salmon;dje. 363 



town, and to be received by the overseer or overseers of the poor thereof, in the 

 manner provided for in the first section of this act. And in case such dam shall not 

 have been so altered within the time above-mentioned, such dam shall be adjudged 

 a public nuisance, and may be abated in the same manner as is provided in the 

 second section of this act. And further, that any mill or other dam which shall be 

 hereafter erected across said river, or any branch or channel thereof, shall be con- 

 structed with an apron or slope as aforesaid. And any owner or owners of such 

 dam, which shall be hereafter constructed acroBS said river as aforesaid, who shall 

 neglect or refuse to comply with the provisions of this section, shall respectively for- 

 feit the same penalty, to be prosecuted for, received and applied, as is herein before 

 provided in this section. 



§ 4. And be it further enacted, That it shall not be lawful for any person to fish 

 for, catch, or take Salmon, while passing over such aprons or slopes, or within the 

 distance of four rods of said slopes, aprons or dam ; And any person offending herein, 

 shall forfeit and pay the sum of twenty-five dollars, to be recovered and applied in 

 the manner provided for in and by the first section of this act. 



§ 5. And be it further enacted, That nothing contained in the first three sections 

 of this act, shall be so construed as to prevent the fishing for, catching 1 , or taking 

 Salmon with a spear, in the waters aforesaid, by the owner or owners, lessee or lea 

 sees, and their lawfully authorized agents of the lands over which the waters of said 

 river flow, or adjoining the waters of Lake Ontario aforesaid. 



§ 6. And be it further enacted, That this act shall take effect on the first day of 

 January, eighteen hundred and fifty. 



A. L. Tiiomason, Chairman. 



I earnestly recommend the passage -of similar laws to this, by the 

 Legislatures of the various Eastern States, especially by that*of Maine, 

 in reference to every river eastward, at least, of the mouth of the Ken- 

 nebeck, as the only method by which the speedily approaching extinc- 

 tion of the Salmon can be prevented. 



I have no doubt, however, that if the same law were passed by the 

 Legislatures of Connecticut and New York, with regard to the fine 

 river which gives name to that first State, and to the noble Hudson, 

 coupled with an absolute prohibition to take or destroy the Salmon for 

 the space of five years, that this, the king of fishes, might be re-intro- 

 duced into those waters, by the adoption of the simple method des- 

 cribed at page 60 et sequentes of- this volume. 



And I take this opportunity of stating, that I have good hope of ma- 

 king such arrangements as will enable me to procure, in this coming 

 spring, such supplies of the Salmon fry, in the state which admits of 



