26 



ratio they decrease more rapidly, and the operation be- 

 comes accelerated at every step, till the stream or lake 

 which once abounded with excellent fish is utterly, and 

 absolutely denuded and left sterile, bare and unpro- 

 ductive. The insects have devoured the last edible fish 

 which map's greediness had failed to reach. This has 

 happened with so many of the ponds and water courses 

 of our country that it is safe to say, fully one-half of the 

 lakes, rivers and streams throughout the older states, at 

 least, yield nothing of food for man. 



Such a result is no trivial injury to the community. 

 The vast extent of these sketches of water are but little 

 understood by the people at large. There are in the 

 State of New York alone 647 lakes, with an area of 

 466.457 acres, besides countless smaller ponds, and miles 

 of river and stream. Fully a quarter of a million of 

 acres of the public patrimony are thus allowed to go to 

 ruin and decay for the want of proper knowledge and a 

 little care. It would have been easy to have protected 

 them ; it is a far more serious matter to restore their 

 ancient productiveness. 



The sea fisheries are scarcely better off. Professor 

 Spencer F. Baird, of the Smithsonian Institution, was 

 appointed, under a law of Congress, Commissioner to 

 examine into the condition of the National fisheries and 

 the cause of the diminution of their yield. The fact of 

 " diminution " is the present point on which Professor 

 Baird says, h"is observations having been made on the 

 Coast of New England : " The evidence of the most 

 deplorable decrease in the supply of fish is only too 

 clear ; and so greatly and rapidly has this occurred, that 

 fishing stations which in 1860 produced thousands of 

 fish, now furnish only hundreds, or at that ratio, giving 

 a diminution of quite nine-tenths and often more." 



