INTRODUCTION xi 



it comes to this, that if the tidal waters continue 

 to be ransacked during the open season in such 

 manner that whole runs of fish are destroyed, 

 if poachers are allowed with impunity to spread 

 their nets all round the river mouth during the 

 close season, if leistering and " snatching " are con- 

 doned on the spawning beds of the upper waters, 

 if, in short, men are permitted to treat salmon as 

 if they were a dangerous vermin instead of the 

 most valuable of British fishes, whether for sport 

 or market, the wonder will not be that salmon 

 become scarce in the Tweed, but that they should 

 have escaped extermination so long as they have 

 done. 



In two respects the changes since Scrope's day 

 have been for the better. First, the use of the 

 leister, which he describes with irresistible gusto, 

 and the use of the rake hook, of which he speaks 

 with toleration, have both been rendered illegal. 

 Next, kelts can no longer be legally killed, which 

 seems to have had the effect of rendering heavy 

 fish more numerous in proportion to others of less 

 weight. Thus, although Scrope tells us that of 

 the many hundreds of fish which fell to his share 

 not one pulled the scale to thirty pounds, salmon 

 of that weight are nothing unusual in the Tweed 

 at this day. In his recent work on salmon fishing, 

 the Hon. A. E. Gathorne-Hardy notes the follow- 

 ing instances of extraordinary weights taken in the 

 Tweed of late years : 



1873. A salmon of 53| Ibs. 



1886. One of 57 Ibs., killed by Mr. Pryor on the Floors 

 water. 



