BEFORE THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 133 



worse and worse as the roe grows ; spawn in No- 

 vember, December, and beginning of January, in 

 furrows ; they throw themselves on their sides when 

 they come together, and rubbing against each other, 

 they shed their spawn, both into the furrow at 

 once ; I have seen three pair upon a spawning bed 

 at a time ; I have stood and looked at them, both 

 while making the furrow and laying the spawn ; 

 takes some days before they have done spawning ; 

 they do not lay it all at once, takes eight or twelve 

 days ; young fish first appear in March ; not the 

 same number of pea in all fish, from 17 to 20,000; 

 does not consider the whiting to be young sal- 

 mon, or yet the gilse or sea-trout ; speaks of the 

 injury done by drawing nets over the breeding 

 beds ; much fry destroyed by mill-dams ; there ought 

 to be a sluice or escape for the fry ; much mischief 

 done by manufactories ; thinks the coble-net fish- 

 ing most injurious, as destructive of the breeding 

 places, by moving the sand ; stake-nets being still 

 don't injure the spawn ; attributes the destruction 

 7iot to the stake-nets, but to the parent jish and th-e 

 fry ; strongly approves of stake-nets ; more salmon 

 destroyed by grampuses, porpoises, and seals, than 

 all the fishers in England ; hunt in packs \ has seen 

 3 or 400 porpoises at a time, go up and down with 

 the tide. 



John Halliday again examined. — Grampuses 

 and porpoises have taken the fish from the stake- 



k 3 



