ON THE CHANNEL-FISHERIES. 7* 



suffocated ; having a mesh so small as to take 

 fish not larger than a sixpence ; and that close 

 upon the shore, where the young fry principally 

 swarm, without the least regard to the law of the 

 land, or to any one single thing but what they very 

 injudiciously suppose to be their own private in- 

 terest. From the smallness of the mesh the con- 

 sequence is that the bag of the net is so completely 

 choked with mud, sand, and sea-weed, that nothing 

 but water can pass through. The effect of this 

 pernicious practice must be so self-evident to every 

 man's senses, as to require neither reasoning or 

 proof to convince him of the national mischief that 

 it must of necessity produce. Thousands of mil- 

 lions of young fish, and the roe of fish of all the best 

 qualities, are thus destroyed, contrary to the intent 

 of the present law, and for want of an effectual 

 one to check the evils complained of. 



About twenty years ago, curiosity alone induced 

 me to go a little way to sea in a trawl-sloop, merely 

 to see the operation of the trawl-net, and the mode 

 of catching fish therein, without any reference to 

 the law ; for 1 then had thought nothing about it. 

 After the net, which was extended upon a pole 

 thirty feet long, had been at the Hottom about half 

 an hour, it was drawn up, and several fine fish were 

 taken out. But when the bag of the net was 

 emptied of all which it had collected at the bottom, 

 during half an hour upon a pole thirty feet long, I 

 could not refrain from expressing my astonishment 

 at seeing its contents. To state any opinion upon 



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