Some persons dispute the claims of France to the honour of this discovery, asserting that the peasant Remy had borrowed his idea from the experiments of Shaw of Drumlanrig, who had by the artificial system undertaken to prove that parrs were the young of the salmon. As I shall again have occasion to allude to Mr. Shaw’s experiments, I do not require to say more at present on this part of my subject than that they were brought to a successful conclusion long before the rediscovery of the art of pisciculture by Remy. In my opinion the honours may be thus divided, whether Remy knew of Shaw’s experiments or not: I would give to Scotland the honour of having re-discovered pisciculture as an adjunct of science, and to France the useful part of having turned the art to commercial uses. In regard to what has been already stated here as to the accidental discovery of artificial fish-breeding, I may mention that James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, was one of the discoverers. Hogg had an observant eye for rural scenes and incidents, and anxiously studied and experimented on fish-life. He took an active share in the parr controversy. Having seen with his own eyes the branded parr assuming the scales of the smolt, he never doubted after that the fact that the parr was the young of the salmon. In Norway, too, an accidental discovery of this fish-breeding power was made; and certainly if salmon-fishing in that country goes on at its present rate cultivation will be largely required. The artificial plan of breeding oysters has been more than once accidentally discovered. There is at least one well-authenticated instance of this, which occurred about a century ago, when a saltmaker of Marennes, who added to his income by fattening oysters, lost a batch of six thousand in consequence of an intense frost, the shells not being sufficiently covered with water; but while engaged in mourning over his loss and kicking about the dead molluscs, he found them, greatly to his surprise, covered with young oysters already pretty well developed, and these, fortunately, although tender, all in good health, so that ultimately he repeopled his salt-bed without either trouble or expense—having of course to wait the growth of the natives before he could recommence his commerce.