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THE RIVER AND LAKE FISHERIES OF NORTH AMERICA. 



In taking up this comprehensive subject, we do not allude to the fisheries 

 pursued upon the British coast or elsewhere at sea, but simply to the vast 

 and neglected field afforded for successful operations in this line among the 

 rivers of Canada. There are, perhaps, thirty rivers, of more or less im- 

 portance, which fall into the St. Lawrence, between Quebec and the Gulf, 

 in which we understand that salmon and trout may be taken in great abun- 

 dance. Indeed, those who have had some personal opportunity of in- 

 vestigating the subject, assure us that there is nothing superior to them, 

 either in point of the opportunity for sport, or in the advantage which 

 might be taken of the fisheries in these streams for purposes of profit, 

 in any of the rivers of the British Isles or the North of Europe. Of late 

 years the Canadian Government has paid some attention to the subject, and 

 has rescued these rivers from the mode of fishing practised by the Indians, 

 and that scarcely less savage of the Hudson's Bay Company. 



Under the more intelligent provisions of law, several of the streams have 

 been rented, both for net fishing and rod fishing ; but though the product, 

 both to the Government and leaseholders, might be very great, yet the 

 profit to neither amounts to much, because no due means are provided for 

 getting the fish to market. The distance and chances to which sailing 

 vessels are particularly liable prevent a full supply of the most delicious 

 fish in the world to the chief cities of Canada, because the people and the 

 Government do not seem yet to have waked up to the ready means of con- 

 quering the obstacles interposed, by the employment of a suitable steamer 

 or two, to make the proper trips at regular periods, during the appropriate 

 season, to stop at the regular stations to convey the necessary supplies, and 

 to transport the sportsman and his ample prey to points where thej> could 

 be disposed of to advantage. 



Were this course adopted, these Canadian streams would so n find plenty 

 of people from the States and probably from Europe, to take leases of their 

 fishing privileges for the season, and a great deal of mutual benefit to all 

 parties, in the way both of profit and recreation, might ensue. But while 

 the Canadians are thinking over this suggestion, it would be not surprising 

 if some of our enterprising Yankee friends should appear upon the premises 

 prepared for duty and pleasure, at all points, after having obtained due 

 permission of the Government. 



On the first discovery of the northern coasts of North America, whether 

 of Greenland, Labrador, the present British provinces, or the United States, 

 nothing, in the first instance, so much attracted the admiration of the dis- 

 coverers as the immense profusion of animal life which teemed in all the 

 littoral waters, the shoal places of the ocean itself, the estuaries, the river 

 courses, and, as they were subsequently and successively discovered, the 

 interior streams and inland lakes of the virgin continent. 



