ON THE CHANNEL-FISHERIES. 85 



And whereas sundry idle and disorderly persons, 

 in defiance of all law and the authority of the civil 

 magistrate, make a practice of destroying salmon 

 by night * chiefly in the winter season, and during 

 the fence days, and when they are unseasonable 

 and unwholesome, by various arts and devices, but 

 principally by spears, first attracting the salmon by 

 means of lights and fires to certain spots convenient 

 for their purposes, where a large white stone or 

 board painted white is placed at the bottom, and 

 when part of such stone or board is covered by a 

 salmon drawn thither by the said light, which is 

 easily perceived, such salmon is struck by a barbed 

 spear and caught, or destroyed ; be it therefore 

 enacted, that if any person or persons shall be 

 detected in hunting or searching for, injuring, kill- 

 ing, or attempting to injure, or kill, with the spear, 

 as aforesaid, any salmon during the fence days 



* It is a perfectly well known fact, that not only salmon, but 

 other fish, can be attracted to particular spots at night by lights, 

 and can be more numerously and effectually destroyed by 

 night than by day, as I have been assured by a very experi- 

 enced sportsman at this sort of work ; by day the fish can see 

 and hide himself from his pursuer, but by night he is allured to 

 his own destruction by the light. As there is also a much greater 

 difficulty in detecting the offender in his nocturnal depreda- 

 tions than if he acted in open day, the salmon should be put 

 under the protection of the law, by an extraordinary severity 

 of punishment, upon the same principle as goods, wares, and 

 merchandise exposed by night, are protected by law, because 

 they cannot be protected by their owners. Light has the 

 same effect upon sea-fish as it has upon the river fish* 



G 3 



