of Charlemagne until now, have decreed should be had come to pass, the millenium would have been at least as old as our republic, and government defaulters and lecherous scandal-mongers would have been as scarce as chub in a salmon pool. But, unfortunately, only a beggarly moiety of what was promised ever found embodiment in performance, and most of what was attempted, looking to the amelioration and elevation of the race, was prosecuted so feebly-with so little of the essential element of thoroughness-that the devil has seldom had occasion to thrust out his cloven foot to stop the car of progress.

By which digression I simply mean to say, that when the Provincial authorities determined to preserve their salmon fisheries, they determined to make thorough work of it-to replenish as well as to preserve - not only to guard what came to them in a natural way, but to avail themselves of all the artificial processes which practical science had developed. Hence, besides fish commissioners and fish wardens and a fish police, they recognize and employ fish breeders — men of experience, intelligence and integrity (alas! what a rarity) to whom they give carte blanche (as unrestricted as that given to Adam) to go forth and replenish the waters with this king of fish and rarest morsel that ever melted on a gourmand's palate.

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And this is being done-not (as in New York) by a beggarly contribution to a petty hatchinghouse which one might cover with a good sized Mexican sombrero, situated so remote from the natural haunts of the most valuable fish sought to be propagated that it requires even more care and skill to transport the tender fry where they are needed than it does to catch them after they are full grown. These provincial establishments are placed where nature has placed a man's nose -just where they are needed, and just where, like the gratuitously distributed Pacific railroad stock, they can do the most good". on the natural salmon rivers, where the raw material is at hand. (this is not intended as a pun upon the mode of manipulation), and where the product, like all good deeds cast upon the world's waters, will "return after many days," to fill the nets of the fisherman, the exchequer of the realm, and the picklebarrel (and stomach) of the consumer. If, as is the case, the spawn or fry is needed for remote waters, either to introduce or to replenish, they are quite as available for this purpose as if, as at our State hatching-house, the raw material had to be imported before it can be dispensed—with the single exception of brook trout, which are as indigenous to Caledonia brook as salmon are to the Cascapedia. These provincial hatching-houses, like the salmon

fry which they are to furnish, are still in their infancy. Only two or three are yet erected; but the work is going on, and in a very few years there will be one or more on every principal salmon river in the three provinces. Mr. Wilmot, the son of the gentleman who began the business on lake Ontario several years since, has charge of them, and from what I saw of him during my recent visit, I am quite sure that he is the right man in the right place.

I have said this much on this subject of fish breeding, not because I object to what has been done at home, but with the earnest hope that what I have said or shall say may stimulate our legislature to do more. Our fish commissioners have done well with the scanty means placed at their disposal, and Seth Green, their zealous and intelligent agent, deserves the thanks and gratitude of the whole people. But you might as well try to scoop out lake Ontario with a landing net as to properly replenish our barren waters with the fish natural to them from the product of the all too limited establishment at Mumford.

We are mercifully told that Providence winked at what was done foolishly "in the time of man's ignorance." And while legislators were confessedly and excusably "ignorant” of the results of fish-breeding, no one was disposed to find fault with their excessive parsimony. But this

time of excusable ignorance is past; and now the man who does not comprehend the grand possibilities of fish-breeding, and who is unwilling to give his vote for its extension, is quite unfit to represent an intelligent constituency, and is himself a - well, a fish which is far less attractive to an artistic eye than to an epicurean palate. The Mumford hatching-house and its zealous manipulator have returned to the State and country a thousand fold for all they have expended. But "the little-one" should "become a thousand." From having the only source of supply so diminutive and so obscurely located that a stranger would waste as much time in discovering its whereabouts as Diogenes did in his vain search for an honest man, Seth Green should be made the superintendent of State hatching-houses at a dozen points in the Adirondacks, on lake Ontario, on the Hudson, and on several other waters, so that fish might be made a source of as great wealth to the State and of as great benefit to the people as the hog and poultry crop combined.

Anglers may be deemed a useless race by men who haven't juice enough in their composition to perspire with the thermometer at 90, nor muscle enough in their right arm to cast an eight ounce fly rod; but if their love of the sport and their desire, in season, to be able to effectively cast their lines in pleasant places, shall result in such an

enlightenment of the people and in such a concentration of public sentiment as to compel such wise and liberal legislation as will insure the replenishment of all our depleted streams with the fish indigenous to them, they will deserve the benedictions of all who would much rather feast and fatten upon the toothsome flakes of trout and salmon than grow lean and cadaverous in sipping the imaginary "nectar of the gods."

I find myself drawing toward my theme as a prudent general invests a beleaguered city, by very gradual approaches. But few fish are more prolific than the salmon, and those who write about them should be excused if in this they are like them. Besides, the salmon is the king of fish, and all kings have many subjects. And still besides, -a salmon pool can only be fished successfully when approached with caution. I am acting upon this principle in penning these rambling chapters. I do not intend to hazard the satisfaction I find in composing them, or the diversion which awaits those who shall have the good taste to read them, by any premature denouement. Half the pleasure of the "good times" of life is lost by the rush and hurry with which they are begun and ended. Just now, for the first time in half a century, I am in no hurry. It is a new sensation and I rather like it.