12 
LAND & WATER 
Mas- lu, 1917 
cuUings.tlie canal between the Aisnc anil tlie Mamc and, furtlier 
to tlie rear, the Suippe. The prn,t;ress made in this sector was 
inconsiderable. Finally, in the neif^liboiirliood of Rheims, the 
plain is studded with a refjular archipelago of raised islands. 
We liave compared the Craonne plateau to Land's lind and 
the Chanjpagne to the Atlantic. The heights of Rheims emerge 
from this .sea like the Scilly Islands. The enemy is established 
there and it is extremely difficult to dislodge him frontally. 
The island which is situated farthest to the north-west, the 
lieij^ht of lirimont. has been bnached at its foot by Loivre 
and Courcy ; but it remains in the firm po.ssession of the enemy. 
The last army engaged, that is the one attacking to the cast 
of Rheims, had the same archipelago to deal with, but on its 
southern instead of its western side. As we have seen, it made 
its attack a diiy after the other two. with extremely powered 
artillery and ver\- likely with an element of surprise. Unfortu- 
nately April 17th was a day of very bad weather, which robbed 
the army of some of the results which it was entitled to e.\|)ect. 
Ne\-ertheless it achieved a magnihcent exploit. It completely 
carried the highest and most important of the islands in the 
l\heims plain, the massif of Moronvilliers. This is a long 
chain of heights, running from south-west to north-east, from 
]Mont Cornillet to Hill 227, with the crowning peak in the centre. 
This crowning peak is called Mont Haut and is 254 metres in 
height. As om- soldiers started from an altitude of 100 
metres they had 150 metres to scale, with the eniMuy formidably 
entrenched in the undulations in the chalk and in the pine 
woods. Between the 17th and the 30th the whole of the 
massif was won . 
This is a position of capital importance. It was from here 
that the enemy bombarded the left wing of our attack in the 
battle of September 2f)th, it)i5. The centre of resistance at 
Auberive, which stopped our left wing in that same battle, 
has also been won, and now supports Moronvilliers to the south- 
east. The enemy has himself demonstrated the high import- 
ance of this massif by multiplying his cimnter-attacks upon it. 
l-'rom this eminence the plain is dominated to an inunense 
distance : and towards the west one sees in the rear the heights 
of Nogent rAbtx,'sse. whence the (^rmans are bombarding 
Rheims ; the massif of Moronvilliers is separated from those 
heights by a gap, the valle\' of Beine where the French made 
further progress on the .?oth. 
One must visualise an entrenched battlefield as an alterna- 
tion of strong centres of resistance and of trenches linking them 
together, just as in old pictures one sees strongholds composed 
of alternate towers and curtains. On the front of fifty miles 
as the crow flies, which the French attacked on April ibth and 
17th, the (Germans had fi\e main centres of resistance. 
On the west, the ])lateau of ("onde, which was carried ; then 
moving towards the centre, Craonne. which held firm ; \'illc 
aux Bois, which was carried ; Brimont, which held firm ; and 
last, in the east, Moronvilliers, the capital point, which was 
carried. Add to this 20,000 prisoners and much material 
captured, and twelve (icrman divisions taken front the general 
reserve and thrown into battle. If the battle did not result 
in the breaking of the enemy's line it certainly shook and im^ 
perilled it. The efforts of the French attacking on the soutJi 
are intimately associated with those of the British troops 
attacking on the west, and the (Germans are thus being sub- 
jected to a most formidable pressure which will constitute 
to-morrow's battle and, if one may venture to say so, to- 
morrow's triumph. 
Salmon and Food Supply 
By W. Baden-Powell, K.G. 
01' nature's so\N-ing, the harvest of salmon depends 
on man's husbanding. The potential necessity of 
I his harvest has been culpably neglected by man. 
Jiven the present-day efforts of nature arc greatly 
curtailed and are steadily declining under inefficient legisla- 
tion and effete administration, that is, under ill-treatment 
at the hands of man. 
To attempt to set out the exact decrease of the salmon 
harvest, is, from the nature of the fish and the fishings, an 
unattainable tiuantity. The salmon lives in the sea, out 
of our ken, so no man can even estimate the stock there ; 
it enters our rivers at irregular intervals for the purpose of 
spawning ; it is netted on a])proaching and within the rivers, 
and is caught by rod and line. These are the fish captured 
and used for food ; but how many each season is not as- 
certainable from tlic market returns, for a market, such as 
Billingsgate, does not include the salmon sent to the provinces, 
nor private nets, nor "rod" takings. All fishings fluctuate, 
thosi- caught in captures being affected by weather and water. 
