CULTURE OF THE SALMON. 127 



Mask, would most likely do so by some of the many sub- 

 terranean passages, and be lost in the bowels of the earth. 

 The foregoing, in substance, is from " The Field," of Nov. 

 19th, 1864. Mr. Ashworth, in his prize essay on the culti- 

 vation of salmon fisheries, says, " I have lately expended 

 1700 in the construction of a salmon-passage and ladder, 

 between Loughs Corrib and Mask, and through which 

 salmon have passed in the winter of 1865, into an exten- 

 sive district of new breeding-ground from which they had 

 been previously excluded." This is the last we have of 

 the passage alluded to. Whether the fish have passed it, 

 in numbers, and if so, whether Mr. Buckland's prediction 

 of the fry getting lost in the bowels of the earth has been 

 realized, I am unable to state. 



I am indebted also to Mr. Francis's book, for an account 

 of Mr. Edward J. Cooper's experiments at Ballisodare, 

 Ireland. 



" This undertaking, which was really an experiment, 

 shows how great difficulties can be overcome by persever- 

 ance, and how a fishery can be created where none has 

 previously existed. Mr. Cooper owns two rivers, the 

 Owenmore and the Arrow, which unite some two and a 

 half miles from the sea and form the Ballisodare river. 

 On these rivers are three falls ; the lowest, which is a suc- 

 cession of falls over high ledges of rock, is within a short 

 distance of the sea ; the next, which is a short distance 

 above it, is called the Upper Ballisodare Fall. This fall is 

 impracticable to fish, though fish had been known to sur- 

 mount the lower one occasionally, but not often. The 



