THE THAMES AIJGLING SOCIETY. 315 



from. The other matters are almost beyond their reach. 

 It takes a long, long time, where the fish have fair play, 

 to fish a river out ; and I believe that, if the Thames had 

 fair play, no amount of fishing would do so : but with the 

 swans to eat the spawn by barge-loads, the sewage to cut 

 ofi" the most valuable part of its fishery from the sea, to 

 the extinction of salmon, sea-trout, shad, lamprey, stur- 

 geon, &c., the immense diminution of the eel and other 

 valuable fish, and the yearly slaughter of myriads of such 

 fish as are left to us ; with the canalization of the river,^ 

 which has for a long series of years been going on under 

 the management of the Navigation authorities, so that 



' That I am not writing without being able to give instances of 

 the exceedingly destructiTe effects of canalizing rivers, I will cite 

 two instances on the Thames, both of which came immediately 

 under my notice. Many years since one of the best fishing places 

 on the Thames was Hampton Court, or rather Moulsey. At that 

 time opposite the lock, on the other side of the river, was a very 

 deep hole, with a strong eddy ; the bottom of this hole was covered 

 with all sorts of rubbish, old punts, old trees, &c. &;c., amongst 

 which any quantity of fish could always, in all waters and weathers, 

 find a secure and quiet harbour. Barbel of almost (now) fabulous 

 size used to tenant it, while the bream and chub found in it seemed 

 inexhaustible. Many and many a hundredweight of fish have I, 

 with poor old Bill Wisdom's assistance, coaxed out of that hole 

 into my punt — well. When the new lock was made, this hole was 

 partially filled up. It was thought that the eddy exercised a malign 

 influence on something or other, although, as an engineer, I never 

 could make out what or how-: it was, however, thought necessary 

 to mitigate the hole, and mitigated it was accordingly ; and the 

 fishing has never recovered the blow it then received. Again, 

 Hampton deeps were, perhaps, with the exception of Shepperton, 

 the most famous on the river. There were many excellent swims 

 in them. Barbel of huge size were con&tantly taken there. Bream 

 abounded, and other fish were found there in proportion. Some 



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