410 THE SALMON RIVERS OF SCOTLAND 



section of the Salmon Fisheries (Scotland) Act 1862, the pro- 

 visions of the English Fishing Act 1 1861 are made to take the 

 place of the Scottish provisions which regulate these matters. The 

 wording is that the Act in question "shall extend and apply to 

 salmon fisheries in the waters and on the shores of the Solway Firth 

 situate in Scotland, as the same may be fixed by authority of this 

 Act, and to the rivers flowing into the same, in so far as such pro- 

 visions relate to the use of fixed engines for the taking of salmon : 

 Provided that all offences against such provisions shall be prosecuted 

 and punished as directed by this Act." We have therefore to go to 

 the English Act and consult the definition there given of a fixed 

 engine. In Section 4 we find " Fixed Engine " shall include stake 

 nets, bag nets, putts, putchers, and all fixed implements or engines 

 for catching or for facilitating the catching of fish." This is not 

 really very explicit. After mentioning four varieties we are simply 

 told that fixed engines shall include fixed engines. The definition 

 was revised, however, by the Solway Salmon Fisheries Commissioners 

 (Scotland) Act 1877, 2 which says, " In this Act and in the Salmon 

 Fisheries (Scotland) Act 1862, and in any Act therewith incorporated, 

 ' Fixed Engine ' shall include any net or other implement for taking 

 fish, fixed to the soil or made stationary in any other way, not being 

 a cruive or mill-dam." This seems to me to be sufficient without 

 any dubiety, to include haaf nets. Many prosecutions have been 

 carried out against haaf netting in the past, but these, I believe, have 

 been mainly on the ground that the fishing was on the ground of 

 proprietors who had not granted permission, the Solway Act of 1804 

 (Section 9) 3 expressly providing that permission for any fishing is 

 necessary. Haaf netting as now practised, however, is with per- 

 mission or by instruction of the proprietor, hence the absence of 

 objection on the broader grounds stated above, is, in my view, in line 

 with the absence of objection to infringement of the Salmon Acts in 

 general, which, as I have already indicated, is a singularly common 

 feature in the district now under review. 



This brings us to the third reason for the decline of the Mth 

 fisheries the obstruction of almost all the tributaries. In 1887, an 

 Inspector of Salmon Fisheries reported that only in three out of six- 

 teen obstructions specified had any attempt, apparently, been made 

 to comply with the Salmon Fishing Regulations. 4 Things are per- 

 haps not quite so bad now. Fish passes have been constructed at 



J 24 and 25 Viet. C. 109. 2 40 and 41 Viet. C. CCXL. S. 4. 3 44 Geo. III. C. 45. 

 4 Sixteenth Annual Report of the Fishery Board for Scotland, Part II. 



