To my mind another most convincing proof of the crude methods of fish capture employed in Australian waters is to be found in the following.  In one of the Fisheries Reports it is gravely recorded that “some very valuable gear in general use amongst English, Norwegian, and American fishermen, had been destroyed in the Garden Palace fire, but that the commissioners had been able to replace the otter-trawl and the beam-trawl.”  The very fact that these appliances, in active use at the present time by those in the foremost front of fishery enterprise, are regarded in the light of curiosities in Australia, proves only too forcibly the correctness-of this opinion as to our primitive fishery appliances.

THE BEAM-TRAWL IN DEEP-SEA FISHING.

It must not be imagined that trawling has never been advocated (indeed, it has even been experimentally practised), for we have only to look through the various Fisheries Reports to find it repeatedly referred to; unfortunately, however, these appeals so far have been without any practical results.  It will, therefore, be most instructive to refer briefly to the manner in which trawling and other modes of deep-sea fishing are carried out elsewhere; and more particularly to bring under notice the enormous fish yield effected by them.  Trawling, or as it is more properly termed, beam-trawling, may be described as a method of deep-sea fishing, in which a large bag net is towed along the ground so as to scoop, as it were, the fish into its receptacle.  There are at least several important stations in England for trawling; some in the English Channel; some on the west, and also on the Welsh coast; and others again (amongst which is Grimsby, the largest fishing port in the world) on the east coast on the North Sea.  The trawling grounds of the latter are widely known, and comprise the famous Dogger Bank, which covers many hundreds of acres in area.  In its neighbourhood, also, there are numerous grounds such as the Inner and Outer Well Banks, and there are others again nearer the English coast.  In addition to these there is the Great Silver Pit, discovered in a severe winter in 1843; and it has been noticed that during the winter months the fish frequent the deeper water, because the temperature is more equable than in shallow places.  The depth at which trawling is usually carried on varies from 20 to 30 fathoms; never under any circumstances reaching 50 fathoms—­the depth of the Silver Pit being from 35 to 45 fathoms.

It was formerly urged against trawling that it was very destructive to the spawn, at that time supposed to be lying on the sea bottom.  But the investigations of the late Professor Sars, for the Swedish Government, into the spawning habits of sea fish, have conclusively revealed the fact that the ova of fish float on the surface of the water during the whole period of their development.  Not only have the floating ova of