In the van of the ascending shoal that extended from bank to bank of the eddying stream were massed the largest and the strongest fish, the steady, even approach of their densely compacted ranks being betrayed by a nearing ripple, visible at a distance of several hundred yards. From beyond the submerged borders of the continent, whence it had taken its departure, an advance of six or seven hundred miles had been accomplished, with orderly movement and close formation, by this vanguard of the finny host. Day after day, in ocean's gloom and river's light, through billowy forest and far-rolling meadow, unseen and unmolested of man, the column had struggled onward. Battling with a madly contending current, sometimes halting, sometimes retreating,[1] and again advancing as the swirling waters became colder or warmer, many of the weaker and smaller fell out of the serried ranks, but the larger and stronger pushed unflaggingly forward to the difficult goal. The upper valley, apparently the bourn of their long and toilsome endeavor, was generally attained about the first of April, the males preceding the roe-burdened fish, successive shoals of each prolonging the fishery for some weeks, the best running eight or nine, and in exceptional instances reaching a weight of eleven and even of twelve pounds.
After the desolation of the lovely valley by the memorable Indian massacre of 1778, its widowed and fatherless were the objects of much kindly solicitude, and among the thoughtful administrations of the rugged frontiersmen was what became known as the widow's haul. The first Sunday after the season began the entire catch of the seine, whether much or little, was set apart for their exclusive benefit, and in 1790 one of these hauls, near Wilkesbarre, resulted in an authenticated total catch of ten thousand shad, and even larger draughts were reported from Nanticoke and Bloomsburg. The damming of the river, conjoined with wasteful methods of capture, utterly extinguished these magnificent fisheries, of which former abundance a partial renewal is hoped for from the labors of the Pennsylvania Fish Commission.
The lavish generosity of Nature has everywhere been abused, and the finny treasures of the Delaware have been wasted with the same reckless prodigality and unconcern for the future that have elsewhere marked the fishery. In 1891 the joint action of the commissions of New York and Pennsylvania, in establishing an effective fishway at Lackawaxen dam upon the Delaware, opened an additional hundred miles of that splendid stream to the shad.
- ↑ The chilling of the water, occasioning the retreat of the fish, may be the result of a lowering of the aërial temperature, or of the sudden irruption into the main stream of the ice-bound waters of an upper tributary. In the Hudson shad have been known to retreat fifty and even sixty miles.
