556 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



diameter, and empties into a large trough or reservoir thirty feet long by 

 four feet deep, set five fe^t up from the floor; this reservoir is placed in 

 the rear of the room. The hatching troughs run at right angles with it. 

 The troughs for the raising of lake trout are twenty-four in number, and 

 are sixteen feet long by twelve and one-half inches deep. The water is let 

 into .them by means of a two-inch pipe, set at an inclination of 45°. There 

 art also twenty Holton boxes in fall operation each containing about 

 350,000 eggs of the white fish (Coregonus albus), about 7,000,000 in all. 

 The number of trout amounts to between two and three million, and all 

 at the present writing in splendid condition, nearly ninety-five per cent, 

 of the eggs sho wing che fish formation. The lake trout spawn was pro- 

 cured of the City of Milwaukee from the fish as they were taken from 

 the gill-nets. The white fi*h spawn was taken at Detroit, Mich., San 

 gautuck, Mich., Penecauk^e, Wisconsin, and Escanaba, Mich. The 

 hatchery is under the management of Mr. H. W. Welsher, of Rochester, 

 N. Y., formerly with uat prince of good fellows, Seth Green. Under 

 Mr. Welsher's management the establishment is on the high road to 

 sue ;ess, and we Milwaukeeians pride ourselves upon having one of the 

 best, if not Lhe best, fl=h h .tching establishments in the United States. 

 Mr. H. F. Housinan, of Walterville, Wis., a prominent citizen of this 

 State, and largely interested in the raising of brook trout, is Secretary 

 of the Board of Fish Commissioners. Only yesterday the Board, with 

 the Chief Engineer of the City, Board of Aldermen and other promi- 

 nent citizens of this city visited the house and expressed themselves as 

 highly pleased with the good work that was going on. All feel proud of 

 the step Wisconsin has taken, a step whicn places her in the front rank 

 with her sister States in the noble science of fish culture. 



COBEGOHUS. 



FRESH WATER SALMON. 



Editor Forest and Stream:— 



Your Canada correspondent is much mistaken when he 

 says that salmon will not live away from the sea more than 

 two years. It he will come nere i will show him plenty of 

 salmon {Salmo salar) three and four years old from Califor- 

 nia, Bnv.ksport, and Canada e^gs, that have never tasted 

 salt water. Oar experience is mat salmon are more easily 

 raised than trout, will grow much larger, do not require 

 very clear waier, and will live in almost any mill pond, and 

 give great sport with a fly. Jas. B. Thompson. 



New Hope, Dec. 'diith, 1676. 



X 



inmt j§i8targ. 



THE BASKING SHARK IN NEWFOUND- 

 LAND WATERS. 



THE readers of Forest and Stream are aware that 

 some of the most remarkable curiosities of natural 

 history have of late come to light in Newfoundland. On 

 this island w T as the home of the Great Auk, which I de- 

 scribed in a former communication, and here alone are to 

 be found the remains of this extinct marine bird. The gi- 

 gantic cephalopod, commonly called Devil Fish, with arms 

 24 feet in length, first put in an appearance here, and I 

 was the first to obtain a perfect specimen of this huge 

 monster, previously supposed to be fabulous. One of our 

 salmon seems to have nurtured the largest tape-worm yet 

 found in this species, if indeed it be not the only one. I 

 have now to add to the list of our natural curiosities an- 

 other not less remarkable, namely, a specimen of the Bask- 

 ing Shark, which I had the good fortune to obtain rather 

 recently. 



j.u iuj month of August last I was informed that an ex 

 traordinary sea monster had come ashore at a small vil- 

 lage called Topsail, on the southern shore of Conception 

 Bay, and about twelve miles from St. John's. I 

 lost no time in hurrying to the spot, hoping the stranger 

 might turn out to be another Devil Fish. To my intense 

 regret I found that before my arrival the fishermen had 

 cut it into fragments for the purpose of extracting the oil, 

 and thrown parts of it into the sea, which, however, I in- 

 duced them to fish up for me. Had they only known what 

 a prize they had got, and preserved it whole, they would 

 have realized a very handsome sum by the sale, for this 

 proved to be a splendid specimen of the Basking Shark, of 

 which there are only three specimens in all the museums 

 of the world, and about whose anatomy and habits very 

 little is known. How delighted Professors Verrill and 

 Baird would have been to add this to their collections! 

