SALMON— ENGLISH LAWS FOE THEIR PROTECTION. 119 



From early times laws have been enacted in order to prevent the extermination 

 of these fishes, ■whether from immoderate capture, or to secure a free passage for 

 breeding salmon from the sea to their spawning beds, and a safe descent when 

 unfit for food or too small for consumption, as well as to obviate other deleterious 

 agencies. It has also been found necessary to prohibit each individual proprietor 

 from increasing the efficacy of his methods of capture to the injury of his neigh- 

 bour or that of the general interest. For rivers only hold a supply to a limited 

 amount, and should a disproportionate capture be made at one spot,- this unduly 

 diminishes the share which would otherwise accrue to the owners of fisheries in 

 the upper waters. It has consequently been decided (in theory) that each fishery 

 is merely entitled to its share of the general supply. 



In legislation there ai'e two main objects to be considered ; first that it is 

 necessary in order to prevent the depopulation of our rivers to regulate captures 

 and diminish obstructions in its lower reaches and the contiguous seas, as well as 

 to prohibit pollutions. And, secondly, that it is merely in the upper waters and 

 affluents that improvement can be carried out by assisting the breeding of these 

 fishes in every necessary way, and giving them rest during the spawning season 

 as well as by protecting their eggs and young. 



It is evident that the habits of a salmon compel it to live when in fresh water 

 in a locality where man is able to secure it, or else it has to annually pass through 

 some narrow channel which is capable of being commanded by the fisherman. 



If salmon rivers are fully stocked, which no English ones are, it would of course 

 be useless to try and augment the number of fish in it, for even if fairly treated 

 they must remain stationary, and will need protection, because as population 

 grows their value as food augments, thus increasing the inducement for their 

 capture and sale. When destruction passes certain limits, tending to rapacity, 

 scarcity sets in owing to the fish being unable to reproduce as rapidly as they are 

 captured. 



In salmon fisheries there are at least three forces at work : (1) the riparian 

 proprietor who lets them for rent, and sometimes endeavours to realize all he can 

 by them ; (2) Fishermen who hire them or ply their occupation in waters that are 

 free, their purpose being to capture all they are able ; (3) Fish Commissioners 

 who, if they were competent and did their duty, should be the advocates of the 

 fish to preserve them from undue destruction, and assist in their due propagation 

 in order that the greatest benefits for the community could be obtained from the 

 waters. 



One peculiarity of the English laws relating to the rights of proprietorship 

 in salmon appears to be that in the sea and in tidal rivers the public have a 

 general right to fish for them (unless some private right overrules the general one), 

 while in such rivers as are not navigable this right is, as a rule, vested in the 

 proprietors along either banks of the stream, but which may from some cause, as 

 by purchase, have become alienated from the owner of the neighbouring land. 



The many phases through which salmon legislation in the British Isles has 

 passed would require volumes for its full and clear explanation. At first, the 

 primary consideration appears to have been the good of the fisheries, and devices 

 injuriously affecting them were in the earliest periods of English law reprobated 

 as public nuisances. Especial attention was drawn in Magna Charta, a.d. 1215, 

 to how the Crown had attempted to disregard these laws, and permitted certain 



(1752). The annual average of salmon taken in the Usk from 1871 to 1884 inclusive, and which was 

 effected solely by rods, was 1562, the smallest number being 566 in 1876, and the largest 3556 in 1879. 

 As regards the rivers along the Southern coast, the majority, as has been already referred to, 

 are generally late ; but it is remarkable, in the evidence adduced in 1860, what fishermen then 

 considered to be a clean fish, for some believed they might be so up to within a week of spawning. 

 Mr. Buckland gave a list of the salmon captured in the public waters of the Hampshire rivers, 

 Avon and Stour, commencing prior to the passing of the Act of 1861. It was as follows:— 

 1860, 40 fish ; 1861, 70 fish ; 1862, 80 fish ; 1863, 360 fish ; 1864, 380 fish ; 1865, 430 fish, 

 averaging 14 lb. each ; 1866, 460 fish, averaging llf lb. ; 1867, 317 fish, averaging 12J lb. ; 

 1868, 75 fish, averaging 9^ lb.; 1869, 652 fish, averaging 9^ lb.; 1870, 873 fish, averaging 12| lb.; 

 1871, 549 fish, averaging 121 lb. ; 1872, 364 fish, averaging 12 lb. ; and 1873, 344 fish, averaging 

 12 lb. each. 



