By W. L. Barker, Esq. 253 



fully realised, that salmon has not yet reached so low a price and 

 become so common an article of food as to deserve especial mention 

 in the indenture of apprentices as in days of old, that some of our 

 so-called trout- streams abound in all kinds of Fish with the single 

 exception of Trout; but the attentive observer of the signs of the 

 times, will not fail to recognise in the silent growth of public 

 opinion, and in the efforts of the Legislature, an earnest desire on 

 the part of the English people, to restore the rivers of the United 

 Kingdom to their original " pride of place," and to strengthen the 

 hands of those able and intelligent men who devote their whole 

 time and attention to the furtherance of an object, so simple in its 

 management, so effectual in its working, and so universal in its 

 application. 



To return to the History of Fish-Culture, In the absence of 

 recorded facts we advance from 1758 to 1841. For a few years 

 previous to the latter date, a great diminution in the yield of trout 

 was perceived by those of our French neighbours who dwelt on the 

 banks of the Moselle, in the department of Vosges. Two humble 

 fishermen named Gehin and Remy, inhabitants of an obscure village 

 called La Bresse, made it their business to discover the cause of the 

 evil, and to devise some means of checking it. After much careful 

 enquiry, they resolved to adopt a plan whereby the frail germ of 

 the future fish should for a time be protected from the operation of 

 those unseen but deadly agents which beset its career, from the 

 moment of its nativity to the time of its rupture and the escape 

 of its contents. Their first experiment was made in the year 

 1841, and was crowned with extraordinary success. In 1842, 

 1843, and 1844, they repeated their experiments, and each year with 

 increasing good fortune. La Societe d' Emulation des Yosges gave 

 them a bronze medal and voted them a sum of money. In the 

 course of a few years, they succeeded in re-stocking the waters of 

 the Moselle. It is to be observed that although the fecundation of 

 the egg of fish by the means employed by Gehin and Eemy was 

 known to scientific ichthyologists, it was quite unknown to them. 

 Too much praise can scarcely be lavished on the intelligence and 

 zeal which they brought to bear on the discovery of so important 



