53 



this measure, but did not press the subject probably because, 

 having so far stripped the river, there was not much lost by 

 the restriction. 



The improvement consequent upon stopping the netting 

 soon became apparent. Towards the end of the second season 

 the hand-hne fishing from boats near town improved consider- 

 ably, and the fish have since steadily increased both in quantity 

 and size. Angling has been resumed with great success in 

 the lower waters, and is gaining in favor as a healthy and pro- 

 fitable recreation each year. Near the mouth of the Sorell 

 Kivulet shoals of large bream have been constantly seen, 

 where, a short time ago but few, and in some seasons, none 

 showed themselves, One man who has fished the river for 

 more than 30 years, and on whose veracity I can rely, assures 

 me that he has seen a shoal of these fish covering half an 

 acre, and that he believes the river will soon be what it was 

 in its best days. 



The bays about New Town and Eisdon have been alive with 

 fish during the last season, and anglers in those waters rarely 

 failed to make good baskets. 



This abundance of fish in the bays above the town has now 

 excited the cupidity of those few net fishermen who do not 

 consider anything beyond then- present gain, and who for the 

 sake of two or three good seasons would not only run the risk 

 of wasting all the money and labour expended, for their own 

 ultimate benefit, in the salmon experiment, but would even 

 wantonly sacrifice the permanent interest of the public, and 

 especially of the angling n nd line fishing public, by scraping 

 up every spawning fisl^ tuey can follow to the shallows, and 

 thus undo all the good work which the Salmon Commissioners 

 have done by placing some restriction on the netting. 



These fishermen are now urging Parliament to re-open the 

 river, and those who advocate this to do so mainly on two 

 grounds, one the hardship to the fishermen by taking away 

 their means of livelihood, the other the advantage to be 

 gained by catching a veritable salmon, and proving beyond 

 doubt the success of the experiment. 



As to the first ground, it is difficult to understand why the 

 presence of a larger number of fish in the upper waters makes 

 the hardship any greater now than it was in 1864. On the 

 contrary ; the closing the river has each year tended to make 

 the fishing in the lower waters better at those seasons in which 

 the fish ought to be caught. 



Had the net fishermen been allowed to go on as they had 

 commenced, the river would soon have yielded them no profit 

 at all, either in the upper or lower waters, a hardship much 

 more serious than any they can now be subjected to by keeping 



