70 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



hue, and its smell was "like that of rotten eggs." This was diffused 

 gradually around the lagoon, and passed into the ocean ; and within 

 twenty-four hours every fish, coral, and mollusk in the part impregnated 

 with this discoloring substance died. So great was the number of fish 

 thrown on the beach that it took three weeks of hard work to bury them 

 in a vast trench dug in the sand. 



It is supposed that this water was impregnated with hydro-sulphuric 

 or carbonic acid. The statement is made that the corals and shells 

 were deeply corroded, the corals, especially, being in many places worn 

 down to the solid base. For a long time alter the catastrophe there 

 were no signs of life in the lagoon. 



Precisely to what cause we are to ascribe the destruction of fish in 

 the summer season, in the Gulf of Mexico, it is impossible to say. Here, 

 without any apparent reason because of change of temperature or other 

 physical condition, for a period of weeks together, myriads of fish, of all 

 species, are found dying or dead, so much so that they drift ashore in 

 vast numbers, threatening to create a pestilence. It appears that the 

 cause, whatever it be, is disseminated in the water, as smacks loaded 

 with living fish in their wells, intended for the markets of Key West, 

 Cuba, or the north, when entering certain zones experience the loss of 

 their entire cargo It is possible that the fatality is caused by some 

 algous or fuugous plant, which exercises a deleterous effect upon animal 

 life. The statement that the zones of dangerous water are differently 

 colored from the main body, would strengthen this impression. One 

 explanation is that the water from the Everglades, pouring into the Gulf, 

 in some way exercises a deleterious influence. 



As a general rule, of the fishes which perish from one of these causes 

 or another, no matter how great the mass, it floats at the surface of the 

 sea until decomposed and wasted, leaving but little in the way of defi- 

 nite remains. 



In regard to the agency of physical causes in destroying immense 

 numbers of fish simultaneously, under circumstances to involve their 

 being imbedded and their skeletons thereby preserved, numerous illus- 

 trations can be adduced in modern times, as we have already shown. 

 The eruptions of volcanoes along the sea-coast frequently discharge 

 immense bodies of acid or heated waters into the sea that poison every- 

 thing around them, the fish being imbedded in the mineral matter 

 which accompanies the discharge, or covered up by the ordinary 

 tides, or by the extraordinary currents produced by the same out- 

 break. 



Another very frequent and important natural source of destruction 

 to which we have just referred is in the sudden cooling of tropical wa- 

 ters by the "northers." These are frequently observed in the Gulf of 

 Mexico, where, in the winter especially, the waters are frequently 

 changed abruptly and to a very marked degree by the persistent blow- 

 ing of an intensely cold and long continued wind from the'north. This 



