A Sportsman 71 



and shooting advantages offered; and about twenty- 

 five thousand dollars per annum are obtained from 

 the sale of licenses, which funds are contributed to- 

 ward the expenses of supervision, wardens, and the 

 propagation of fish. 



In 1875 there were but four lakes or ponds which 

 contained land-locked salmon, which have now been 

 introduced into more than eight hundred, and hun- 

 dreds appropriate for black bass have also been 

 stocked. The salt-water smelt, which is suitable 

 for many fresh waters although seldom reaching 

 the size attained in the sea, is very generally dis- 

 tributed throughout Maine waters, and entirely 

 throughout the Rangeley waters, which cover about 

 one hundred square miles ; it has furnished a new and 

 very important source of trout and land-locked salmon 

 food, and seems to be the chief food in the spring 

 after the ice clearing. They are seen in large schools 

 at the surface, of about two inches in length, and I 

 have counted out from the stomachs of large trout 

 and salmon as many as fifty or sixty from a single 

 fish. 



Under the intelligent action of the game com- 

 missioners, the breeding of trout and salmon has 

 been most extensively prosecuted, and besides stock- 

 ing home waters, young fry has been very extensively 

 and freely distributed throughout the country, even 

 to the Pacific Coast. In fact, the protection of game 

 and sporting interests, prosecuted in the successful 

 manner it has been, has largely increased the pros- 

 perity of the State, and United States Senator Frye, 

 himself an ardent sportsman, in the course of a recent 

 address, said: 



