I2O Modern Pishcutture in fresh and Salt 



floor of the second story, from where it went to the 

 floor below and was again used. Some holes in 

 swampy land below had been intended for trout ponds, 

 but they were covered with water from the harbor at 

 high tide and geese swam up to the hatchery. 



The north side of the island is hillv, some hills being 

 200 feet above tide, and they are glacial drifts, sand, 

 clay, gravel, etc., plowed out from the mainland by the 

 ice. Such a hill was within 500 feet, and I filled the 

 old holes with sand, leveling the swamp. Then 

 "ponds" were staked out and left as the sand was 

 dumped around them, on the principle that the Irish- 

 man said cannon were made ; said he : "They take a 

 long hole and pour brass around it." So we made 

 ponds. These were temporary ponds, merely for use 

 until the State could afford better, and the raceways 

 were made of the cheapest hemlock boards. 



In 1887 there was an appropriation for a new hatch- 

 ery made at the insistence of Commissioner Blackford, 

 and I planned to put it as high as the inflow from the 

 reservoir would bear, as the water went from the hatch- 

 ery to the ponds, and when it was up high we could 

 control it. When the ground was staked out for the 

 building the northwest corner was three feet above 

 ground and the southeast was thirteen feet in the air. 

 It looked queer, but the levels were correct. The foun- 

 dation was built and I filled the grounds until there 

 was no queer look about it. The old ponds were filled 

 and new ones of sand built with their bottoms where 

 the old surface was. 



For a time it was dangerous to step near a pond, but 

 it settled hard. Walks and flower-beds were laid out 

 and a road made east of the ponds, which is as solid 

 to-day as can be. The sand holds water well. The 



