Genre:

Essay

Subjects:

Laboratories, Animal Husbandry, Breeding, Industry, Commerce, Naturalists, Nationalism, Controversy, Embryology, Animal Development, Natural History

    Describes the 'pisicultural laboratory' (197) established at Huningue in Alsace by the French government 'for carrying on a new and curious species of industry [...] namely, the breeding of fish by artificial means'. The 'great laboratory' follows the 'new method of fish-breeding' developed in the 1840s by the 'peasant fisherman' Joseph Rémy. (195) Insists, however, that while 'to the French nation belongs the merit of making a commercial use of the discovery', 'the far higher honour of the successful application of pisiculture to the requirements of science must be awarded to the hard-headed sons of Scotland', who used the 'artificial method' of breeding to settle the long standing 'parr controversy' (196). Observes that 'In addition to serving as a commercial depôt, the naturalist has rare facilities at Huningue to study the development of the fish', and in following 'the progress of the egg' may test the observations of Louis Agassiz concerning the growth of the embryos of various fish (198).