214 THE SCIENTIFIC RESULTS OF V 



sole, the cod, and salmon, are hardly to be looked for. 

 Really complete zoological collections would be too 

 cumbrous for transport and exposure in such an Ex- 

 hibition. But above all it is true that many of the 

 most important scientific conclusions affecting the 

 interests of fisheries are not capable of exhibition. 

 The instruments with which the investigations are 

 made, and in some cases the animals which have been 

 the subject of investigation, may be exhibited, but 

 the scientific result can often only be " exhibited " in 

 so far as it affects the procedure of fish-catchers, fish- 

 breeders, or fish-culturists. 



I think that it has been made very apparent, not 

 only by the class of objects exhibited by foreign con- 

 tributors to this Exhibition, but also by the original 

 papers and the discussions which the Conferences con- 

 nected with the Exhibition have produced, that there 

 is nothing which is so much needed in connection 

 with all kinds of fisheries, river or sea, shell-fish, true 

 fish, coral or sponge as more knowledge, more 

 science in fact, more zoology; and not only that, 

 but that there is nothing which is more desired and 

 recognised as needful by all those who are best in- 

 formed in their own particular branches of fishery. 



Improved machines for catching fish, new legisla- 

 tive restrictions, State aid to fisher-folk all such 

 desiderata are, I believe, admitted to be less urgently 

 needed, less likely to prevent our various fisheries 

 from deteriorating or disappearing altogether, than 

 the one desideratum more accurate knowledge. 



It is admitted on all sides that many British 



