BULLETIN UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 203 



some $300 for engineer's cliarges, printing, advertising, &c., making in 

 all the sum of, say, $2,700 the entire cost. The rock is of slate, the 

 strata leaning with the current. The conditions were all favorable. The 

 fish-way is made on the southerly side of the stream. The principal 

 weight of the water flowing along the northerly side, the southerly side 

 was easih^ laid bare by a wing-dam, projected from the southerly bank 

 at a sufficient distance above the fall and at such an angle as to deflect 

 the current to the northerly shore. This mode of exx)osing the beds of 

 rivers, as practiced by the California gold miners and ^prospectors, is 

 quite inexpensive, and, at the same time, answers its purpose most 

 thoroughly. 



The wing-dam is usually made of long logs secured together so as to 

 form a narrow crib or frame, one end of which having been secured to 

 the bank, the other is swung out into the stream and anchored at the 

 proper angle, when it is filled with sand-bags, brush, sods, and other 

 material, and is very easily made perfectly water-tight. This is contin- 

 ued and extended in the same manner until the part of the river bed to 

 be laid bare is entirely brought within the angle. 



If there remain within the angle any pools of water they are baled 

 out, and if any leakage, etc., makes it necessary, the small streams are 

 very easily stopped out, and the part required made literally dry. 



These dams are easily removed after they have served their purpose, 

 or in cases where the fish-way is near the bank a portion may be 

 strengthened and allowed to remain so as to make an eddy, if desirable, 

 at the head of the fish-way. In the construction of the fish-way at Pitt 

 Eiver considerable preparatory labor was necessary. The falls are in a 

 canon, some eight hundred feet in depth, and it was necessary to cut a 

 trail down to the foot of them on the northerly side, down which all the 

 material, such as lumber for the workmen's shanty, provisions, material 

 for a boat, &c. (for the foot of the falls could be reached only by the 

 side of the river opposite to site of the fish- way), had to be carried on 

 the backs of men, and then it also became necessary to improvise a 

 rope ferry across the river below the falls to get at the work. All of 

 this preparation and the entire completion of the job was done within 

 the sum named in the contract, and, in fact, yielded the contractors a 

 liberal profit ; but, you will observe, this was done after the manner 

 of California gold mining. The first contract was made in the sum- 

 mer of 1880, but as the season for work was nearly expended it was 

 not commenced, and the contract was thrown up. We again let it to 

 new parties, residents of the neighborhood, and this last spring and 

 summer it was commenced and completed in about four months. I have 

 never seen the falls of the Potomac, but from what I am informed that 

 river carries, at its falls, a much less body of water than Pitt Eiver 

 which last, although but a little over 100 feet in width at its falls, is a 

 deep and rapid canon stream. I fear that I have extended this letter 

 beyond your reasonable patience, but as I consider the great interest 



