52 LAWS RELATING TO 



Sect. 2. Be it further enacted, That the times and manner pre- 

 scribed for taking fish in an act passed 4th March, 1790, entitled " An 

 Act to regulate the catching of salmon, shad and alewives, and to 

 prevent obstructions in Merrimack River, and in the other rivers and 

 streams running into the same within this Commonwealth, and for 

 repealing several acts heretofore made for that purpose," shall be 

 observed as the times and manner for taking said fish in the said 

 streams in the town of Andover ; and if any person shall take any 

 of said fish at any other time or in any other manner than is pre- 

 scribed in the act last recited, he shall for each offence be subject to 

 such penalty as is provided in the said act for the same offence, to 

 be recovered and appropriated in the same manner as is therein 

 directed. 



Sect. 3. Be it further enacted, That any of the inhabitants of said 

 town of Andover, not concerned in violating this act, may be admit- 

 ted as witnesses in any action that may be brought for the penalty 

 aforesaid, they being inhabitants of said town notwithstanding. 



Sect. 4. Be it further enacted, That the inhabitants of said towns 

 at their annual meeting in the month of March or April, shall be and 

 hereby are empowered to choose a committee or committees, being 

 freeholders in said town ; and each person so chosen shall be sworn 

 faithfully to discharge the duties required of them by said town, 

 agreeable to this act ; and the committee or committees, or the major 

 part of them, are hereby authorized and empowered to open such 

 sluice or passage-way, through or round any dams erected, or that 

 shall be erected across said streams, as they shall judge necessary for 

 the free passage of said fish, and to remove lumber and every other 

 obstruction to the free passage of said fish ; to erect racks or wooden 

 frames, as they shall judge necessary, in the stream or streams 

 through which the said fish pass, they being restricted, in such open- 

 ing and clearing, to do the same as little to the damage of the owner 

 or owners as may be ; such passage so opened by the committee 

 aforesaid, shall continue open, if they shall judge it necessary, from 

 the tenth day of April to the last day of May, annually. And if any 

 person or persons shall unlawfully obstruct the passage or passages 

 for said fish, remove or injure any rack or racks that shall be erected 

 by said committee on said streams, such person or persons so offend- 

 ing, upon conviction thereof shall forfeit and pay a sum not exceeding 

 thirty pounds nor less than ten pounds, to be recovered in any court 

 proper to ivj the same, one moiety to the informer and the other 

 moiety to the poor of said town. 



Sect. 5. Be it further enacted, That the said committee or com- 

 mittees be and hereby are authorized and directed to distribute the 

 fish that may be taken by them, or any person under them, as equally 



