62 
of vital importance to retain men acquainted with the fishing grounds, 
tides, and currents. House them comfortably, and give them the 
best of rations. Give the single men a comfortable barrack, with a 
cook to look after it, so that they may always be certain of a com¬ 
fortable meal and dry clothes on coming ashore; they will thus secure 
the willing services of the best men to be had. A company so begun 
and prudently conducted will, I have no doubt, not only prove most 
profitable to the parties engaged but to the colony generally. 
It is not the business of the Government to force this or any other 
industry into existence, but as the fishing grounds are at our doors, 
most bounteously stocked by nature, while there are both capital and 
men ready to be employed upon them, it is the legitimate province of 
the Governments of Victoria and Tasmania to clear the way by a 
survey of the coasts and straits. Private individuals cannot be 
expected to spend their capital in making discoveries which at once 
become public property, as fishing banks inevitably do. Where 
labour is so high it is of great importance to have the men constantly 
employed, but°until the different banks are laid down they cannot 
be so. The trawlers canuot work in anything like a heavy sea, but 
if they knew of a bank in their neighbourhood they could, with the 
deep-sea line, as long as the vessel could hold her own, actually fill 
the vessel instead of lying-to idle. The survey of the bank off 
Tasman’s Peninsula alone would well repay the expense of employing 
a sixty-ton vessel, which would be quite sufficient. There is no doubt 
that most of the fish come into the bays in summer to spawn, and it 
is most desirable that both Governments should strictly enforce a close 
time, and regulate the size of the mesh in all nets, trawlers included, 
as the wanton destruction now is most sinful. 
I hope when the Society has the means that the Council will turn 
their attention to the introduction of the cod and the herring. 
Lieut Maury, in his “ Physical Geography of the Ocean, mentions 
that on the portion of the southern states of America touched by 
the Gulf stream on its way northwards, the fish are of bright colour 
but poor quality, and that these southern states are supplied by rail 
from the states further north, whose coasts are washed by the cold 
current which flows south from the Arctic Ocean inside of the Gulf 
stream. It appears from Maury’s chart of these seas (Ho. IX. Sea- 
drift and Whales) that the whole of the south coa3t of New Holland 
is bathed by the waters of the cold Antarctic, so that fish of the 
finest kind will retain their good qualities. The cod is not only a 
eood fish of itself, superior to any of ours, but the salt-fish of 
commerce and if established in these seas, would greatly facilitate 
the formation of an export trade, and, I think, quite as worthy of 
attention as the salmon. The roe is so exceedingly minute that 
more than nine millions have been counted in one fish ; being 
so fine it would be laid among the moss m pieces, and one 
box might contain twelve millions of roe. The sea-water would be 
sufficiently cold during a great portion of the voyage, certainly after 
