$84 REPORT—1862. 
produce of the English fisheries has fallen so low, that it has been estimated not 
to exceed 10,0007. per annum, and this including the fisheries of Wales, while 
the money value of the Irish, according to the reports of the Commissioners of 
Fisheries, is not less than 300,000/. yearly; one fishery in Scotland, that of the 
Duke of Richmond in the Spey, is said to return to his Grace 12,000/, annually. The 
author, in illustration of what may be accomplished for the improvement of salmon 
rivers, describes what has been done at his fishery in Galway, and the results. In 
the short space of ten years the river has been rendered ten times more productive. 
During the present season as many as 3000 salmon have been taken with the rod. 
This great improvement has been chiefly owing to the great care taken in pre- 
serving the streams during the breeding-season, at an expenditure of 500/., and by 
introducing young salmon, artificially bred, into streams fitted for them, but from 
which the fish had before been excluded owing to impediments preventing access 
from the sea. These impediments have either been removed or avoided by means 
of ladders so constructed as to render the passage to and from the sea easy. A 
striking example is given by him of a river in ireland converted into an excellent 
salmon river ty means of ladders. This river is in county Sligo, the property of 
Mr. Edward Cooper. The ladders are over a fall of about 40 feet. So productive 
has this river, before barren, become, that in July last as many as 1000 salmon were 
captured in one week. 
An Attempt to show that every living Structure consists of Matter which is the 
Seat of Vital Actions, and Matter in which Physical and Chemical Changes 
alone take place. By Professor Bratz, /.R.S. 
The object of the author was to show that every living structure was composed 
of matter that was “living” and matter that had ceased to “ live ”—of “ germinal 
matter”? and “formed material.” The first was alone the seat of purely vital 
phenomena, while in the formed material physical and chemical changes alone 
occurred. It was not possible to form any notion of the chemical relation of the 
elements of living matter. Neither could we obtain evidence as to the chemical 
character of the compounds of which living matter was composed. We could not 
obtain living matter in solution, and separate it again, as we could crystalline sub- 
stances. The instantwe commenced its chemical examination the particles ceased 
to be living, and the moment they ceased to live the elements combined to form 
certain compounds, The compounds did not exist as such in the living matter, but 
were formed the moment death took place. To understand these views, it is neces- 
sary to be acquainted with Dr. Beale’s definition of the structure of a “cell.” 
At the last Meeting of the British Association, in Manchester, the author had 
endeavoured to prove that every “cell,” or elementary” part of a tissue, con- 
sisted of matter in two states—forming, growing, active, within ; and externally of 
matter which had been in the first state, but was now formed, and had ceased to be 
active. The latter could be changed by external conditions, &c., but it had lost all 
inherent active powers of changing itself, or of communicating its powers to inani- 
mate matter. All pabulum (nutrient matter) which was to nourish a living 
organism must come into contact with the living or germinal matter. Then, and not 
till then, it acquires the same properties ; so that the living matter has increased in 
quantity in consequence of the inanimate pabulum, or certain of its elements, being 
converted into this living matter. Such a change never occurred in inanimate matter 
unless living matter were present. The greater the facility with which the inanimate 
pabulum came into contact with the living matter, the faster this increased. No 
matter how abundant the pabulum might be, if the living matter were surrounded 
by a thick layer of formed material, the living matter would increase but slowly. 
It may be next inquired, What takes place during life in the smallest living inde- 
pendent particle, which consists of an envelope of formed lifeless matter, with living 
germinal matter. within P 
1. Pabulum passes through the formed material, enters the living particles, and 
reaching their centre, some of its constituents become living. Thus the quantity 
of the living matter is increased. 
2, The new particles tend to move outwards from the centre where they became 
