[3] REPuPULATING BELGIAN WATERS. 817 



thought people had solved the problem of the repopulation of our rivers. 

 The founding of the Society of Acclimatization in France, and the estab- 

 lishment of the I'iscicultural station at Hiiningen gave the first impetus. 

 Prior to this the King of the Belgians, Leopold I, had successfully en- 

 gaged in fish culture on his estates in the Ardennes, following the old 

 methods of the German foresters. 



In 1853 M. Ernest von den Peereboom had spoken in favor of fish- 

 culture in the Chamber of Ee{)resentatives. Exi)eriments which were 

 made at the time, but in waters very little suited to the purfjose and 

 with defective apparatus, did not prove successful. 



Some time afterward a more important society of fish-culture was 

 formed, and serious efibrts were made. This society, however, only 

 existed a short time. The mistake had been made to embrace in its 

 work too many branches of this new science, and to attempt, moreover, 

 the culture of oysters and salt-water fish at Nieuport, which place did 

 not possess all the conditions necessary for such culture. People finally 

 entertained the idea, which was widely spread at the time, that trout 

 and even salmon could live in all the pure waters of the country and 

 prosper, even when shut up and in a state of confinement. Hence the 

 mistakes and finally the dissolution of the society, which was composed 

 in great part of persons whose i^roperty was not in the region where 

 salmonoids can live. 



Although for twenty years the question may be said to have slept, 

 from a practical point of view it has at least not been buried, for sev- 

 eral times during this period it has given rise to public discussions and 

 various publications. It is necessary to give a brief historical sketch of 

 the phases through which this question has passed before its active 

 awakening. 



In 18G5 an(l 1866 the provincial council of Brabant ai)pointed a com- 

 mission whose duties were to study the best means for purifying the 

 water-courses, and to find means for repopulating our brooks. Thelate 

 M. de Gronckel prepared the report of this commission, and stated in it 

 that in this matter the most powerful interests centered, which it has 

 became the duty of the authorities to protect, to harmonize, and concili- 

 ate as much as possible, above everything the interests of health and 

 security from inundations. To this must be added, he says, a question 

 of alimentation and national wealth, viz, that of ])reserving and multi- 

 plying the fresh-water fish. 



The "Free Society of Emulation " of Liege, at the instance of my re- 

 gretted friend, Theodore Lacordaire, professor of zoology at the Uni- 

 versity of Liege, set a prize for tcie best answer to the following ques- 

 tion : " To determine the causes tchichfor the last tirenty years have brought 

 about a degeneration of fish in the rivers of the province of Liege, and to 

 indicate the means for remedying this state of affairs.'''' 



The prize essay, whicli was i)rinted, came from the pen of the late 

 Charles Lehardy de Beaulieu, a well-known and highly esteemed en- 

 S. Mis. 110 52 



