25 



daceous insects are also on the alert doubly gratified at 

 his increased size, and epidemics attack him more 

 severely than ever, and sweep away thousands. 



These are the perils which surround our coming fish 

 on his way to development. In the natural method 

 they all have full scope and free exercise. Is it aston- 

 ishing then that not more than one in a thousand ever 

 reach a marketable size or attain the dignity of itself 

 being a lather or mother ? Moreover, at this point man 

 steps in to help along the ruinous process. He has no 

 use for the minnows, nor the merciless insects, nor the 

 many worthless varieties of creatures which play such 

 havoc, but he takes the best the water affords. The 

 magnificent salmon in all the silvery glories of the sea, 

 amid whose caves of coral and pearl he has been gather- 

 ing size and splendor; or the soft skinned trout, as 

 delicate of color as the finest tints of the artist's brush, 

 and as soft to the touch as the finest velvet ; or the 

 monster salmo amethystus, the Mackinaw salmon of 

 Lake Superior ; or the white fish, whose silvery scales 

 shine like burnished silver. Man takes the best and so 

 upsets the equipoise of nature, which up to that time 

 had by its checks and balances kept all varieties of liv- 

 ing creatures at an established relative proportion. For 

 every salmon he eats there are ten thousand fewer 

 eggs for the water bugs and the minnows who will make 

 up the loss out of those which are left. These embodi- 

 ments of evil must be fed and grow mo're diligent in 

 the search for food, the scarcer it becomes, still man 

 keeps on with net, and spear, and hook, making yearly 

 larger drafts as the human race increases and extending 

 his machinery as the prey diminishes ; so the whole sys- 

 tem of nature is disarranged. The edible fishes at first 

 diminish, then, as the process goes on in geometrical 



