OF FISHINGS. 169 



Assize, which shall be held by the Forest-Masters or their 

 Lieutenants, a master of the community, who shall keep 

 an eye upon them, and report to the Officers of the 

 Maitrise any abuses which may be committed ; and in 

 places in which there are fewer than eight, they shall call 

 together those of two or three of the nearest towns or 

 ports, that they may together appoint one of their number, 

 who shall undertake the same duty, all without charge and 

 without exaction of fees, presents, or entertainment, under 

 pain of exemplary punishment and arbitrary fine. 



' 4. We forbid to all fishers to fish on Sundays and 

 festivals, under pain of forty livres fine ; and to this end 

 we expressly enjoin them, immediately after sunset, to 

 take to the quarters of the master of the community all 

 their implements and tackle, which shall not be restored 

 to them until after sunrise on the next day after Sundays 

 and festivals, under pain of fifty livres of fine, and sus- 

 pension from the fishing for a year. 



' 5. We forbid likewise that on other days and seasons 

 when they may fish, they shall do so at other time than 

 between sunrise and sunset, excepting at arches of bridges, 

 at mills, and at fisheries where they may use large drag- 

 nets, in which places they may fish both day and night, 

 provided it be not a Sunday or festival, or be otherwise 

 forbidden. 



' 6. Fishers cannot fish during times of spawning, namely, 

 in rivers in which the trout abounds above all other kinds 

 of fish, from the 1st of February till the middle of March ; 

 and in others from the 1st of April till the 1st of June, 

 under pain for the first offence of twenty livres fine and a 

 month's imprisonment, and of double the fine and two 

 months' imprisonment for the second, and the iron collar, 

 the lash, and banishment from the district of the Maitrise 

 for five years, for the third. 



' 7. We except always from the prohibition in the last 

 article the fishing for salmon, shad, and lampreys, which 

 shall be continued in the customary manner. 



' 8. Also, they cannot put hires or bow-nets of willow at 