The general rise or fall of the salmon stock within each 
river is, apart from detail, well known to all the experts con- 
cerned in the fisliing of that ri\er ; but there are variations 
from year to year caused by the nature of the sca.son, whctluu" 
wet or dry, especially where there are obstructions such as 
dams or weirs : also the /nilh as to amount of net, and even 
rod, " takes," is questionalile. The breeding stock seen upon 
the " redds." when judged by the exjjcrts of experience and 
comjjared with former years, gives a fairly good estimate of 
increase or decrease of stock ; but on many rivers the spawn- 
ing places are too widely separated or the water too deep to 
see the fish to enable one to join up the reports into a 
^•aluable or reliable verdict on the stock. 
Official reports of the Inspectors of I'isherics and of river, 
Conservancies, seem to establish that the stock of salmon found 
■ic'ithin the rivers of Scotland. ICngland and Irelaml has with 
rare exceptions decreased by nine-tenths in the last twenty- 
fi\e years ; and as to grilse and sea-trout the decline is reixjrted. 
to be "appalling." The grilse is the young of salmon 
making its hrst return to fresh water to breed, a fine stock of , 
new blood -indeed for «|uality a far surer " stock " than the ; 
mature salmon. But, with a few exceptions, they arc IK^I, 
allowed to get into the rivers, they are <lecimated by the nets 
ill the sea along the coast before they can get into their iutendc(i 
ri\er. Even within the river, their running time being early 
summer, the grilse lind the nets in full working. Here is au 
instance from the kji.-; report of the Scotch Board : Alter con- 
sidering the great difference in the takes of grilse within 
and outside the Dee the Inspector says " The only alternative 
view was that the coast nets had killed so many that very 
few remained for the river nets to kill, and, one might add 
tliat only a \ery biuall rtmuaul could have usceadcd liie 
river to offer a chance for destruction by the lure of the 
angler, or for reproduction. " 
Stock for reproduction is the main consideration ; and we 
know from the " takes" of the coast and estuary all tiie 
country over, that there is immense stock in the sea ; and we 
know, to a reasonable degree, the ridiculously low proportion 
of spawners that are able to reach the up river nursery. 
Even so we are faced to-day, and have been for many years 
with a clear knowledge that the paucity of spawners in the 
rivers is cajiable of immense augmentation if the adminstra- 
tion of all salmon fisheries was on common-sense lines and all 
laws and " rights," public and private, ancient and modern, 
were reviewed and revised. 
^^'ith hundreds of rivers aggregating several thousand miles 
of water capable of breeding salmon, such as exist in these 
islands, one cannot do more than notice a sample or two. 
The reports of Fishery Districts are appearing for iqib. The 
Shannon, probably the finest and largest salmon fishery, 
'reports a " steady decline, a progressive dechne, and those 
interested had come to the conclusion that hatcheries should 
be established if the fisheries were not to be altogether un- 
lirodnctive." The Severn, the largest salmon river in I'-ng- 
iand, rejjorts for the net fishing of lyiO the " take of salmon 
being only 12,750, a decrease of .5,700 on 1<)15 •" The ucst 
door river, the Wye, is on the other hand a marked example 
of improvement "under new management ; " the Consi'rvan;y 
report gives the old state kill for rods 468 fish in 190b, and 
in 1916 the rods killed .^,2I5 fish. But for those ten years the 
netting has been in the hands of the Association and the 
. river itself has simple features compared to the majority 
of .salmon rivers. Even so the report comments on " the 
remarkable absence of grilse in 1916 in spite of the great 
ClcKxl horses still fetch good prices : at a sale at Warner, 
Sheppardaud Wade's Ke])osit(jry at [^cicestcr, only the other day 
two hunters which belonged to the late Mrs. Clayton Swan, were 
sold, one for 115 aud the otlier for 180 guineas. 
• Fate has not allowed all of iis to travel, and even when this 
privilege has been permitted, there conies a time when wc have 
to Ix; Content to be stay-at-homes. Lady Poorc is therefore a 
" blessed benefactress with her new book, .In Admiral's Wife 
in Ihr Mtikiuf;. (Smith IClder. 7.S. fxl.) She takes the reader 
.) with her all over the. Junpire and everywhere makes hiui at home, 
( shows him the beauties of the surroundings, laughing. liKlUly 
, at discomforts. For there is much pleasant laughter in I1h'!><; 
i>ages. Incidentally we are given a good insight into tlie private 
life of the British Na\'y, which is not by any means a lx^d of roses. 
Lady Poorc was a daughter of Bishop Graves of Limerick, and 
though she does not give sign of possessing the poetic gifts of her 
brothers, she certainly commands happy prose. A more dclight- 
iul l)ook <jf reminiscences has not been "published tliis year; it is 
vaiied ajid cheerful, witty and of a ^ood spirit. 
