404 A Plea for Sea Fisheries. Chapt. XXVI. 



93. The officer or officers appointed to lav down the first lines 

 of Pisciculture in India should, in my "pinion, meet these requisites. 

 Those that follow, if well selected, can acquire their knowledge in 

 the course of their duties. 



94. ISut no officer can do justice to the task without books of 

 reference, and as I am asked to give, an opinion what delinite steps 

 Government should take, I venture to submit that the first thing 

 it should do is to form in each Presidency a Piscicultural bookshelf, 

 containing a complete record of all that has been done and is being 

 done in the several branches of fish industry in different parts of 

 the world. We want all the information we can get about nets, 



lini i ts, steam-launches, and all other appliances for capturing 



fish in the sea, in the estuaries, in the fresh waters ; about the 

 different methods of curing and packing fish for human consumption, 

 and for manure ; about oil extracting ; about artificial fish breeding, 

 and in this respect the American experience is valuable; about the 

 Laws and rules made in different countries to suit different circum- 

 stances. 1 cannot find, and 1 have searched, that the Government 



of this Presidency* has a single 1 k of any real value on the 



subject, and never have I been able to get the smallesl particle of 

 help from any Government bookshelf in this matter. I have had 

 to be entirely dependent on my own private library, lamentably 

 meagre though it is. The officer charged with the task of organiz- 

 ing the Indian Fisheries should be given a very liberal discretion in 

 the formal ion of a library. 



95. The existing museums, by devoting a section thereto, can do 

 something hereafter towards the education of those employed in 

 aiding the advancement of the industry, and the several Superin- 

 tendents will doubtless co-operate kindly when the time arrives. 



* I hare since learnt that there ire omi boos about fish in the Madras Central 

 Museum, but whether fchej are of the uorl required, is the question. 1 fear thev 



are not. 



