1162 FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. [8] 



of the food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States has 

 taken place ; and, if so, to what causes the same is due ; and also whether 

 any and what protection, prohibitory or precautionary measures should 

 be adopted in the premises, and to report upon the same to Congress. 7 



" The resolution establishing the office of Commissioner of Fisheries 

 required that the person to be appointed should be a civil officer of the 

 Government, of proved scientific and practical acquaintance with the 

 fishes of the coast, to serve without additional salary. The choice was 

 thus practically limited to a single man for whom, in fact, the office had 

 been created. Prof. Spencer F. Baird was appointed and entered at 

 once upon his duties. 



u 1 think I may say without fear of challenge that very much of the 

 improvement in the condition of our fisheries has been due to the wise 

 and energetic management of our Commissioner. Himself an eminent 

 man of science, for forty years in the front rank of biological investiga- 

 tion, the author of several hundred scientific memoirs, no one could 

 realize more thoroughly the importance of a scientific foundation for 

 the proposed work. 



" His position as the head of that most influential scientific organiza- 

 tion, the Smithsonian Institution, given by an Englishman to the United 

 States ' for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men,' enabled 

 him to secure at once the aid of a body of trained specialists. 



"Pure and applied science have labored together always in the serv- 

 ice of the Fish Commission, their representatives working side by side 

 in the same laboratories ; indeed, much of the best work both in the 

 investigation of the fisheries and in the artificial culture of fishes has 

 been performed by men eminent as zoologists. 



" The work of the Commission is naturally divided into three sec- 

 tions : 



" 1. The systematic investigation of the waters of the United States 

 and the biological and physical problems which they present. The 

 scientific studies of the Commission are based upon a liberal and philo- 

 sophical interpretation of the law. In making his original plans the 

 Commissioner insisted that to study only the food-fishes would be of 

 little importance, and that useful conclusions must needs rest upon a 

 broad foundation of investigations purely scientific in character. The 

 life history of species of economic value should be understood from be- 

 ginning to end, but no less requisite is it to know the histories of the 

 animals and plants upon which they feed or upon which their food is 

 nourished ; the histories of their enemies and friends, and the friends 

 and foes of their enemies and friends, as well as the currents, tempera- 

 tures, and other physical phenomena of the waters in relation to migra- 

 tion, reproduction, and growth. A necessary accompaniment to this 

 division is the amassing of material for research to be stored in the 

 National and other museums for future use. 



