232 PROPAGATION OF FISa 
slioiikl be unwilling to adopt the simplest legislation to 
preserve, foster and protect our other fishing interests. 
Cod are not generally considered equal to salmon or 
trout, and although at present more numerous, a few 
years of culture might bring the latter extensively into 
competition. I am not in a position to give statistics, 
but the sahnon that are sold in our markets fresh and 
smoked, to say nothing of that which is pickled, must 
amount to millions annually. 'No one single subject is 
so important and so capable of adding to the wealth of 
our country as the re-stocking our rivers with their 
natural inhabitants. 
There is a very erroneous impression, encouraged, too, 
it is shame to say, by Smith, in his work on the fish of 
Massachusetts, that the wild creatures of the woods and 
waters must, in the nature of things, disappear before 
man. E'ow, although this is a lamentable fact, it is not 
a necessary consequence, and there is nothing in man's 
capturing fish or killing game, properly and reasonably, 
that will seriously diminish their numbers. Fish and 
birds prey on one another ; for every large trout a man 
takes he saves a hundred small ones ; for every hawk he 
catches hovering over his barnyard, and kills, he saves a 
hundred quail, and thus, although he kills them himself, 
he preserves them from vermin, from one another, and 
from birds of prey. If he will add to this a very little 
care and protection of the young, he will increase the 
supply a thousand fold. 
It is calculated that the roe of one shad or cod would 
stock the world, but that not one egg in a million arrives 
at maturity. The lowest calculation of the roe of a 
