1870.] INTRODUCTION OF SALMON INTO TASMANIA. 15 
then Dr. Mackenzie suggested the sending impregnated roe as more 
likely to lead to success than any attempt to carry the living fish. 
The Doctor’s description of his method of impregnating the roe from 
fresh-killed fish by rubbing it and the milt together would, however, 
astonish a modern pisciculturist as much as his notion that the 
impregnated spawn placed in a basket of gravel and hung in the 
ship’s tank could possibly live many days in tropical weather. 
In the year 1848 a gentleman belonging to the Tasmanian Survey 
Department, Mr. James Ludovick Burnett (then on leave of absence 
in England), visited Mr. Young, of Inverness-shire, manager of the 
Duke of Sutherland’s Salmon-fisheries, and consulted him on the 
practicability of introducing Salmon and Trout into Tasmania. Mr. 
Young suggested two methods for trial—one, to bring out the spawn ; 
and the other, to bring young fish. On the whole, Mr. Young gave 
the preference to the latter method, which is the more remarkable 
as from the account of one of his experiments it is clear that he had 
accidentally been upon the verge of discovering the very method which, 
after many years, led to success. In the experiment alluded to, 
Mr. Young caused the fecundated ova, packed in baskets of gravel, 
to be hung in a running stream at different distances from the 
shore. During a severe frost one or two of the baskets nearest the 
bank, and which were in comparatively still water, were frozen hard 
on the surface, and Mr. Young supposed that the vitality of the eggs 
was destroyed; but he let them remain, and discovered that the only 
effect of the reduced temperature was to delay the hatching of the 
ova for several days. 
On August 13, 1849, Sir William Denison, then Lieutenant-Go- 
vernor of Tasmania, wrote to Earl Grey on the subject of the intro- 
duction of Salmon, and in his letter mentioned that several attempts 
had been made to bring out the spawn, but they hadall failed. Un- 
fortunately no official record seems to have been kept of such at- 
tempts ; but they were probably made in some of the vessels employed 
in the convict-service, and entrusted to men who took little or no 
interest in the experiment. A long correspondence afterwards took 
place on the subject, which was wound up on May 16, 1850, by a 
letter from Earl Grey declining to take any further steps in the matter 
on the ground that the project of fitting up a welled smack to carry 
out the living fish, as finally suggested by Mr. Young, would involve 
too great an expense. 
Mr. Burnett and Sir William Denison still firmly believed that 
Salmon were to be brought out; and that belief culminated in the 
first attempt, of which any detailed record can be found, to trans- 
ort Salmon-ova to Tasmania. The Home Government employed 
Mr. Gottlieb Boccius, under whose superintendence a large oval tub 
was constructed of wood cased in lead, capable of containing sixty 
gallons of water besides the requisite quantity of gravel ; and on the 
31st of January, 1852, this tub, containing 50,000 ova of Salmon and 
Trout, was shipped on board the ‘ Columbus’ at London, and slung 
below and on one side of the fore hatchway. 
Mr. Boccius, who himself procured the ova, gave minute directions 
