$8- SALMON-FISHERY OF SCOTLAND. 



was in salt water, or on the coasts, that yairs were truly pro- 

 hibited, as destructive of the fry of all fishes : yet salt water is 

 interpreted into fresh water ; thus directly falsifying the statute. 



The statute 1489 anent cruives and fish-yairs which destroy 

 the fry of fishes and hurt the common profit of the realm, or- 

 dains that they be all utterly destroyed, and that the cruives 

 in fresh waters be three inches wide. The words of this statute 

 bear out what has been stated to have been the primary object 

 of the Legislature viz. an anxiety for the preservation of the 

 fry of all fishes of every kind along the coasts ; but it was 

 supposed that the destruction of cartloads of the fry of sea fishes 

 in the yairs on the coasts was no hurt to the common profit of the 

 realm, and, therefore, we were assured that the prohibition of 

 yairs was intended only for the rivers. The very way, indeed, 

 in which fresh waters are mentioned in the Acts " and they 

 that have cruives in fresh waters " shows that it was to a dif- 

 ferent description of waters the prohibitions applied. 



The statute 1563 ordains that all cruives and fish-dams 

 which are in salt water that ebbs and flows those in the water 

 Solway alone excepted be utterly destroyed, and that the 

 cruives in fresh waters be made according to law. Nothing 

 can be more correct than the mode of expression in this Act. 

 It is free from all negligence in point of style, while it confirms 

 the whole tenor and import of the former statutes, all having 

 evidently the same object in view. If there was not another 

 Act upon the Statute-Book, this Act alone should be quite 

 sufficient for the purpose. The Legislatures by whom this and 

 the other later Acts were framed, were undoubtedly better 

 judges of the meaning of the former statutes, and of the inten- 

 tions of former Legislatures, than some of the present day can 

 pretend to be ; but let the intentions of those who framed the 

 earlier statutes, have been what they might, nobody will say 

 that the subsequent Legislatures might not make further enact- 

 ments if they thought fit ; or, that even if the original statutes 

 had limited the prohibition of yairs to fresh waters which 

 most assuredly was not the case- the subsequent Legislatures 

 might not have extended the prohibitions to salt water, if they 

 chose to do so; .and that they have done it whether -as a new 