 The length of lhe monster was thirly feet. It had got en- 

 tangled in a salmon net at a short distance from the shore. 

 Two boys paddling about in a boat actually passed over 

 the fish as it lay struggling in the net, unable to use its lo- 

 comotive organs. A number of fishermen, on hearing the 

 news, soon managed to pass a rope round the tail and 

 towed it ashore, where they at once proceeded to kill it and 

 cut it up. I did the best I could under the circumstances. 

 I bargained for the skull, only half of which, unfortunate- 

 ly, remained, the caudal, dorsal and pectoral fins, and one 

 of the veitebrse. 



Though evidently one of lhe shark tribe, it presented 

 some most puzzling appearances. In ils mouth I found 

 long strips of what seemed to be fringes of whalebone 

 along the gill openings; and not being then aware that any- 

 thing resembling it was found in the mouth of any fish ex- 

 cept the whale, I was unable to determine to what species 

 It belonged. I cut out several feet of these whalebone- 

 like fringes, which constituted along each gill a kind of 

 grating, bearing a close resemblance to the teeth of a 

 combo Their color was olive brown; the laminae I found 

 very elastic, but on bending one or two of them I found 

 fthey snapped off like steel when bent beyond a certain 

 point. Tnis showed they were not whalebone. But an- 

 other puzzle presented iuelf. I found in the mouth long 

 strips of small palate teeth, which were veiy hard, conical, 

 all curved slightly at the point, in one direction 

 and rather over a quarter of an inch in 

 length. They were arranged very closely together, 

 each strip containing six rows. It was evident 

 that with such teeth and the pectinated structures already 

 referred to, this shark must be a harmless fellow, living 

 probably on small fish or animalcule filtered out of the 



water by his comb-like appendages. When taken it was 

 probably pursuing the shoals of caplin in the bay— a small 

 fish about seven inches in length whfch, at that time, were 

 in great abundance. The teeth would he quite sufficient 

 to catch and crush these and similar small fry. Whether 

 the fringes are used for keeping the gills clear of floating 

 substances, as the fish feeds near the bottom* filtering the 

 water before it enters the gills, or whether, like the baleen- 

 plates of the whale, they serve to extract from the sea the 

 minute creatures on which it lives, I leave naturalists to 

 determine. Might not these fringes suggest that this shark 

 is a link in the gradation of animals between the whale 

 tribe and the cartilaginous fishes? The skin was whitish 

 and without scales. The lobes of the caudal fin are un- 

 equal in size, as is the case in all sharks. I had to content 

 myself with a portion of the skull, the fins, vertebrae, teeth 

 and pectinated appendages referred to. These are now in 

 my possession. 



In the standard works on natural history I found but 

 meagre accounts of the Basking Shark, about which, in- 

 deed, little is known among naturalists; and I could find 

 no reference whatever in works to which I have access to 

 the fringes or teeth. Lately, however, my attention was 

 drawn to two articles on the Basking Shark, which ap- 

 peared ir Mature for August 10th and August 31st, 1876, 

 written by Mr. Ed. Percival Wiight and Mr. George J. All- 

 man. These writers have furnished a complete account 

 of this fish, so far as existing knowledge goes, and cleared 

 away my difficulties. From this source I learn that quite 

 recently the British Museum and the Royal Dublin Society 

 have each added a specimen of the Basking Shark to their 

 zoological collections, and that twelve months ago the only 

 specimen in a*ll the museums of Europe was to be found 

 in Paris; so that at present only three preserved specimens 

 of this sea monster are in existence. 



In the Museum of Trondhyem, Norway, and in those of 

 Christiana, Kiel and Copenhagen, there have been long 

 preserved pieces of the very fringes I have been describ- 

 ing, and they have proved a puzzle to every one who ex- 

 amined them, some eminent authorities believing that they 

 were planted on the outside of the fish's skin, like the long 

 spines of certain rays. The eminent naturalist, Prof. 

 Steenstrup, of Copenhagen, in whose charge one of these 

 fringes was, hit on the right conclusion, guided by an ac- 

 count of the appendages written by Bishop Gunnerus in 

 1766, and made up his mind that they really belonged to 

 the Basking Shark. He further argues that "they must act 

 as strainers ; that the shark takes in whole volumes of mi- 

 nute food, catches it on these fringes and then swallows it. 

