SALMON LEGISLATION. 14o 



and improvenieiit, necessary under the existing system, 

 can be got over, — a plan by which the most economical 

 and most productive machinery may be brought into 

 operation, not for the benefit of some and the loss of 

 others, but for the common or proportionate good of all. 

 in the meanwhile, however, and till the system is re- 

 formed altogether, there is an absolute necessity for 

 adhering to the old principle that a proprietor shall not 

 l^e allowed, by the use of novel or extraordinary ma- 

 chinery or appliances, to increase his natural advantages 

 or diminish his natural disadvantages, and so acquire 

 more than his intended and accustomed part of what is 

 practically a fixed or limited whole. 



While the recent legislative battles have had refer- 

 ence to the same questions and principles as formed 

 the subjects of the legislation of old, it has happened that, 

 partly from the increased value or demand for rod-fishing, 

 the proprietors of salmon fisheries have, in a rough way, 

 been of late ranged into two temporarily hostile bodies— 

 the upper and the lower. With some amount of concession 

 and compromise, all the recent Acts have been victories 

 won l)y the upper proprietors, though in some cases the 

 lowei- timeously surrendered, from a conviction that the 

 demands of tlie upper were bettei- for both, and though, 

 in all cases where a battle was fought, the former have 

 already confessed that they were benefited by defeat. 

 As to the two divisions — river or upper, and estuary or 

 lower proprietors — tlie war may thus be said to have 

 ended to the satisfaction of both parties. There remains, 

 howevei-, still to be fought a sort of supplementary con- 

 test,- the battle of lnjth river and estuary against sea, 



