38 MAKING A FISHERY. 



there are at right angles to the course of the 

 river a number of irrigation cuts or carriers 

 varying from a few inches in width to as much 

 as twenty or thirty feet, and in the case of 

 all but the very narrowest it is desirable that 

 proper planks should be provided. These 

 should be set at a distance of from twelve to 

 fifteen feet from the bank, so that while it 

 should be possible to walk up the stream 

 without scaring every fish, yet they should not be 

 so far removed from the river as to handicap the 

 fisherman too severely when walking down with 

 a hooked fish. Some freeholders, or their agents 

 or tenants, assert that it is the fishing lessee's 

 business to provide and maintain these planks, 

 and a more untenable proposition it is barely 

 possible to advance. It must be remembered 

 that every right of fishing conveys with it a 

 right of way, and that for each time the 

 keepers or fishermen cross these planks the 

 farmers and their labourers use them twenty 

 times. It must be remembered, too, that the 

 effect of placing these planks is that everyone, 

 whether fisherman, keeper, farmer, labourer, or 

 trespasser, walks along the same track, so that 

 only a small quantity of the pasture is injured, 

 while, if no planks are supplied, each one takes 

 a course according to his own fancy, and a 

 considerable width of herbage is more or less 



