The Ristigouche and Its Salmon Fishing With a Chapter on Angling Literature

SAGE, Dean (1841-1902)

Edité par David Douglas, Edinburgh, 1888

A propos de cet article

(12 3/4 x 8 3/4 inches). Half title page: 'Fishing in Canadian Waters.' Aquatint title-page partly printed in red after G. Reid by Annan and Swan, aquatint frontispiece after Reid by Annan and Swan, 16 etched plates on Japan paper, 63 etched, engraved, and wood-engraved headpieces. Double-page lithographed map. Original publisher's cloth binding, with salmon and osprey design on upper cover, decorated endpapers. A fascinating work recounting Canadian salmon fishing on the Restigouche River in New Brunswick, drawing upon the author's experience fishing the river and his relationships with members of the Mi'kmaq Nation. Sage's book is the most significant work on Canadian fishing, one that also documents the consequences of Canadian fishing laws for the First Nations. The Restigouche River flows across the northwestern part of the province of New Brunswick and the southeastern part of Québec, where it is referred to as 'Ristigouche,' serving as a boundary between portions of the two Provinces. The name 'Restigouche' may have been derived from the Mi'kmaq name 'Listuguj.' Variant spellings have been used by European visitors and settlers since the seventeenth century: 'Restigoch' (The Jesuit Relations, 1642); 'Ristigouche' (Denys, 1672); 'Restigousche' (Des Barres, 1778). French settlers established several communities on its banks during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but the area remained largely void of European settlement until after the French and Indian War. The Mi'kmaq Nation had long fished on the river prior to European contact, but their traditional claim to the river, like the other First Nations, had been diminished in the nineteenth century after a series of Canadian laws that regulated salmon fisheries. Colonial administrators had already initiated closed seasons for salmon fishing and gear restrictions, However, Acts passed in New Brunswick (1851), Nova Scotia (1853), and Québec (1857) were detrimental to the First Nations. 'First, the acts identified spearing and other modes of fishing for salmon on spawning beds as the major source of resource depletion and prohibited this practice. Second, the Québec and New Brunswick legislation provided for the licensing of fishing stations on estuaries and the leasing of fluvial portions of rivers' (Parenteau, p. 6). Such Acts favored sport-fishermen such as Dean Sage over traditional fishing practiced by the First Nations. Dean Sage writes of his interactions with Mi'kmaq guides who assisted him on the river. These descriptions are largely favorable and reflect his admiration for Indigenous innovations, such as birch-bark canoes, which he insisted are the best way to fish on the Restigouche. Early chapters in Sage's book document Mi'kmaq customs, especially in his portrayal of two guides, Alexis Marchand and Jacques Vicaire, whose portraits are included among the etched plates. Bill Parenteau, '"Care, Control, and Supervision": Native People in the Canadian Atlantic Salmon Fishery, 1867-1900,' in The Canadian Historical Review, Vol. 79, Issue 1 (1998): 1-35; Catalogue de la bibliothèque de pêche de M.G. Albert Petit (1921), no. 1861; Phillips p. 328; Gee, Sportsman's Library p. 100; Sherwin sale (1946) lot 428; Wetzel p. 206; Bruns S-4; Litchfield p. 58; Hampton (2008) p. 245; Bibliotheca Salmo Salar 11; Heller 2:469.

N° de réf. du vendeur 42067

Détails bibliographiques

• Titre: The Ristigouche and Its Salmon Fishing With a Chapter on Angling Literature
• Éditeur: David Douglas, Edinburgh
• Date de parution: 1888
• Reliure: Folio