SALMON LEGISLA TION IN SCOTLAND. 555 



with power to raise funds to purchase the fixed nets on the The Solway. 

 Scotch shore of the Solway. 



Most of the rivers in the Solway have generally been 

 subject to special legislation. The Esk is now under 

 English law, but it would seem that the Solway Act still 

 applies to the Scotch portions of it, as well as the English 

 Act. The Firth is now under the general Scotch Acts. 

 The Annan is also under the general Scotch Acts, but it 

 has also an Act of its own still in force, the Annan Act, 

 1841. There is nothing, however, which calls for any 

 special notice. 



The Report by Messrs. Walpole and Young is so recent, 

 and deals so ably and fully with the whole question, that it 

 cannot be improved upon, and we therefore content our- 

 selves with referring to it. 



If the fixed nets could be got rid of on the Solway, the 

 fishings must materially improve. The gross annual value 

 of the fish caught at present is probably not less than 7000 

 to 8000. Here is what Russell says about the Newbie 

 fishings : * 



" The Solway also affords the most conclusive evidence not only of 

 the unfair, but of the ultimately self-destructive operations of these 

 engines. The first stake-net on the Solway i.e. the first fixed net with 

 leaders and chambers was erected at a place called Newby, a short 

 distance west of the mouth of the Annan, in 1788. Up to that time 

 the rent of the Newby fishery had been only ^i 6, whilst the rents of 

 the fisheries farther up the Firth amounted to several hundreds of 

 pounds. In a few years the rent of the Newby fishery, formerly 16, 

 was ^2000 ! whilst its upper neighbours sank to a mere fraction of their 

 former value. Here was a great transfer of property, and then came a 

 great destruction of property. The Newby example was copied ; the 

 Firth was overfished ; the rent of Newby is now (1864) little more than 

 a tenth of what it was ; and its neighbours, though they did not par- 

 ticipate in its prosperity, have shared in its decay : for instance, a 



* Russell ' On the Salmon,' p. 131. 