 He declares it to be a great mistake to call this fish a car- 

 nivore—that is, if be eats flesh at all, it is small flesh, not 

 big flesh." Mr. Wright believes that "these big, lubberly 

 beasts, which in their mouth have scarcely more than the 

 name of teeth, feed on all sorts of minute oceanic crea- 

 tures, frequently taking in with them floating algae." Here 

 it is that my specimen seemed to me of special importance, 

 as its teeth do not at all answer this description of Mr. 

 Wright's, being numerous, strong and sharp, more than a 

 quarter of an inch in length, curved like the teeth of the 

 white shark, and quite* capable of crushing the smaller 

 fish. I should incline to the opinion that such teeth indi- 

 cate that the Basking Shark lives mainly or entirely on 

 small fish, such as caplin and lance. At the time when 

 my specimen was taken the whole bay was full of shoals of 

 capliu, rushing in on the shore to spawn; and it seems 

 *most probable that it was in the eagerness of its pursuit of 

 these that it approached so near the shore, and got entan- 

 gled in the net. Such teeth of course quite unfit it for the 

 life of carnage led by the white and blue sharks— those 

 terrors of the tropical seas— so that we may infei it is a 

 peacable, harmless animal. It remains, however, to be 

 determined what is the special function of the fringes. 

 Steenstrup, as we have seen, considers that they serve to 

 collect its food from the water. Mr. Allman is of opinion 

 that these branchial appendages are strainers by which the 

 water, before coming in contact with the branchial,is freed 

 from extraneous bodies which would otherwise interfere 

 with the function of respiration. "Its teeth," he says, "are 

 little more than tubercles." The teeth of my specimen, how- 

 ever, are far from despicable ; so that possibly my discovery 

 may add anew fact to science. "Its food," he adds, "must 

 accordingly be found among the less resisting inhabitants 

 of the ocean; and as the Basking Shark will therefore 

 be driven to feed near the bottom, and among sea weeds, 

 the existence of the branchial appendages admits of an 

 easy explanation. We must thus at once perceive the ad- 

 mirable adaptation of this interesting arrangement to the 

 habits of an animal which would otherwise be subjected 

 to the constant annoyance of having ita branchial clogged 

 with the floating fronds of sea weed, a circumstance which 

 the anatomical structure alone would otnerwise render 

 more liable to occur in this than in the other sharks, as the 

 openings to the branchial in the Selachus maximum are of 

 enormous size, and the branchiostegous membranes par- 

 ticularly loose." I think Mr. Allman's view is strength- 

 ened by the character of the teeth in my specimen. 



It is very remarkable that so little should be known of 

 the Basking Shark. Dumeril, an eminent French natural- 

 ist, stated truly only twelve months ago, that the specimen 

 in the museum of Paris was "the sole representative in 

 the museums of Central Europe of this enormous species 

 of the northern seas." Since then, as we have seen, two 

 other specimens have been obtained. There is no speci- 

 men I am told, in any American museum, a circumstance 

 which deepens my regret at the destruction of the one I 

 have been describing. One hundred and ten years ago 

 Bishop Gunnerus, of Norway, described after a fashion 



this great fish, and referred to the strange fringes; but ow- 

 ing to the rarity of opportunities afforded to naturalists of 

 examining the Basking Shark, its anatomy and mode of 

 life are but partially known. Yet these huge sharks are 

 often seen, sometimes in shoals, off the west coast of Ire- 

 land gambolling playfully, or basking in the bright morn- 

 ing suns.of June. "Of large size," says Mr. Wright, "and 

 shark though it be, it would appear, like many other big 

 animals, to be of a gentle and placid disposition, to be 

 fond of sunning itself on bright days, and to never inter- 

 fere with mankind, unless when they interfere with it; and 

 yet with all these facts in its favor the animal being, so to 

 speak, common, having local names, being of a size not 

 easily overlooked, and not being like its cousin, the blue 

 shark, a man-eating devil, this Selache niaximus was very, 

 little heard of and less known until the other day." I dare 

 «ay one reason of this has been the difficulty of capturing 

 the Basking Shark. Of course it will not take bait, like 

 the white shark, and when harpooned it dives with light- 

 ning-like rapidity to such depths that the rope from the 

 boat becomes exhausted, and crew and boat are pulled to 

 the bottom. Hence, though the oil from the liver of one 

 of these sharks is worth £40 sterling, such are the difficul- 

 ties and dangers of capturing them — greater than those of 

 whale fishing — that men engaged in the sperm whale fish- 

 ing dread to harpoon them . 



