DECAY OF SALMON. 9 7 



each sent to London from the Irish fisheries was only 

 300 or 400 ; ten years ago, it had risen to 3000, and is 

 now above 8000 ; in other words, has increased twenty- 

 fold. On the other hand, it should be noted that recent 

 prices, as ordinarily quoted, do not fully represent the 

 rise of price that has taken place ; for the falling off in 

 the supply has been in the earlier months of the season, 

 when fish are in best condition and at highest value, 

 while there has been rather an increase in the latter 

 months of the season, when the condition of the fish is 

 deteriorated, and the greater number of them consist, 

 not of adult salmon, but of grilse, which bring little 

 more than half the price per pound. 



Coming down to later dates, we encounter a new 

 diSiculty, rendering the statistics regarding the salmon- 

 fisheries of the rivers not available as data for proving 

 the decline in the total supply — the introduction of 

 fixed engines on the sea-coast, begun about forty years 

 ago, having transferred, without at the first diminishing, 

 the supply. Looking mainly to the Scotch rivers, the 

 fact that, for a considerable number of years after the 

 introduction of fixed engines on the sea-coast, there 

 was no considerable decline of supply on the whole, 

 seems sufficiently established by the fact, that, with a 

 demand certainly not .decreasing, prices (subject to 

 the explanation just given) did not materially alter, 

 though many of the older or river fisheries suffered 

 almost immediately a severe impoverishment. Beyond 

 all this lie other difficulties — it is impossible to obtain 

 the statistics of the whole fisheries at former periods, the 

 statistics even of the present period are very imperfect, 



a 



