30 



used, did not at all enter into the consideration of the 

 Judges, in determining the question of law, whether the 

 mode of fishing fell under the prohibition in the statute- 

 book. They had nothing to do with it. They had to take 

 the law as they found it, fettered by the precedents and 

 usages of former times. And one and all of them, accord- 

 ingly, laid out of view the question of expediency, leaving 

 it to the legislature, to whom it properly belonged. The 

 late Lord Meadowbank is reported to have expressed him- 

 self in these distinct and decided terms. c Much, 1 said his 

 JLordship, * has been said of the immense patrimonial 



* and national importance of the question. I beg leave 

 ' to say, that I divest my mind as much as possible of 



* the great value of the interests in competition. I com- 



* pel my mind to consider it as if it were the case of an 

 ' individual merely ; for it is a question of law which I 



* am bound to construe as a judge, tied by precedents, and not 

 6 biassed by its consequences in any way. As to the various 



* questions of expediency, as to the new light which has 

 4 been thrown, by great ability, on what it is alleged 

 ' ought to be the construction of the statutes, I am hum* 

 4 bly of opinion, that it is the province of the legislature 

 4 only to appreciate these, and apply the remedy, if wrong has 

 4 been done, not of your Lordships. You must tread in 

 the footsteps of your predecessors ; you must separate 



* the new lights, which have been recently thrown upon 



* this subject, from the case as it stood upon the old acts 



* of parliament, and the decisions of this Court. That 

 1 is all that you have to do ; you must consider these 

 4 matters only, and decide upon them, whatever injury 

 4 may be occasioned thereby to any person or body of 

 4 men ; and if there shall be any wrong done to the public 

 4 interest, by any judgment that you may pronounce, you 



