WATER CULTURE COMPARED WITH LAND CULTURE. 223 



i : ',\ of action is essential, Cor it is useless to protect in one 

 locality it' wanton destruction is permitted in another. 



Many species are migratory; that is, pass from the ocean, at 

 certain Beasons ^l' the year alter they havegVown fat feeding' there 

 during their period of rest, up the streams into the fresh water, 

 where alone can they deposit their eggs and hatch their young. 

 In these oases the fishermen along the coast are jealous of those 

 on the upper waters; the former complain that the latter destroy 

 the parents while they are spawning, and in this way destroy the 

 race; while the latter complain that the coast fishermen use im- 

 proper am! murderous methods of fishing, and kill ont the entire 

 supply before they can have a chance to reach their spawning 

 I Is. Unfortunately, both these complaints are too well founded. 

 Each class takes all it can, blind to the future, which presses 

 closer and closer on the heels of such want of foresight; it looks 

 onl}' to immediate gratification, and accepts the proverb, "after 

 me a famine." 



The navigable streams of this country are subject to the juris- 

 diction of the national Government, and this is even more clearly 

 the case with the coast line within three miles of the shore. This 

 is a general rule of law, and if there are any exceptions to it they 

 do not exist in the western States, where the rivers were express- 

 ly reserved to the nation It is not necessary for the purposes of 

 this application to maintain so broad a proposition, as it is not in- 

 tended to take any actual control of legislation on this subject at 

 present, but only to develop the natural resources by artificial 

 means, restock waters which have been exhausted, spread infor- 

 mation concerning the matter, and lead the people either to pro- 

 fee! their own rivers or to grant unquestionable authority to 

 Congress to do so. And it is to that alone which the proposed 

 law addresses itself. 



The progress made abroad has been stated, and it has been 

 shown to be sufficiently encouraging to induce our country to 

 follow the example, but the cases are different in many points, and 

 in every point to the advantage of the United States. The extent 

 of our inland waters is something that is hardly understood 

 abroad, and is not properly appreciated at home. Our vast lakes, 

 enormous rivers, innumerable streams, brooks ponds, bays, la- 

 goons, creeks, and rivulets, are not equaled in any other quarter 

 of the globe. In the State of New York alone we have far more 

 area of water than in Great Britain and France united, the actual 



