46 



South to become a successful salmon river but this 

 spring several hundred young salmon have been taken 

 from the river, weighing 9 to 14 pounds, and I believe 

 this will continue. In 1894, 500,000 young salmon 

 were deposited in the upper river, which will return in 

 still larger numbers. It is principally as a shad pro- 

 ducing river that the Delaware is successful. The 

 Susquehanna River at one time excelled the Delaware. 

 Throughout Maryland the fish are disappearing, be- 

 cause fish baskets are legalized, and these have killed 

 the young shad deposited in the upper part of the 

 rivers, and these have decreased since a few years ago. 

 This shows the protection aft'orded to the Delaware, 

 and the value of re-stocking that river." 



Mr. Henry H. Lyman, of New York, said: 



" The dissemination of disease by eating fish from 

 polluted streams impresses me that along that line 

 great interest might be awakened among the people 

 who take their drinking water from these same streams, 

 and thus in remedying this, help along the matter of 

 the preservation of the fish. As you know there are 

 many rivers in this State that are supplying drinking- 

 water to large numbers of people, and in these same 

 streams fish are being poisoned to death by deleterious 

 matter thrown into the streams. I live on such a river, 

 and many factories along the banks are daily deposit- 

 ing unhealthy matter in the water. My idea is to 

 practically bring the question before the people in such 

 a manner that they will realize that their lives are in 

 danger, and have a law passed to put a stop to these 

 practices, and thereby accomplish our purpose as 

 reo-ards the fish." 



"The trouble in awakening popular interest in years 

 past, as to the proper protection of fish has been, that 

 fishing was considered as a sort of fad among sports- 

 men, rather than of vital importance to the people 



