136 DOMESTICATED TROUT. 



themselves in a tin pail, somewhat larger, and to fill 

 in with sawdust. This is a simple, compact, and 

 safe way, and is the best now known, unless it is 

 Mr. Wilmot's method.* The packing of the eggs in 

 moss should be done as follows : Fill a large pan, 

 a little deeper than the packing-box, with water. Make 

 a bed of moss about half an inch deep on the bot- 

 tom of the box, and sink the box in the pan of water. 

 The bottom layer should be a single bunch of some 

 kind of the finer common mosses, which are found 

 almost anywhere in the woods. The subsequent lay- 

 ers should be the damp rank moss which grows in 

 swamps, and is known by the name of Sphagnum. 

 Then take the required number of eggs from the 



* Mr. Wilmot's method of packing fish eggs is a very excellent 

 one. His apparatus consists of a cylindrical can of tin, say fifteen 

 inches in diameter, having two walls or sides, one within the 

 other, on the refrigerator principle. The annular space between 

 the two walls is filled with sawdust, to preserve an even tempera- 

 ture within. The cylindrical space enclosed by the inner wall is 

 filled with shallow circular trays about an inch deep, all of the 

 same size, resting one upon another, and of a sufficient diameter 

 to fit nicely to the inner wall of the can. Each one of these shallow 

 trays or pans has a circular hole through the centre to admit a 

 movable iron rod, which runs from the top of the can to the bot- 

 tom of the last pan, to which it is fastened. The eggs are packed 

 with wires in the shallow pans, and each pan as it is packed is 

 strung on to the perpendicular rod, as beads are strung on a 

 string. The first one, of course, going to the bottom of the can, 

 the next resting on it, and so on till the top of the can is reached. 

 The upper end of the rod now serves as a handle, by which all 

 or any number of the pans can be raised at once out of the can, 

 and by unstringing the pans, so to speak, each one with its con- 

 tents can be examined. 



