386 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



collect the fish at some favorable point at the East, where they could 

 be kept alive until everything was ready for the journey ; secondly, to 

 fit up a car with the apparatus most suitable for transporting living fish : 

 and, thirdly, to take this car when loaded to California in the least pos- 

 sible time, and without any transfer of its contents. This plan was 

 successfully carried into practice up to the time of the accident just 

 beyond Omaha. 



"The first installment of living fish intended for the California car 

 arrived at Charlestown, N. H., the point of rendezvous, on the 7th of 

 May. It consisted of eighty-two black bass, (Grystes fasciatus;) glass- 

 eyed perch, (Lucioperca;) and bull-heads, (Pimelodus;) and about 300,000 

 eggs of the Perca fiavescens and the Lucioperca. 



" These fish were collected at Lake Champlain, and at the Missisquoi 

 River in Vermont, and were taken a journey of thirty hours by rail, 

 before reaching Charlestown. They, nevertheless, bore their trip admi- 

 rably, and arrived at their destination in first-rate order. 



" The next two weeks were spent in fitting up the car, which had 

 arrived at Charlestown, N. H., and making other preparations for the 

 difficult undertaking in prospect. Arrangements had been previously 

 made, at the suggestion of Hon. Spencer F. Baird, United States Com- 

 missioner of Fisheries, with Mr. Monroe Green, at Castleton, on the 

 Hudson, for a supply of young shad and fresh-water eels j and also, 

 with Capt. Viual Edwards, of Wood's Hole, Mass., for young lobsters 

 and other salt-water fish. The eastern trout (Salmo fontlnalis) were to 

 be taken from the Cold Spring trout-ponds at Charlestown ; the large 

 lobsters were to come from Johnson & Young's establishment at Bos- 

 ton ; and Mr. Myron Green was dispatched to the Baritan Biver for cat- 

 fish. 



" The equipment of the car having been completed, and everything 

 being ready, the 3d day of June, 1873, was set for our departure. At 

 midnight of June 2d, Mr. W. S. Perrin arrived from Boston with a 

 special car, having on board the lobsters, oysters, small lobsters, salt- 

 water eels, tautogs, and reserves of ocean-water. We began at daylight 

 the next morning filling the tanks in the car and loading in the fish, and 

 by 1 o'clock in the afternoon everything was ready, and at a quarter 

 past 2 on Tuesday, June 3, the California aquarium-car started on its 

 journey. 



"The car was furnished by the Central Pacific Bailroad Company, 

 and was one of their fruit-cars, intended for quick trips across the con- 

 tinent. It was 27 feet long and 8 feet wide, and was provided with a 

 Westiughouse air-brake and Miller platform, which enabled us to take 

 it along with passenger-trains. 



"At one end of the car was a stationary tank, built of 2-inch plank, 

 lined with zinc, and occupying the whole width of the car and 8 feet of 

 its length. This tank was 2 feet and 8 inches deep, and held, when full, 

 about five tons of water. At the other end of the car was a large ice- 



