598 BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 
disappointment awaiting the sylviculturist who should attempt to grow chest- 
nut trees on soil permeated with lime. Compared to our knowledge of sylvi- 
culture, our knowledge of sponge culture is most uncertain, and it is therefore 
difficult to foresee the future of sponge culture from seed. There arises in this 
instance the question of species; each individual case ought to be studied 
separately and only one general rule may here be given—that recommending 
the greatest prudence. 
SPONGE CULTURE BY PARCAGE. 
This method might give more immediate results than the former. Under- 
taken by a private individual in a limited and well-defined area of the sea, it 
would consist in preserving sponges of small dimensions, brought up in fishing, 
by placing them in favorable localities, whence they would be taken out at the 
desired time to be prepared and sold. The fisherman would not neglect the 
small specimens, the skeleton of which can be sold only at a loss. If the legis- 
lation of his country is wisely protective, if it forbids the fishing, sale, and 
exportation of small sponges, the fisherman will preserve them in parcs, awaiting 
the time when they will be sufficiently developed. 
Such an enterprise is theoretically possible, but this does not mean that it 
would be remunerative. Sponges which it is desired to preserve must be 
gathered and transported with the greatest precautions, for which there are no 
facilities in practical fishing and which would render the latter quite expensive. 
In spite of the greatest care individual sponges would suffer fatally; the death 
of some would be unavoidable and the survival of the others would demand a 
certain period of time to recuperate and regain their former health before 
growing. ‘‘A fixed fragment, or an entire sponge transplanted and fixed like a 
fragment, will exhibit a rapidity of development much inferior to sponges coming 
up spontaneously.” Such is the opinion of a convinced sponge culturist, 
Allemand. 
The installation of a pare would probably be subjected to an annual tax 
which we might suppose to be quite negligible; but expenditures of maintenance 
would not be at all negligible. Sponges are a commodity which it is very easy 
to steal, and it would be necessary not only to supervise the pare but even to 
inclose it. It has been observed that sponges do not develop so rapidly when 
they are subjected to too much thinning. This was noticed by O. Schmidt and 
Buccich in regard to Euspongia officinalis adrjatica, and it was likewise 
observed by Allemand in regard to Hippospongia equina elastica. Sponges 
can not, consequently, be kept in very shallow water; the inclosing of the parc 
would then be very expensive if it were done with a wall; it would be necessary 
to content one’s self with determining the boundaries by means of floating beams. 