Mr. Allman relates that thirty years ago a Basking Shark 

 got entangled in the trammels of some fishermen, and was 

 towed into the strand at Coolmain, on the southern coast of 

 the County Cork. There, however, it met the same fate as 

 overtook my specimen, having been immediately cut in 

 pieces by the country people, with the expectation of ob- 

 taining oil from it. It is, however, an interesting fact 

 this huge shark is sometimes seen in Newfoundland wa- 

 ters, and being a good-natured, lubberly sort of fel- 

 low, we may hope that another specimen may be 

 persuaded to come ashore in the interests of science. lam 

 not without hope that the portions I have secured may, 

 when examined by a competent anatomist, throw some 

 more light on the structure and habits of this great rover 

 of the deep. M. Harvey. 



St. Johns, Newfoundland, Dec. 21st, 1876. 

 -+*+- 



ADDRESS OF A. R. WALLACE BEFORE 



THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION 



RISE AND PROGRESS OF MODERN VIEWS AS TO THE ANTIQUITY 

 AND ORIGIN OP MAN. 



Concluded. 



THERE is one other striking example of a higher being 

 succeeded by a lower degree of knowledge, which is 

 in danger of being forgotten because it has been made the 

 foundation of theories which seem wild and fantastic, and 

 are probably sin great part erroneous. I allude to the 

 Great Pyramid of Egypt, whose form, dimensions, struc- 

 ture and uses have recently been the subject of elaborate 

 works by Professor Piazzi Smyth. Now, the admitted 

 facts about this pyramid are so interesting and so apposite to 

 the subject we are considering, that I beg to recall them to 

 your attention. Most of you are aware that this pyramid 

 has been carefully explored and measured by successive 

 Egyptologists, and that the dimensions have lately become 

 capable of more accurate determination owing to the dis- 

 covery of some of the original casing-stones and the clear- 

 ing away of the earth from the corners of the foundation, 

 showing the sockets in which the corner-stones fitted. 

 Professor Smyth devoted many months of work with the 

 best instruments in order to fix the dimensions and angles 

 of all accessible parts of the structure; and he has care- 

 fully determined these by a comparison of his own and all 

 previous measures, the best of which agree pretty closely 

 with each other. The results arrived at are:— 



1. That the pyramid is truly square, the sides being equal 

 and the angles right angles. 



2. That the four sockets on which the first four stones of 

 the corners res f ed are truly on the same level. 



3. That the direction of the sides are accurately to the 

 four cardinal points. 



4. That the virtical height of the pyramid bears the 

 same proportion to its circumference at the base, as the 

 radius of a circle does to its circumference. 



Now all these measures, angles, and levels, are accurate, 

 not as an ordinary surveyor or builder could make them, 

 but to such a degree as requires the very best modern in- 

 struments and all the refinements of geodetical science to 

 discover any error at all. In addition to this, we have the 

 wonderful perfection of the workmanship in the interior of 

 the pyramid, the passages and chambers being lined with 

 huge blocks of stones fitted with the utmost accuracy, 

 while every part of the building exhibits the highest struc- 

 tural science. In all these respects this largest pyramid 

 surpasses every other in Egypt. Yet it is universally ad- 

 mitted to be the oldest, and also the oldest historical build- 

 ing in the world. 



Now these admitted facts about the Great Pyramid are 

 surely remarkable, and worthy of the deepest considera- 

 tion. They are facts, which in the pregnant words of the 

 late Sir John Herschel, "according to received theories 

 ought not to happen," and which, he tells us should there- 

 fore be kept ever present to our minds since "they belong 

 to the class of facts Which serve as the clue to new dis- 

 coveries." According to modern theories, the higher 

 civilization is ever a growth and an outcome from a 

 preceding lower state; and it is inferred that this progress 

 is visible to us throughout all history and in all the material 



