534 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



Champlain, and may be regarded almost as an estuary up to the falls, 

 a distance of about three miles, and is navigable to that point by ves- 

 sels of light draught. It was therefore peculiarly adapted to the habits 

 of the salmon, and beyond the falls I thiuk they could not penetrate. 



The record of the circumstance of capturing fifteen hundred pounds of 

 salmon in the year 1823, at a single haul of the seine, near Port Kendall, 

 iu the town of Chesterfield, in the county of Essex, was said to have been 

 among the papers of Levi Highby, esq., in 1852. -lie was a man of high 

 character, and was, I understood, an actor iu the achievement. This fact 

 isnotonly memorable for the extraordinary quantity of the fish taken, but 

 it also illustrates the singularly erratic and inscrutable habits of the sal- 

 mon. Iu all my investigations on the subject, this is theonly instance that 

 I have learned of the salmon being taken in any great quantities except 

 from the rivers and their branches. The facts connected with this incident 

 seem to claim some attention, as calculated to throw a little light on the his- 

 tory of the fish. Between the Bouquet and Au Sable Rivers, no stream of 

 any magnitude enters the lake except the brook that debouches at Port 

 Kendall. This brook plunges over a sheer precipice of at least forty feet, 

 directly into the waters of the lake, without any or scarcely any space in- 

 tervening. The immense catch of salmon recorded could not therefore 

 have been taken while they were attempting to reach their spawning- 

 grounds, but were found near the shore, although in the open waters of 

 the lake. They must necessarily wander through the lake in schools; 

 but this is the only case which I have been able to trace where they have 

 been captured except in streams or in the act of entering into them. 



These facts, which might, I think, be accumulated by a large cata- 

 logue of similar incidents, are sufficient, in my judgment, to sustain the 

 proposition that the waters and the tributaries of Lake Champlain were 

 teeming at a former epoch with salmon to an extraordinary, if not un- 

 exampled, extent. 



2. — THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE SALMON, AND ITS CAUSES. 



Unhappily, another fact, alike regretted by the sportsman and the 

 political economist, is equally clear — the total disappearance for many 

 past years of this prince of fishes from all the region. An event of such 

 importance has elicited much inquiry and speculation, but it still 

 remains a problem that will probably never receive a satisfactory 

 solution. Various theories iu regard to the agencies which have 

 caused this singular revolution have been suggested and may claim 

 investigation. If any physical condition of the country, or the waters, or 

 their channels, formed allurements that attracted the salmon, the decay 

 or removal of these conditions would necessarily dispel such attractions, 

 and tend to the abandonment of the region by the fish. I have referred 

 to the uncommon repose and seclusion, even in a wilderness region, that 

 marked the borders of the lake, as one explanation of the original 

 exuberance of salmon in these tranquil scenes. The first occupation of 



