THE NEW AET OF BKEEDING FISH. 109 



abuse of fishing has devastated, as though they had 

 never been supplied. The question is reduced sim- 

 ply to setting apart at the breeding season, in the 

 reservoirs in the form of little brooks communicating 

 with creeks or rivers, all the females who have their 

 eggs attached to the appendices of the Tiail, and not 

 to allow their consumption until their offspring is 

 hatched. This offspring, retained afterwards for a 

 period in propagating streams, would not be allowed 

 to swim through the gratings until capable of taking 

 care of themselves. 



As to salt-water sheU-fish, France possesses on the 

 Mediterranean shore, immense salt marshes, where 

 the females of these animals could also be retained 

 till the moment of hatching their eggs, as they carry 

 them under the tail like the craw-fish. If the ex- 

 periment succeed, and these spawn increase on the 

 spot suflSciently fast, they may be fattened in these 

 vast receptacles. If, on the contrary, the conditions 

 are unfavorable, they should be at liberty to go at 

 large to seek another spot and stock our coasts. 



But this is not the only use to which these marshes 

 can be put. The sea-fish are too much liked not to 

 suggest the means of multiplying them, either by 

 artificial fecundation, or by transporting the young 

 fish of ce_rtain kinds. In favoring the realization of 

 such an enterprise, the state will have created in a 

 few years, ponds much richer than the artificial pis- 

 cines which were dug at so great an expense by the 

 Eomans, by the Grulf of Naples ; piscines among 



