638 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



propose new ones, and to promote the fisheries in every possible way, 

 have been spoken of above. 



Great Britain. — The British fishing-laws deserve our fullest attention. 

 Since, about eighty years ago, the discovery was made that salmon 

 packed in ice could be brought to London in a fresh condition, the 

 demand for it, and the price paid, have been increasing so rapidly that 

 there was imminent danger of seeing the British seas and streams en- 

 tirely depopulated, and of having the traffic in salmon, the pride of the 

 English fisheries, entirely destroyed. 



Dire necessity has compelled Great Britain to protect and improve 

 its fisheries in every possible manner. All technical inventions and im- 

 provements, artificial fish-culture, passage-ways for fish, &c, are put to 

 the best practical use. Immense capital is invested in the fisheries by 

 private individuals or by joint-stock companies. The laws afford the 

 fullest protection to these enterprises. Holders of fishing-privileges 

 have formed themselves into well-managed organizations, so that the 

 majority is enabled to pass resolutions which will prove beneficial. The 

 British fishing-laws afford protection against the factories, the poison- 

 ing of the waters, and their being obstructed by weirs ; they pro- 

 tect the spawning places; see to it that the spawning seasons are 

 properly observed ; do away with injurious stationary nets ; prevent the 

 capture and sale of young fish, &c. Inspectors of fisheries possess full 

 powers to control the privileges of angling in salmon rivers and of using 

 a specified kind of nets ; to have a strict eye to stationary nets and other 

 apparatus ; and to punish all violation of the law severely. 



Although occasional complaints are raised that the acts of parliament 

 are getting more and more confused, their complication is not so great as 

 to injure the fisheries, and, with sensible firmness, injurious influences 

 are constantly overcome, and improvements are made. 



Many antiquated and impracticable laws have been replaced by new 

 and better ones, especially since the beginning of Queen Victoria's reign. 

 Still more important are the acts of parliament of 1828, 1812, 1850, 

 1857, and 1861. They refer either to special branches of the trade 

 such as salt-water fishing, shell-fish and oyster dredging, and salmon 

 catching, or to the fisheries in the several different countries composing 

 the British monarchy, England, Scotland, Ireland, or to certain lakes or 

 streams, as for instance the act of 1857, concerning the Tweed fisheries, 

 which was ameuded in 1859. 



In discussing the act of 1861, relating to salmon-fisheries, many were 

 of the opinion that this entirely neglected British industry, the profits 

 of which amounted to almost nothing, could never again be brought to 

 a flourishing condition. 



These opinions have proved to be erroneous, since that law has pro- 

 duced such favorable results; and it is expected that these results will 

 be still more brilliant in the future. A commission was appointed in 

 1S70, charged with considering the question in what respects the salmon- 



