109 



I shall, for brevity's sake, abstain from enlarging on this 

 subject, merely observing that ample information can be 

 obtained upon it by consulting the works of MM. Coste 

 and Fry, which are to be found in the libraries and book- 

 shops in this city ; and that in the streams in which it may 

 be put into operation — if there are mill-dams upon them — 

 the artificial construction to enable the fish to descend and 

 ascend to and from the sea will still be requisite. 



Having said so much on the decrease and restoration of 

 salmon in Canada, let us now turn our attention for a few 

 moments to their preservation in the rivers in which they 

 still abound. These rivers I believe to be as valuable and 

 inexhaustible as any others upon the face of the globe, but 

 so circimistanced that their capabilities have not been 

 developed, and that one year of neglect will cause their 

 serious injury, if not their utter destruction, as salmon 

 streams. They extend along the northern shore of the St. 

 Lawrence from Quebec to Labrador, a distance of about 

 500 miles, and are many in number. They are chiefly 

 held under lease from the Government of Canada, by the 

 Hudson's Bay Company, who fish some of them in an 

 unsystematic manner, with standing nets, because they can 

 be conveniently and cheaply so fished, whilst others are 

 left wholly to the destructive spear of the Indian. In the 

 smaller streams on which the fishermen of the Comps ny 

 are employed, a series of standing ba.rrier-nets, (which kill 

 indiscriminately every fish of every size and weight,) is 

 used, a process, which in European rivers, would have long 

 since banished salmon from them. But in Canada the high 

 water in the spring, enables some of the largest and strong- 

 est of the breeding fish to ascend the streams before those 



