THE TWEED FISHERY. 



35 



from 1850 to the end of 1865, when the Legislature put 

 an end to the open fisheries : * 



The lover of salmon cannot regard without feelings of 

 apprehension and indignation the condition of the Tweed 

 fisheries indignation at the manner in which they are 

 spoliated, apprehension lest exhaustion should be the re- 

 sult of the spoliation. Recent legislation appears to have 

 done but little good. A new Government inquiry is 

 promised, however ; and it is to be hoped, rather than 

 expected, that it will remove all grievances, and restore 

 the fisheries to prosperity. If the stranger inquire of a 

 Tweed fisherman what is the fons et origo mali, he will 

 be told it is the systematic " poaching " that is carried on 

 in spite of watchers and constables ; and he will come to 

 the conclusion, perhaps, that the best remedy for so 

 serious an evil is not a Government Commission, but the 

 diffusion of knowledge, and the growth of a healthy 



* Bertram, " The Harvest of the Sea," p. 222. 



