PRESERVATION OF SALMON. 207 



zealous regard to protect every fish he or his 

 friends cannot take by fair means, and is willing, 

 personally, and with his own hands, to enforce 

 preservation strictly. I remember on one occa- 

 sion (a.d. 1838), hearing late in the evening, 

 that permission was (as we argued, contrary to 

 the understanding with subscribers) given to 

 certain parties to draw or net a great extent of 

 this river during that night. What was the 

 result ? I and one or two more anglers sallied 

 forth in the dark at once (for there was no 

 time to remonstrate) and with our own hands 

 pelted every pool, as far as we could, so as to 

 drive the fish to the banks and to those streams 

 where the nets dared not venture in the dark, for 

 fear of entanglement. We succeeded ; for in 

 none of those places did the netters take a single 

 fish. And next morning, to the great satisfac- 

 tion of all parties, excepting the netters, we found 

 that the permission had been wholly misunder- 

 stood : — for every '' inch" given them, the netters 

 had intended to take " two ells ! ! " and a stop 

 was put to any further proceedings. If, on that 

 occasion, blows had been requisite, we would ^ 

 have preserved the river, as the lawyers say, vi 

 et armis — notwithstanding what may be said to 

 the contrary*. I know, perhaps, a dozen other 



* See Evidence before House of Commons, 1836. Question 1564, and 

 Index tit. " Angling." 



