Page:The aquarium - an unveiling of the wonders of the deep sea.djvu/89

56 the bottom, it embraces nothing, merely driving everything before it, and coming up empty. The hide net is almost indestructible.

To the two ends, or short sides of the frame, which forms an oblong square, are attached by a hinge two long triangles, which meeting in front at some distance from the mouth, are connected by a swivel-joint. To this the dragging rope is bent, which must be long enough to allow thrice as much at least to be overboard as the perpendicular depth would require:—if you are dredging in ten fathoms, you must use at least thirty fathoms of line, or your dredge will make long jumps over the ground instead of steadily raking it. The inward end of the rope having been made fast to one of the thwarts, the dredge is hove to windward, and the boat is put before the wind, or at least allowed a flowing sheet.

The keer-drag is in principle similar to the dredge, but there are peculiarities in its construction, and it is employed for different game. It is considerably larger; the one which I used was six feet wide, and one foot high at the mouth, whereas the width of the dredge does not usually exceed two feet. The mouth consists of a stout iron rod bent up to form three sides of the quadrangle, neither of which is thinned to a lip; the fourth side is made by a stout beam to which the iron ends are riveted, and this by its lightness is always uppermost when on the bottom. The handle is made by three lines, one of which proceeds from the middle of the beam and one from each of the two iron ends; they are united at some ten feet from the mouth, where the drag-rope is attached. The net affixed to