APPENDIX. 



Extracts from the Reports of the Commissioners appointed to enquire 

 into the Salmon Fisheries of England and Wales. 



I. 



* * * * In spite of the disadvantages which now attach to 

 them these large rivers with their unobstructed estuary are well 

 worthy of attention and if a free passage were opened through them 

 the fisheries would be of great value. 



Viewing, then, the rivers in England and Wales as a whole, and 

 setting aside those waters which have been poisoned by mines, or 

 greatly contaminated by the pollutions arising 'from manufactures, 

 there remains still a vast area possessing great natural advantages 

 for the production of salmon. The rivers of England and Wales 

 exceed in extent those of either Scotland or Ireland, which supply 

 great quantities of salmon, and yield a large revenue. They embrace 

 a full average proportion of water well suited for the breeding of fish, 

 with rapid streams, and deep pools, and the upper parts contain 

 good gravelly spawning beds. They thus possess every requisite for 

 increasing the supply of a valuable commodity, were not the bounty 

 of nature frustrated by the perverseness or negligence of man. 



It had been alleged in certain petitions presented to Parliament 

 shortly before the issuing of this Commission, that the supply of 

 salmon from the rivers and fisheries of England and Wales had of 

 late years considerably diminished. We made it our first object to 

 ascertain in the several localities we visited, how far such an allega- 

 tion is founded on fact. We regret to state that it has been fully 

 substantiated by the evidence. 



In some rivers the fact is patent and notorious. Salmon formerly 

 abounded, but have now almost or altogether ceased to exist. These 

 are the cases in which mines or manufactures have poisoned the 

 waters or obstructions have been erected, by which the fish have been 

 blocked out from the breeding grounds. 



The instances of extinction are but few ; those of diminution, in a 

 greater or less degree, exist in every river that we visited. 



D 



