared for London. REX.