30 



in another. If that could be brought into operation in our 

 sea fisheries it would lead to very important changes. 



Mr. McLELAN (Canada), said that some of the fishing 

 grounds on the great lakes in Canada, where the mode of 

 fishing just referred to was adopted, were 400 or 500 miles 

 long ; and the reports coming from fishermen were, that 

 unrestricted fishing diminished the number of fish even in 

 these large lakes. Application had been made to him 

 repeatedly to permit a smaller sized mesh of net to be used ; 

 but in consequence of the testimony which had come to 

 him from all fishermen, he had refused to allow it. He 

 considered it was a very important question whether sea 

 fisheries were exhaustible or not ; probably the most im- 

 portant question which could be discussed. Previous to 

 coming to England, all the testimony he had received from 

 the fishermen of Canada, both shore fishermen and sea 

 fishermen, was, that on the great lakes, fisheries that had 

 hitherto been very profitable, were being exhausted from 

 over-fishing, and from all he could hear from fishermen 

 all round the coast, he had come to the conclusion that 

 it was possible to exhaust the fisheries of the Dominion 

 of Canada. Mr. Duff had told them that with regard 

 to herrings they first had an open season, in which 

 an average of 500,000 barrels of fish were taken every 

 year ; then for some seventeen years they had a close 

 season, in which there was an average of 600,000 

 barrels, and then it was made open again, and the 

 average rose to 800,000 barrels. The inference from 

 all this was, that it was better to have free fishing ; 

 but at the same time the honourable gentleman stated 

 that the appliances for catching the herrings had been 

 multiplied fivefold, and it occurred to him that if that 

 were so, they ought to have had three million barrels 



