178 STATUTE LAWS RELATING TO 



can justify taking salmon but by the fair and legal 

 net, which is the net described by this act. The 

 use of other nets to take small fish opens a door to 

 much fraud, since, under a pretence of taking fish 

 of little or no value, vast quantities of unsizeable 

 salmon are destroyed: this is a widely-extended 

 evil and a source of much complaint. 



I am not antiquary enough to give any opinion 

 upon the value of %0s. in the days of 2 Eliz., nor 

 am I competent to say whether the penalty is 20s. 

 or 207. ; Dr. Burns thinks it is the former ; but 

 under such and other circumstances there may be 

 difficulty in recovering the penalties, which is the 

 weakest part of the act, at least as suitable to the 

 present times. Still the engines and traps may be 

 seized and destroyed, which is a very great point, 

 since it opens a free passage to the fish, and enables 

 them to keep in the natural streams. The unlawful 

 nets may be seized likewise if they can be found ; 

 but neither they nor the engines can be seized be- 

 fore conviction, as was determined in Bulbrooke's 

 case, 3 Bur. 1770. It is perhaps the difficulties 

 attending the execution of this act ; and the prac- 

 tice of holding courts of conservancies having be- 

 come obsolete, except such as are within the pre- 

 cincts of a leet; added to the trouble and expense 

 of summoning juries, and the neglect of stewards 

 to give the act in charge to those juries, that have 

 perpetuated the use of those unlawful nets with 

 which salmon are constantly and openly taken ; and 

 been the 'means of encouraging the number of un- 



