xii DAYS AND NIGHTS OF SALMON FISHING 



written on the credit side. In the first place, we 

 have much more knowledge of the salmon than 

 they had in Scrope's day. More is needed, but we 

 have enough now to enable us to frame a sound 

 policy in regard to salmon preservation, with the 

 assurance that could it be put into operation without 

 hindrance there would be ample supplies of fish to 

 serve the markets, the needs of sportsmen poor as 

 well as rich and the spawning beds. The salmon, 

 in fact, instead of being a luxury, whether for food or 

 sport, could be so multiplied that it would become 

 a relatively inexpensive article of food and also a 

 common inhabitant of our rivers available to 

 sportsmen of all classes in due season. This fact 

 would do more to solve the problem of poaching 

 than armies of watchers, for legitimate angling has 

 far more fascination than poaching when it can be 

 prosecuted with some hope of reward. It would 

 become the will of the majority, and that in the end 

 prevails. At present the majority, having no 

 particular hope or interest in the matter, is apathetic, 

 and the preservation of salmon is left to the few. 

 Their task is rendered none the easier because the fish, 

 being scarce, is considered a perquisite of the rich, 

 as indeed to a large degree it now is. So class- 

 feeling is not absent from the problem, and poaching 

 meets with a good deal of sympathy on that account. 

 But if the fish were as plentiful as they should be 

 they would no longer be the perquisite of the rich, 

 and everyone would have a chance of a share in the 

 sport and food provided. 



The policy of salmon preservation now wanted 

 may be quite briefly summarised : 



