108 THE SALMON. 



the period at the end of which the rental of the Tay 

 had not materially decreased, the price of the fish had 

 very greatly advanced, from which the inference is, that 

 the produce must have fallen off in proportion as the 

 price rose. On this point, however, we cannot get beyond 

 an inference, the returns of the produce of Tay extend- 

 ing only to 1844, till which period they were made under 

 compulsion of a local act, and since which they have been 

 kept secret by the lessees, who are numerous, divided, 

 and jealous. From such facts as we have, we learn, 

 1st, that the proportion of captured grilse to salmon had 

 been greatly and gradually increasing, though it had not 

 attained to anything like the results in the case of the 

 Tweed ; and, 2d, that though the Tay fisheries as a 

 whole did not materially decrease in money value, the 

 upper net-fisheries, situated immediately above the tide, 

 feU off so rapidly that their rental, which was formerly 

 £3000, sank to £650. The signification of these two 

 facts, and especially of the last, is simply this, that the 

 fishing in the lower or tidal parts of the river had so 

 increased in effectiveness that a Tay salmon's life had 

 been reduced by many months, and his road to destruc- 

 tion shortened by many miles. But how are we to ac- 

 count for these results being so much less in degree in 

 the Tay than elsewhere, and especially in the Tay's sister 

 and rival, the Tweed ? By way of explanation, we 

 would suggest, first, that the number of fish killed in the 

 Tay, though perhaps as great positively as that kiUed in 

 Tweed, is smaller in proportion to the number existing ; 

 and second, that the breeding-fish and the young on the 

 Tay have been very much better protected. On the first 



