Fisu-cuLtrurE iN AMERICA. 365 
food-fishes in the waters throughout the Union. Reports 
from the French government have been forwarded to the 
President, and by him they have been laid before Congress, 
so that the subject will doubtless soon be acted on nationally. 
Through the efforts of individual states, much has been 
done within the past three years. Influenced by an intelli- 
gent enterprise tor which the states of New England are 
justly celebrated, each of those states has appointed a Fisher- 
ies Commission, and the following extract from a report of 
progress in one state may be accepted as a fair sample of all- 
“Ofthe 40,000 spawn recently placed for incubation in the 
Cold Spring trout-ponds at Charleston, New Hampshire, for 
the Connecticut River, the first salmon were hatched Decem- 
ber 11th, 1865. The eyes of the embryo salmon were first 
clearly seen in the egg about November 25th. The eggs 
were taken from the parent salmon on the Miramichi Octo: 
ber 10th, making 62 days as the period of incubation.* The 
first trout which broke shell at these hatching-works this 
season came out on November 9th, 35 days from the time 
when the roe and milt were shed by the parent fishes.” 
Fish-culture is a success, It is not only triumphant, but it 
is almost miraculous. Waters hitherto worse than useless 
may be made a hundred fold as profitable as any equal num- 
ber of acres of land, and with not a tithe of the labor. But 
these truths, so palpably patent to many intellectual minds 
of the present day, are almost a sealed book to the mass of 
the rising generation. In view, therefore, of these facts, and 
the depressing truth that the fishes of the coast and inland 
waters are annually decreasing, while by immigration and 
natural causes our nation is increasing in population faster 
than any other on the globe, is it not advisable to make the 
art of fish-culture a study in the agricultural colleges ? 
Up to the present time the inauguration of plans for pro- 
* Mr. Francis and other fish-culturists are not in favor of employing water 
so warm as to hatch in so short a time, believing that the young fish are not 
s> hardy as those hatched in colder water. 
