150 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



allow those scavengers to come to our shores and eat up the 

 sewage must tend to the improvement of the sanitary condi- 

 tion of the people along the shores. There is a doctor in 

 Boston of a good deal of repute who has stated publicly that 

 he would not reconmiend any of his patients to go on the 

 north shore nearer Boston than Beverly shore. Possiblv he 

 may be specially interested in real estate on Beverly shore ; 

 I do not know about that. I am livini"' nearer Boston than 

 that; I keep a summer hotel right on the sea-shore, and I 

 have no doulit that the doctor's statement has interfered with 

 my business somewhat. Now, then, I am interested, as you 

 see, that the waters of Massachusetts Bay shall be purified 

 l)y these menhaden fish ; and if they are allowed to come in 

 thousands and millions to eat up the sewage from the city 

 of Boston as it enters the bay, it is going to protect the 

 health of the people all along the north shore, according to 

 the statement that was made here to-day. Let us look at it 

 from that stand-point, — the health of the people. If they 

 are scavengers of the sea, don't for mercy's sake drive them 

 away from the shore into deep water, where they cannot 

 follow the instinctive impulses of their nature as God in- 

 tended that they should, and eat up the sewage from the 

 city of Boston. Let us have the full benefit of that, and let 

 us preserve any legislation that protects us, putting aside 

 the great amount of commercial fertilizers that may be pro- 

 duced by the catching of these fish. You see there has been 

 a great diminution all the way along from 1883. Let us not 

 interfere with any legislation which will have a tendency to 

 increase the number of these fish u})on our shores. I put it 

 upon the ground of the evidence that has been produced 

 here, that they are scavengers of the sea, and that the health 

 of the people along the north shore depends upon their free 

 coming into Boston Bay to cat up the sewage. Don't inter- 

 fere with that. 



Hon. John E. Russell (of Leicester). I would like to 

 have the lecturer answer one or two questions, I want to 

 ask him if he regards Buzzard's Bay as part ol" the open 

 sea, over which the United States has jurisdiction. 



Mr. BowKER. I believe that is considered a dis})uted 

 question. 



