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All friends to good living by tureen or dish, 
Concur in exalting this prince of a fish, 
So fine in a platter, so tempting a fry, 
So rich in a gridiron, so sweet in a pie, 
That even before it the salmon must fail, 
And that luscious donne bouche of the land beaver’s tail. 
* * * * * 
‘Tis a morsel alike for the gourmand or faster, 
While white as a tablet of pure alabaster, 
Its beauty or flavor no person can doubt 
When seen in the water or tasted without, 
And all the dispute that opinicn ere makes, 
Of this king of lake fishes, this ‘‘ deer of the lakes,”’ 
Regard not its choiceness to ponder or sup, 
But the best mode of dressing and serving it up. 
Sheldon, Disturnell, Strickland, Kohl, Hubbard and 
others all unite in saying that nature here seems to have 
lavished her bounties with no niggardly hand, so pro- 
fusely are these lakes stocked with fish. 
From the time of the discovery of the lakes down to 
the time of the establishment of the Hudson Bay Fur 
Company, these inexhaustible supplies were drawn upon 
only for the subsistence of the Indian tribes and the 
voyagers, but gradually they became, to a small extent, 
an article of commerce, the surplus being saited and sold 
in somewhat inconsiderate quantities. During all this 
time the northwestern territory was looked upon as a 
source from which valuable furs could be obtained, and 
but little attention was paid to the fisheries of the Great 
Lakes beyond what the immediate wants of those who 
lived upon them or near them demanded. 
Little is known at the early time of which I speak with 
reference to the fisheries of Lake Erie, because of its 
situation it was but little frequented by the early ex- 
plorers and fur-traders. Good reason existed for this 
condition of affairs. The blood-thirsty and cruel Iro- 
quois, the most adventurous and warlike Indian tribe 
which ever inhabited the continent, held undisputed pos- 
session of all that wilderness lying about Lakes Ontario 
and Erie and adjacent to the NiagaraRiver, which was a 
key of approach to the latter lake. 
