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resolutions to be submitted at this time. They have not yet been discussed, but 

 I think they will be satisfactory to those who take any interest in the question 

 before us. The advantages to the great mass of the people in re-stocking Lake 

 Ontario and the St. Lawrence, and the great chain of northern lakes with food 

 fish is more apparent to my mind than ever before, because I am satisfied that 

 the capabilities of Lake Ontario and the northern lakes for propagating and 

 producing fish have not been over-estimated. A very prominent gentleman in 

 Orleans county, Mr. J. H. White, informed me. that in 1846 he saw sold in 

 New York City on Wall street, salmon trout from Oswego. They were caught 

 at a point near Oswego, carried in a sleigh to some point on the Hudson River, 

 from there to New York in a wagon, and sold in Wall street at fabulous prices, 

 the purchasers stating that they were the finest fish they ever saw. Mr. M. F. 

 Reynolds says that as late as 1861, Mr. Clapp, of New York, proprietor of the 

 Everett House, asked him to make a contract with fishermen at Rochester and 

 arrange for a supply of salmon trout for that hotel, which was for a long time 

 thus supplied. These aie facts of great importance as showing the quality of 

 Lake Ontario fish. I referred at Rochester to the importance of stocking large 

 bodies of water. The argument to my mind seemed unanswerable, for the reason 

 that if the bodies of water in which you seek to raise and propagate fish are re- 

 stricted, the quantity of fish produced must be also restricted and limited. But 

 the boundless expanse of water in Lake Ontario, renders it admirably adapted in 

 that respect to the culture of fish, and well adapted for propagating and contain- 

 ing food fish. It is for that reason I made the suggestion about stocking Lake- 

 Ontario and the northern lakes with food fish. It is admitted that the common, 

 brook trout is the handsomest and best pan fish there is, but it cannot be raised; 

 in sufficient quantities in this country to become food for the great mass of fish, 

 consumers, and it is useless, in my judgment, to attempt to make it so, until we- 

 have stocked the northern lakes, and the whitefish, siscoe herring and salmon are 

 restored to the number so abundant thirty-five or forty years ago. I need not 

 tell this audience that we are not pioneers in fish culture. It is certain that 

 nearly 3,000 years ago fish culture was an important adjunct of Chinese civiliza- 

 tion, and sinjce then the Chinese have turned their attention to stocking their large 

 streams. and bodies of water, so that fish can be purchased and obtained there 

 much cheaper than in this country. This speaks volumes for a country that 

 maintains over 450,000,000 people. A Chinese dignitary who visited the Fish- 

 eries Exhibition at London, England, was able to give the commissioners of 

 that country important points, especially about the preservation of small fry 

 in streams. He expressed great surprise at the high prices obtained for fish, 

 saying that in China they can be purchased for one-fourth or one-third of the 

 price. Fish are used as a daily diet, and the demand would be very great if the 

 prices placed them within reach of the mass of the people. You will pardon me 

 for calling attention to one fact that will be significant. I am impressed with 

 the idea that since fish culture and propagation is carried on so extensively iix 

 this country, the citizens of the State of New York and Western States will 

 realize the importance of keeping pure the large bodies of waters near populous, 

 cities. It is a fact that in Lake Ontario, the Genesee river, Irondequoit Bay, and 

 in bodies of water in the vicinity of Rochester, la^ge quantities of deleterious sub- 

 stances are carried into the waters annually, and if it is deleterious to fish life it 

 must be so to human life within reasonable distances of those bodies of water. An 

 individual has no more right to pollute such bodies of water than to put poison- 

 ous substances into a well or stream supplying a family with water. In my 

 judgment the streams of New York State, Canada, or Michigan, are not fit deposi- 

 tories for sewerage, and the time will come when attention will be called to this. 



