Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 59.djvu/557

Rh able seasons as many as 25,000 barrels of roe have been expended in Concarneau alone.

For at least two centuries cod roe has been imported from Norway, which country has always furnished the greater part of the sardine bait. Other countries which have contributed supplies are Holland, Newfoundland and the United States. From time to time the French Government has encouraged its own cod fishermen (at St. Pierre and Miquelon; on the Grand Banks; in the waters of Iceland, and in the North Sea) to preserve the roes of cod and other fish, and in 1816 offered a bounty of $4.00 a barrel for roe made from fish caught by them; but this and other inducements have had little effect on the supply from native sources.

The price of roe has varied greatly from year to year. In the early part of the eighteenth century, bait was bought for 50 cents to $1.00 a barrel, and throughout that century prices were comparatively low. In the second decade of the last century prices reached their highest point; they were apparently never less than $32.00, and ranged from that to $60.00 per barrel. By 1822 the price had fallen as low as 85.00 or $6.00, and since then has seldom been as high as $25.00 or $26.00, averaging $12.00 or $15.00 The average price for Norwegian roe recently has been about $7.00 per barrel. In 1900, owing to the failure of the Norwegian cod fishery and the resulting scarcity of roe, the price for Norwegian bait rose to $24.00 per barrel. The price of