The Three Secretaries 185 



Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries. The duties of this 

 office, although not permitted to interfere with his other offi- 

 cial work, occupied nevertheless a large portion of his time 

 and much of his best thought for the remaining years of his 

 life. 



The interests of the Fish Commission, so limited at first 

 that they were performed largely by himself and a few volun- 

 teer associates, soon became so extensive that he was obliged 

 to give up personal studies and to work entirely through the 

 agency of others. So rapidly did the work extend in later 

 years that notwithstanding the large and competent staff 

 which the increased appropriations enabled him to employ, 

 the burden of routine grew greater than he was able, with his 

 other responsibilities, to endure, and led to his untimely 

 death. 



The work of the Fish Commission while under his charge 

 was the most prominent of all the efforts of the government 

 in the way of aggressive scientific research. 



The law which authorized the appointment of a Commis- 

 sioner of Fish and Fisheries defined his duties as follows : 



"To prosecute investigations and inquiries on the subject 

 [of the diminution of valuable fishes], with the view of ascer- 

 taining whether any and what diminution in the number of 

 the food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States 

 has taken place ; and, if so, to what causes the same is due ; 

 and also whether any and what protective, prohibitory, or 

 precautionary measures should be adopted in the premises ; 

 and to report upon the same to Congress." 



The same resolution required that the Commissioner should 

 be a civil officer of the government, of proved scientific a?id 

 practical acquaintance with tJie fishes of the coast. Only one 

 man was eligible under these conditions. Indeed, the office 

 had been made for Professor Baird. 



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