Where to be Found 41 



Albany in 1897. The only method of stocking 

 our rivers with salmon is to have them prop- 

 erly guarded their entire length, and to enforce 

 the laws as to nets, which are now, as to the 

 Hudson, substantially unheeded. Thirty years 

 ago vast numbers of shad were taken above 

 Albany in this river, and also abundance of 

 sturgeon. Now the river is so nearly closed 

 by nets below that no shad has been caught 

 above Albany for the past three years, and I 

 doubt if a sturgeon has been seen for a much 

 longer period. This has resulted, of course, in 

 a great decrease in the catch of both shad and 

 sturgeon in the lower waters, and a consequent 

 diminution, not only of a valuable article of 

 food, but of the profits of the very men whose 

 violation of the laws has created the scarcity. 



In all countries there seems to be an irresist- 

 ible impulse amongst otherwise law-abiding 

 people to break the enactments regarding fish 

 and game, and such have never been enforced 

 without extraordinary efforts on the part of the 

 state. Legislators in this country have pretty 

 uniformly been in sympathy with the law- 

 breakers in this respect, ignoring entirely the 

 important economic question of the value to the 



