572 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



same fishery-law, one is struck by the peculiar changes of views regard- 

 ing the most important points in question. 



Prior to the year 1848, the fishing-privileges were nearly everywhere 

 considered as an essential part of the rights belonging to every land- 

 owner, and a strict fishery-law would have appeared as an attempt to 

 give renewed stability to the claims of land-owners, which, even at that 

 time, were frequently attacked, and considered as untenable ; the de- 

 sire for such a law, which was expressed by several persons, conse- 

 quently found but little support. 



In the following years, after the fishing-privilege had come to be 

 considered as only an individual claim, which any one might obtain, 

 when new landed properties had been formed and were still forming, 

 such a law appeared to many as an unjustifiable infringement ou the 

 rights of individuals, while most people thought it an unnecessary 

 measure, justified by no actual want ; others thought it a very small 

 matter that the government should make laws regarding the size of 

 meshes, the size of fish which might be caught, the seasons for fishing, 

 &c. Such laws, they said, could never be fully carried out, and would 

 only produce a hateful and inefficient police surveillance ; the gov- 

 ernment, in its zeal to promote the fishing interests, should confine itself 

 to the diffusion of useful information, to money-grants, and similar favors. 

 But even at that time, these views found their opponents. Zealous 

 naturalists and sound political economists joined the intelligent pro- 

 prietors in showing the pernicious consequences of neglecting the fish- 

 eries, and also showed the possibility of improving them by laws based 

 on sound scientific principles. The certain hope was expressed that 

 the constant growth of intelligence among the population would make 

 the belief in the usefulness and the necessity of such laws more uni- 

 versal, and increase the possibility of carrying them out. These views, 

 however, did not succeed, as their opponents were still too powerful. 



2. — IMPROVED APPRECIATION OF THE INTEREST. 



The reports of the last few years are in every respect more satisfac- 

 tory. Natural sciences, which have become better known, having 

 taught men not to surrender unconditionally to the powers in nature, 

 but to combine them in a practical manner with human activity, this 

 principle was also applied to the fisheries. Here, more than in many 

 other fields, have the scientific and economical interests, which called 

 to life the artificial propagation of fish, and the consequent system of 

 scientific fish-culture, produced a radical change. The growing produc- 

 tiveness of the fisheries in those countries in which the right to fish is 

 restrained by strict laws; the better knowledge of the actual condition 

 of the fisheries and of the historical development of the fishing-privi- 

 leges in the several provinces of Austria; the acquaintance with foreign 

 laws in all their details, and the manner iu which they are carried out; 



