176 American Fisheries Society 



in international law involved, and the bearings thereof, and it 

 only covers thirty-one pages. For several years the annual 

 fisheries report was called the "Report of the Commissioner of 

 Fisheries," and signed by him, but there has always appeared 

 an ineradicable tendency for the marine branch to assume pre- 

 cedence over the fisheries in departmental routine, not always 

 to the advantage of the fisheries of the country. 



Samuel Wilmot — Hatchery Pioneer. — One promi- 

 nent Canadian fishery officer merits in this connection very 

 special reference, viz., Mr. Samuel Wilmot, a pioneer fish cul- 

 turist and fish conservator. He was full of courage and en- 

 thusiasm, and even when he was wrong would still fight for 

 his opinions. He had no technical training, but had erected 

 a fish hatchery on his farm near Newcastle, Ontario, and in a 

 report dated December 31, 1878, he speaks of his first hatching 

 efforts as begun in 1865. In 1866 he was appointed an Upper 

 Canada fishery officer, and in 1868, the year after confedera- 

 tion, became an official of the Federal Government. For his 

 earyl services to fis hcutlure he wa sapid $2,000. I nl876, 

 eight years after his first federal appointment, he became the 

 first superintendent of fish breeding in Ottawa, but numerous 

 other fishery duties were given him, and he attended to de- 

 partmental correspondence, inspected fisheries in various parts 

 of Canada, drafted fishery laws, and was chairman of several 

 fishery commissions, the principal ones being the British Colum- 

 bia Commission (1892), and the Great Lakes Commission 

 ( 1893), each of which embodied its evidence and conclusions in 

 bulky blue books, prepared and edited by Mr. Wilmot himself. 

 He represented Canada on important public occasions, such as 

 the Great Fisheries Exhibition in London, 1883, and the Chi- 

 cago World's Fair in 1893. Many of Mr. Wilmot's reports 

 are of very great interest, such as his Lake Winnipeg and 

 Fraser River (British 1 Columbia) reports, made after his 

 visits of inspection in 1890. The original Lake^ Ontario 

 hatchery, which was transferred from Mr. Wilmot to the 

 Dominion Government, was followed by others, so that there 



