XXXli REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



Europe were by Dom Pinclion, in the fifteenth century, at the abbey of 

 Eeome, near Montbard, in France, and in a manuscript dated A. D. 1420, 

 belonging to the Baron de Montgaudry, describing his process, it is said 

 that it is necessary to have long wooden boxes, with solid bottoms, but 

 with wicker-work at the ends, open above, and covered with a willow 

 grating. At the bottom of the box is to be placed a bed of fine sand, 

 and a slight groove is to be made in the sand, in which to deposit the eggs, 

 which have previously been fertilized. The trout is to be kept in a gentle 

 current of water; and as soon as the discharge of ova has taken place, (the 

 period of which is carefully watched for,) and these are fertilized by the 

 milt of the male, the. eggs are to be removed to the boxes referred to, 

 and allowed to remain until hatched out. 



About the middle of the eighteenth century the subject of fish-culture 

 was again brought into notice by the experiments of Lieutenant 

 Jacobi, of Hoenhausen. An account of his labors forwarded to Count 

 de Goldstein was translated into Latin by that gentleman, and later 

 into French by Duhamel du Monceau. The method adopted by Jacobi 

 was that of modern times, namely, the squeezing of the ripe eggs from 

 the body of the female into a dish partly filled with water, discharging 

 upon this the milt of the male, stirring them well together, and after- 

 ward placing them in the boxes for hatching. 



According to Adanson, as early as 1772 some form of artificial fe- 

 cundation, of trout esijecially, was made use of on the borders of the 

 "Weser, in Switzerland, in the Palatinate of the Rhine, and in many of 

 the more elevated regions of Germany. 



The methods of Jacobi, and his results, seemed for many years 

 to have passed into oblivion, although various experiments were made 

 for some time after, in one country or another, looking more particularly 

 toward the increase of the salmon and the trout. jSTo material progress 

 seems to have been made, however, until the time of Joseph R6my, a 

 simple fisherman of Bresse, a village in the Vosges, who by his own 

 ingenuity discovered the general theory of artificial fecundation, and 

 again carried into effect, but much more efficiently, the methods of 

 Jacobi. To him is due the fuller appreciation of the importance 

 of artificial fecundation, and of protecting the eggs and young fish dur- 

 ing the period of greatest danger. It is well known that thei-e is no 

 more attractive food for aquatic animals than the roe of fish, even the 

 very parents of the eggs in many cases devouring them greedily. It 

 is not too much to claim that, as a general rule, 60 per cent, of all eggs 

 are devoured before the young are hatched ; and it is also certain that 

 of the latter, three-fourths are probably eaten while in their helpless 

 condition, with the yolk-bag attached, and before they are able to feed 

 themselves and to take the natural precautions for their safety. 



Again, a serious loss is experienced in the uncertainty of natural 

 fecundation, many of the eggs failing to receive the spermatic fiuid, and 

 of course remaining inert. The estimate has repeatedly been made that 



