542 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



wliat it gives, and neither the one nor the other has ever refused its re- 

 turn. In this manner, receiving and giving without ceasing, both con 

 tribute to nature's wonderful harmony. 



When men appeared at last upon the earth, and entered into the great 

 circle of mutual intluences, originated conditions which were produced 

 by the nature of the surroundings. In the beginning of communities 

 were found every where hunters and fishermen exclusively. They desired 

 of the earth as of the water only what it produced of itself, and as a 

 consequence they required enormous room in which the not numerous 

 tribes might find the uncultivated fruits, the fish, and wild animals which 

 were necessary for their support, and which often failed. In our day 

 still some tribes are in the same condition, and we call them savage. 



Mankind became at length herdsmen ; that is to say, they collected 

 some useful animals about them ; they were raised thereby a round in 

 the ladder of civilization. Less exposed to the cravings of hunger, these 

 tribes increased and became hordes. But to support the animals which 

 they had procured for themselv^es, men were obliged to move from pas- 

 ture to pasture. They remained, therefore, nomadic and barbarous. 



Finally, they learned how to cultivate vegetables, and trees, and plants, 

 and soon thereafter how to imi^rove them ; they abode also in one place, 

 and became agriculturists. But with the new work which they had as- 

 sumed they were obliged trom the first partly to strive against nature, 

 partly to call her to their help. To procure a place for rice, wheat, corn, 

 or potatoes, the weeds had to be removed ; to increase the crops and re- 

 new the exhausted ground's fertility, manuring became nexiessary. Agri- 

 culture was called to life ; it secured a steadily increasing jjoijulation its 

 daily bread. They performed their labors through centuries, and the 

 experience gained secured steady production ; civilized men live plenti- 

 fully, by the million, in a space Avhere a few thousand nomads, a few 

 hundred huntei-s, would starve to death. 



We all see what has been effected in this direction ; but what always 

 escapes the attention of many is that human industry is directed only 

 to the soil, and has forsaken the water. With regard to culture, the 

 hunter has altered his condition ; the fisherman has become a savage. 

 In this respect the most refined Euroi>eau races find themselves, with 

 few exceptions, exactly in . the same condition as the tribes of the Ori- 

 noco or of Australia ; the white does not in any respect excel the negro. 

 As his colored brethren have fished he fishes everywhere, always care- 

 lessly and without judgment ; more numei^ous and equipped with better 

 implements, the civilized white has fished more than the worse equipped 

 black, and has wound up by exhausting the brooks, lakes, and rivers, 

 as well as the sea, of both small and great fishes. But good is often 

 produced from evil in its climax, and necessity has seldom failed to teach 

 mankind wisdom. The diminution of wild animals led undoubtedly to 

 the taming of our domestic animals ; agriculture was instituted, perhaps, 

 in the midst of the pangs of hunger. The decrease of the abundance 



