Highways and byways of the Pacific coast . nd the trader who was right on thewharves had the most advantageous position. Thewhole water front is a curious labyrinth of these wharves,and they jut far out into the water, with a zig-zagging of streets and numerous footways, and therailroad cutting across them all. Here are enormoussawmills with their great piles of lumber, the ware-houses of the river steamers and of the ocean-goingships, and the wide-spreading fish canneries. Here too were the fish wharves with hundreds ofthe staunch rowboats alongside used in the salmonfishing, and as the boats
Highways and byways of the Pacific coast . nd the trader who was right on thewharves had the most advantageous position. Thewhole water front is a curious labyrinth of these wharves,and they jut far out into the water, with a zig-zagging of streets and numerous footways, and therailroad cutting across them all. Here are enormoussawmills with their great piles of lumber, the ware-houses of the river steamers and of the ocean-goingships, and the wide-spreading fish canneries. Here too were the fish wharves with hundreds ofthe staunch rowboats alongside used in the salmonfishing, and as the boats rocked on the waves the pulleysthat were a part of the tackle by which they werehitched kept up a weird and incessant creaking. Someof the boats had gasoline power, but in most I saw amast lying along the gunwale, and as soon as the craftstarted for work and got into open water the mast wasset in place and the sail spread to the breeze. Nowand then a boat would begin to drop the net overthe stern within a few hundred feet of the Mending a salmon net Along the Columbia 245 Others went out to the middle of the river or to theopposite shore, or down where the stream meets theocean. Each boat carries two men—a captain andan * oar-puller. They let the net drift with the they at length take it into the boat they mayhave only one or two fish, or they may have a catch of twenty-five fish there will be those thatweigh anywhere from fifteen to sixty pounds, and thereis a possibility of getting a giant of the race that willrun up to over eighty pounds. Boats are coming and going all the time, but mostof them start out at low tide, toward evening, and donot return till morning. In the quiet weather of summerthey often delay the start for home until the land breezesprings up, and then come flitting in, half a thousandor more, all together. After a boat has delivered itsfish to the cannery or cold storage it returns to itshitching-place by the wharf, and the
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Keywords: ., bookauthorjohnsonclifton1865194, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900
