88 DOMESTICATED TROUT. 



country up to the last spawning season, that of 1871, 

 in the summer of which year, through the efforts of 

 Mr. George Shephard Page, the experiments of M. 

 Vrasski, at Nikolsk, Russia, were made known in 

 America.* By these experiments the very singular 

 facts were discovered that fish eggs could not only be 



* " In his experiments, M. Vrasski had followed the counsels 

 given in French and German works on pisciculture ; but the 

 results obtained were far from being brilliant. In reality he 

 obtained at each hatching but an insignificant number. ' From 

 many thousands of eggs/ said he, in one of his letters, ' there 

 were only some dozens of young fry. The rest of the eggs were 

 spoilt and lost for want of having been impregnated. I have, 

 however, observed with scrupulous exactness all the directions 

 given by the manuals with a view to fecundation.' In the 

 autumn of 1856, M. Vrasski was occupied with the microscopic 

 study of the eggs and the milt, and kept a journal in which he 

 registered the least circumstances and incidents relative to each 

 fecundation that he effected. Two' months of persistent efforts 

 brought the desired results. The journal and the microscope 

 proved to him that the cause of his failure proceeded precisely 

 from the exact observation of all the counsels of the foreign 

 manuals. It is necessary for fecundation that the spermatozoa 

 of the milt of the male should penetrate the eggs of the female. 

 In order to do this, the manuals recommended receiving the 

 eggs in a vessel of water ; afterwards, to receive in another ves- 

 sel of water the milt of the male ; and, lastly, to turn the diluted 

 milt on to the eggs. By his journal, kept with scrupulous exact- 

 ness, M. Vrasski convinced himself that the fecundation was so 

 much the less complete according as the mixture of the milt 

 and the eggs had been the most delayed. If ten minutes elapsed 

 between obtaining the milt and the mixing of it with the eggs, 

 the fecundation failed almost entirely. His observations and the 

 microscopic researches of the eggs and the milt showed that 

 first, when received in water at the instant of issuing from the 

 fish, the eggs absorb the water and preserve the power of being 



