SALMON LEGISLATION. 149 



parties stood upon their rights or their wrongs, the fish 

 meanwhile hastening to extinction. 



It may freely be admitted that the lower proprietors 

 were correct in their statement, that salmon taken in or 

 near the sea are the best for food. Although honest — 

 but, as regards salmon, utterly ignorant — Izaak Walton 

 has stated, " It is observed that the farther they get 

 from the sea they be both the fatter and better," we 

 admit that his statement is just the reverse of the fact. 

 A fish in maidenhood is more wholesome than a fish 

 tending towards the family way. But then, for the pro- 

 pagation of the species, it is absolutely necessary that a 

 certain proportion should be allowed to get into the 

 latter condition. Doubtless, a wether, or an unmarried 

 ewe, makes the best mutton ; but if there were no rams 

 and no breeding ewes, there would soon be no mutton 

 at aU ; and if, in haste to be rich, every farmer were to 

 kiU every succeeding year all the sheep and kmbs he 

 could lay hands on, without thinking how the stock was 

 to be kept up or reproduced, we should soon have in 

 sheep something like what has been going on in the case 

 of salmon. But there is no actual parallel in reckless- 

 ness and wastefulness. If landed proprietors used game 

 as fishery proprietors are apt to use salmon, " shooting 

 down the hens," and not letting one head escape which 

 by any means, fair or foul, they could possibly destroy, 

 nobody could doubt the sure and early result. And yet, 

 to make even this a parallel to the case of salmon, we 

 must suppose that, in addition to his own reckless 

 slaughter, a proprietor had no ground on which birds 

 would breed, and nevertheless so acted as to make 



