185 
requires only the harvest, or, under artificial cultivaticn, the seed-time as well. The 
expense of the harvest, too, depends upon the amount of the yield; for, were fish as 
abundant as they should be, it would be but trifling. A shad, no longer than the first 
joint of one’s little finger, and not much thicker than a pin, is turned loose in the head- 
waters of some river, feebly it floats toward the ocean with the current, feeding be- 
cause it grows, but on food wholly invisible to the eye of man even assisted by the 
microscope of science. Slowly it is converting the worthless into the valuable. Ina 
few months it is an active, vigorous little fish of three or four inches length. Then it 
adventures out into the ocean, the vast store-house of incalculable amounts of its food; 
-animaleula, saspended in mud-water thick as motes in the sun’s rays; crustacea, on the 
bottom, only less abundant than the grains of sand; and conferve, floating about in 
masses an acre wide. It grows and grows, assimilating more valueless substances and 
turning them to man’s service, and at last it returns, of full size, in splendid condition, 
fit for the fisherman’s net, and worthy to grace the table of the epicure. It left its 
birth-place a poor, puny, worthless thing, of scarcely an appreciable weight; it returns 
-athree or four or five pounds weight of edible delicacy, not to be surpassed in strength- 
giving or gastronomic qualities. It demands no care, and draws but little from the 
world’s stock of food or food-making substances; the ox devours tons of grass, which 
has cost much labor and required valuable manure, ere he is fit for the butcher; but 
the shad prepares himself for the fisherman by his own exertions, and then comes 
voluntarily to the net when he is fit to kill. The warm-blooded animals are expensive 
to raise; they are active, full of motion and heat, and waste much of their food in 
assimilating the rest; but fish are cold blooded, dull, and quiet, rarely moving unless dis- 
turbed, and lying, hour after hour, in one position, unless tempted out to pounce upon 
their prey. They void but a trivial proportion of what they consume, and their 
active digestion quickly converts the greater part of it into their own flesh, yet medical 
investigations establish that fish-food is more nutritive than meat, and is especially 
adapted to the sustenance of the brain, marrow, and bones, as it contains large quan- 
tities of phosphorous. In every point of view, then, it is cheaper; and nature would 
seem te have expressly kept this reserve until the earth should be so crowded with 
people that man could no longer find in it a means of support, and should be forced to 
look for maintenance to the waters which once covered the world, and are still two- 
thirds of its extent. This provision seems doubly probable, when it is remembered 
that the principal dangers to fish-life exist in the ova state, and that it is in precisely 
that stage that man’s assistance can be given and is of the greatest use. 
UNITED STATES COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
Professor Spencer F. Baird, of the Smithsonian Institution, acting as 
Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries under act of Congress approved 
February 9, 1871, has made his first report, which has just been printed 
for general circulation. This report embraces his investigatious con- 
cerning the condition of the sea-fisheries of the south coast of New Eng- 
land, in 1871 and 1872. It will be remembered that the act creating this 
commission was passed in view of the reiterated assertions that the most 
valuable food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States were 
rapidly diminishing in number, ‘‘ to the public injury, and so as to mate- 
rially affect the interests of trade and commerce.” The commissioner 
was charged with the duty of prosecuting his inquiries with reference 
to ‘ascertaining whether any, and what diminution in the number of 
the food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States has taken 
place; and, if so, to what causes the same is due; and also whether any 
and what protective, prohibitory, oy precautionary measures should be 
adopted in the premises.” 
It is a matter of surprise that, notwithstanding the material impor- 
tance of the fisheries more immediately to the States along the coasts, 
and in full view of the fact that the fish-supply was becoming less re- 
liable, and, indeed, in some localities failing almost eutirely, no oficial 
investigation or inquiries were set on foot until as late as 1869-70, 
when petitions aroused the attention of the legislatures of Massachusetts 
and Rhode Island. But the reports of committees of investigation were 
so utterly at variance as to conclusions and recommendations, that any- 
thing like harmony and concurrence of action through statistical regula- 
