ON THE CHANNEL-FISHERIES. 95 



the oath of one witness, shall forfeit and pay the 

 sum of 51. for every such offence, to be reco- 

 vered and applied in manner as hereinafter men- 

 tioned. 



And whereas by an act passed in the 13 and 14 

 Charles 2d. c. 28., entitled an act for the regulation 

 of the Pilchard Fishery in the counties of Devon 

 and Cornwall, after reciting therein, that the pub- 

 lic honour, wealth, and safety of the realm, as well 

 in the maintenance of trade and support of navi- 

 gation, as in many other respects, do in an high 

 degree depend upon the improvement and encou- 

 ragement of the fishery ; and that for as much as 

 of late years there have divers pernicious disorders 

 and abuses, by the licentiousness of the times, 

 crept in, and yet continue evidently destructive to 

 that trade, for prevention and redress whereof there 

 was no law hitherto particularly provided for the 

 growing evils occasioned by driving nets and other 

 fraudulent and injurious practices, to the extreme 

 damage of the fishery ; it was enacted, that after 

 the 20th of May, 1662, no person should in any 

 "year, from the first of June to the last of December, 

 presume to take fish in the high sea, or in any bay, 

 pool, creek, or coast, of or belonging to Devon or 

 Cornwall, with any drill-net, trammel, or stream- 

 net, or any other net of that sort or kind, unless 

 it were at the distance of one league and half at 

 least from the respective shores, upon the penalty 

 of the forfeiture of the nets so employed, or the 



