69 



selves, and only combining and harmonizing together, 

 when the public advantage is to be sacrificed at the shrine 

 of that common monopoly which they are all concerned 

 to maintain. 



In the meanwhile, every day's delay is productive of in- 

 calculable injury. And if some alteration shall not speedily 

 be made, there is every chance that, at no distant pe- 

 riod, the Salmon fishery will be completely ruined. 

 The extent to which poaching, during close time, has 

 lately been carried, is almost inconceivable, and the con- 

 sequent destruction of the breed is immense. But 

 even this source of injury, is insignificant, compared 

 to the destruction in the rivers occasioned by the per- 

 mission of fishing at improper seasons of the year. 

 It is reported, that, in the beginning of January last, 

 Jive hundred fish were taken in one week, in a river 

 in the north, of which not twenty-Jive were clean Jish, Jit 

 for the market ! The North and South Esk have almost 

 been cleared of fish ! In the Ericht, near Blairgowrie, 

 vast numbers of foul fish have been taken, to the ex- 

 tent even of seventy in one night; while, in the upper 

 parts of the Tay, it is not uncommon, at various sta- 

 tions, to see more Salmon taken by one haul of the net 

 from the red or spawning-bed, than would suffice to stock 

 the whole river ! 



THE END 



