174 



fiable selfishness. It was, at one time, confidently asserted, that the 

 tide-nets destroyed the fry, and the descending spawned fish; but we 

 presume that this idle declamation has ceased, since the publication of 

 the Reports, wherein it is demonstrated that the places most suitable 

 for the erection of tide-nets, under the limitations already noticed, are 

 those places which neither the fry nor the spawned fish frequent. 



"It has been somewhat hastily announced that Salmon, being bred 

 in rivers, belong to the owners of river property, and not to the pro- 

 prietors on the banks of the estuaries or the sea shore. In this view 

 of the matter it seems to be forgotten that the fry leave the rivers as 

 speedily as possible, to obtain in the sea those sources of nourishment 

 suited to their youth, which their birth-place cannot afford them. But 

 if we must admit that Salmon are the property of those in the fords of 

 whose streams they have been bred, then those only ought to have 

 liberty to catch fish who have spawning fords; and the numerous and 

 important fisheries, at present the most valuable in the kingdom, which 

 are situated in rivers near their confluence with estuaries or the sea, 

 must be proscribed as scenes of poaching, a conclusion, we suspect, 

 not very acceptable to many who have urged the objection with great 

 vehemence." 



X. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH of the BRITISH and IRISH FISHERIES. 

 Compiled by SIR T. CHARLES MORGAN, M.D. 



" Fish being an article of produce that paysno rent, a freegift of nature 

 to the captor, the employment of the fisherman might be thought fully 

 equal to take care of itself, and to require no encouragement, to call it 

 into activity. It is therefore not without surprise that the inquirer 

 learns the vast efforts made by powerful nations to create a fishery, and 

 so often made in vain. 



" The solution of this seeming paradox lies in the perishable nature 

 of the commodity, and the consequent disproportion between the cost 

 of taking and that of preserving and conveying it to the distant 

 market. To transport fish in a fresh condition, so rapidly enhances its 

 price, that, at a small distance from the sea, it becomes an article of 

 luxury; and its market is restricted accordingly. The inferior kinds 

 only can be generally offered for sale at prices which permit their 

 being used extensively as articles of ordinary diet ; and these are so 

 inferior in nutritious qualities, and so much less exciting to the palate 

 than animal food, that the people who can afford to purchase meat, will 

 not largely consume them. Except during the gluts of mackerel and 

 herrings, the artisans of London very rarely purchase fresh fish; and 

 the cured fish they decline altogether, or nearly so. 



" To obtain an extensive sale for this article, it is for the most part 

 necessary that it should be subjected to the processes of curing, and ren- 

 dered capable of conveyance to far distant markets. But the curing 

 of fish, while it implies a considerable degree of art and some outlay 

 of capital, so far decreases the estimation of the commodity in con- 

 sumption, that salt fish usually finds a still less ready market than 

 fresh ; and in thriving communities, it is consumed only by the poorest 



