TWENTY-SEVENTH DAY, MAY 25^^, 1893. 



Sir Chahles Eussell. — Mr. President, I am now able to fortify by- 

 authority the correctness of the answer which I gave yesterday to the 

 question you were good enough to address to me upon the question of 

 how far the right of the King as to property in swans or in royal tish 

 extended, aud whether it extended, or was asserted to exist, beyond 

 the territorial limits. The authority that I refer to is recognized as the 

 principal authority upon the subject, — Chitty on the "Prerogatives of 

 the Crown " — and I am reading from the edition published in 1820, page 

 144. It deals both with the" question of royal fish and royal birds, 

 swans. This is the passage: 



The King has 110 general property in fish. It would be superfluous to specify aud 

 particularly designate Avhales and sturgeons alone, as being royal lish, if all fish were 

 the King's property. Exceptio jjroiat rennJavi. With respect however to whales and 

 sturgeons, it was always a doctrine of the common law that they belong to the King. 

 And by the statute de Prerogativd Regis, it is declared that the King shall have whales 

 and sturgeons taken in the sea or elsewhere, within the realm, except in certain 

 places privileged by the King. But to give the Crown a right to such fish they must 

 be taken within the seas parcel of the dominions and Crown of England, or in creeks 

 or arms thereof; for if taken in the wide seas or out of the ijrecinct of the seas sub- 

 ject to the Crown of England, they belong to the taker. A subject may possess this 

 royal perquisite; first, by grant; secondly^ by prescription within the shore, between 

 the high water and low water mark, or in a certain districtus maris, or in a port, 

 creek, or arm of the sea; aud this may be had in gross or as appurtenant to au 

 honour, manor or hundred. 



Under this head may also be mentioned the right of the King to sicaiis, being 

 inhaiiitants of rivers. 'By the statute 22 Edward IV, chapter 6, "no person other 

 than the son of the King shall have any mark or game of swans, except he have 

 lauds of freehold to the "yearly value of 'five marks; aud if any person not having 

 lauds to the said yearly value shall have any such mark or game, it shall be lawful 

 to any of the King's subjects having lands to the said value, t» seize the swans as 

 forfeits, whereof the King shall have one half and he that shall seize the other". 

 A subject may, however, be entitled to swans; first, when they are tame; in which 

 case ho has exactly the same property in them as he has in any other tame animal; 

 secondly, by a grant of swan mark from the King; in which case all the swans 

 marked'with such mark shall be the subject's, wheresoever they fly; and, thirdly, 

 a subject may claim a property in swans raiione privilegii, as if the King grant to a 

 subject the game of wild swan in a river. 



That I think answers the question you were good enough to address 

 to me. Blackstone in his Commentaries, (Stephen's Edition, page 2), 

 states the law to the same effect. I need not trouble the Tribunal by 

 reading it. Indeed one sees at once that in the nature of things it must 

 be so, because once outside the territorial jurisdiction of the State those 

 who owe no allegiance to that State owe no respect to any rights, 

 1044 regalia or otherwise, which depend upon its laws. Of course 

 the State might make any law to affect its own subjects, but as 

 regards foreigners outside the realm it has no such right. 



Lord Hannen. — If a royal swan at large in the country where the 

 King had the right to swans Escaped to anotlier country where the other 

 King had the same right to swans at large, which King would the 

 swan belong to? 

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