164 SALMON-FISSBKY OF SCOTLAND^ 



personal rigHt granted as a natural pertinent of land, without 

 either title or possession, or a particle of legal ground on which 

 it can rest, save the sic volo principle of the Court, opposed to 

 the IMMEMORIAL POSSESSION of the owners of the salmon- 

 fishery. 



Such is the present state of the Scotch salmon-fishery. It 

 is as clear as that two and two make four, that the fishery can 

 only be improved in two ways : first, by rearing as many fish 

 as possible, which can only be done by incessant attention on 

 the part of the owners of the rivers and next, by preventing 

 the fish from being killsd in such quantities, before they reach 

 their proper growth, by c~ver-fishing ; and in both particulars 

 the Court of Session seems to ba doing all in their power to 

 depress the fisheiy, by cutting up the rights of the river heritors, 

 by whom alone it can be improved, and by extending the over- 

 fishing system on the coasts. It seems to be nmning a race 

 against the fishery, as if for the express purpose of preventing 

 its improvement, and so has fared with it ; for in the very 

 first article of the Eeport of the Committee of the House of 

 Commons, it is stated that the fishery has for many years been 

 decreasing, and is stiU decreasing so rapidly, that unless 

 means be adopted to prevent its further decrease, the loss 

 to the public must be very great. In the Provincial or Sheriff 

 Courts, the same system seems to be followed. In a recent 

 case, the tacksman of a river was foiled in his attempt 

 to prosecute a poacher, who had been fishing in the night 

 with a fixed or hang net, declared illegal by repeated decisions 

 of the Court of Session,* on the ground that the matter was 

 jios tertii to him, according to the doctrine recently promul- 

 gated, and he had eighteen pounds of expenses to pay for mak- 

 ing the attempt ; f and on another occasion, a reservoir, which 

 the tacksman had made for keeping the fish alive, in order that 

 they might be sent to market in ice, instead of being pickled, 

 was, after having been peaceably possessed during eight years, 



* Duke of Queensbery v. Marquess of Annandale, 19th November 1771. 

 Dirom v. Little, 25th February 1797. 

 + Qu. Who has the right to bring offenders against the law to justice ? . 



