HISTORY OF VERMONT. 149 



generally very near their sources, in the high 

 lands. The perch and the sucker are also very 

 numerous, and useful, and of nearly the same 

 dimensions. The most uncommon instance, 

 which I have ever seen, of the multiplying pow- 

 er of nature, was in the increase of these fish. 

 At Tinmouth, is a brook about twenty or thir- 

 ty feet wide, and two or three deep ; in which 

 the trout and sucker were to be found of the 

 common size, and number. ,A dam was built 

 across this stream, for the purpose of supplying 

 water for a sawmill. This dam formed a pond, 

 vdiich covered by estimation, about a thousand 

 acres, where the trees were thick, and the soil 

 had never been cultivated. In two or three 

 years, the fish were multiplied to an incredible 

 number. They were become so numerous, 

 that at the upper end of the pond, where the 

 brook fell into it, in the spring the fish are seen 

 running one over another ; embarrassed with 

 their own numbers, and unable to escape from 

 any attempt that is made to take them. -They 

 are taken by the hands, at pleasure ; and the 

 swine catch them without difficulty. With a 

 net, the fishermen often take a bushel at a 

 draught, and repeat their labour with the same 

 success. Carts are loaded with them, in as short 

 a time, as the people could gather them up, 

 when thrown upon the banks ; and it is cus- 

 tomary to sell them in the fishing season, for a 

 shilling by the bushel. While they have thus 

 increased in numbers, tliey are become more 

 than double to their former size. This extreme 

 increase does not seem to be derived from any 

 other cause, than that of collecting the waters 



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