But still her countenance I scarce could scan, As solemn summer heavens burning bare. Around her head a crystal circlet shone, And when she spoke her voice was now so sweet "He is so weak, so weak who should be strong, "The sun indeed shines ever in the sky: But when the realm is turned from him to night, When moon and stars gleam faint and cold on high Or else are veiled by stormy clouds from sight; "The traveller then through field and sombre wood Finds his own poor dim lamp best guide his feet; The man at home his household taper good For useful light, his household fire for heat. "Celestial flowers are set in earthly clay: However small the circle of a life, If it be whole it shall expand for aye; And all the Heavens are furled in Man and Wife. "So thou, the man, the circle incomplete, Shalt find thy other segment and be whole; Thy manhood with her womanhood shall meet And form one perfect self-involving soul. Thy love shall grow by feeling day by day Celestial love, thro' human, blessing thee; Thy faith wax firm by witnessing alway Triumphant faith for ever glad and free. "By her obedience thy soul shall learn How far humility transcendeth pride; By her pure intuitions shall discern The fatal flaws of reason unallied. "Thou shalt see strength in weakness conquering, The bravest action with the tenderest heart, Self-sacrifice unconscious hallowing The lightest playing of the meanest part. "Chastity, purity, and holiness Shall shame thy virile grossness; and the power Of beauty in the spirit and its dress Reveal all virtue lovely as a flower. "Till love for her shall teach thee love for all; Till perfect reverence for her shall grow To faith in God which nothing can appal, Tho' His green world be dark with sin and woe. "Children, by all they are to glad and grieve, "A priceless boon! and, like such boons to men, When thus her words were ended, it might seem Her supernatural beauty grew less bright, The Spirit of the empyréan Heaven Yet still she was the same, thus different: The pinions there, tho' not put forth in power; Both sheathed thus safely till the fitting hour: And in her mien, and on her face and brow, I woke. A tender hand all silently Had drawn the curtain and dispersed the gloom; The whole triumphant morning in a sea Of warmth and splendour dazzled thro' the room. The dearest face, the best-beloved eyes, JAMES THOMSON. November, 1859. THE SALMON FISHERIES. THE present state of the salmon fisheries excites an unusual amount of discontent in at least one class of those interested in them. That discontent seems to be well founded, and is certainly not new. Yet Parliament has ever lent a ready ear to the fisherman's complaint. The early statute books are full of Salmon Acts. In later days Mr. Henley, a member of the old school, short of speech and jealous of the time of the House, said regretfully that there never was a session without its Fishery Bill, and in the last dozen years Acts relating to the fisheries of England alone have been passed in 1870, 1873, 1876, 1877, 1879, and Bills on the same subject were brought to the House of Commons in 1880 and 1881. Whence comes this perpetual need for legislative aid? It accords no doubt with the genius of the English people that all legislation should be tentative. Our very Constitution has been piled up precedent by precedent, each one created with extreme caution as occasion demanded, and held to with tenacity when created. But no other subject than the fisheries has occupied Parliament from its most ancient days, still occupies it, and seems likely to occupy it as long as Parliament shall exist. And yet the nature of salmon does not change, the rivers still run between the same banks, and fishermen are as greedy, no more and no less than were their fathers before them. Such an expenditure of legislation seems to show that though these fisheries need protection, and have always been considered well worthy of it, their requirements have not been understood. If the public had known what they wanted, Parliament would have readily granted it. Unfortunately, however, the subject has been generally regarded as one, interesting indeed, but scarcely within the province of the uninitiated to discuss. The public, neglectful or ignorant of their own large interests therein, have been misled into thinking it a question of rods v. nets, or sport v. business. By many the fisheries have been remitted to the care of natural history or fishery specialists; by others treated as a prize to be fought over by the owners of rivers or their banks. The men best acquainted with them have been those whose interests were most affected. The wider public claims have been lost sight of, and the narrow local policy, too often allowed to prevail, has required in a short time recurrence to better principles with fresh legislation to enforce them. A clear idea, then, of the salmon fisheries and the interests connected with them may help greatly to a conclusion respecting their present requirements, and to try to obtain this I will first endeavour to describe what a river is quâ salmon, and to show what the interests involved in these fisheries are. The upper part of a river is the nursery. In the shallows of the upper waters and in the streams flowing into the river the fish are mostly bred. The lower part of the fresh waters, where some are also bred, chiefly serves as a highway up and down which they pass as their nature requires to the salt water below, to feed and fatten, and back to the nursery to breed. The interests in the rivers may be divided into two, public and private, and each of these may again be subdivided the private interest into that of the upper and lower proprietors, according to the position they occupy on the river bank; the public into the interest of the fishermen on their common law right in the tidal waters, and that of the consumer. Of these four interests three are inter-opposed. Upon the fresh-water owner, especially the upper, falls the care, and to a great extent the cost, of protection during the spawning season when the fish are most easily killed; and to the lower or tidal men the principal harvest of the fish that the upper men have bred. The interest of the consumer is in accord with that of each of the three classes, but their interests directly conflict with one another; each desires to take the greater share of the produce, and as that produce is limited, the fish that each takes is a fish lost to the others. Their claims, then, are difficult to reconcile, and yet unless they are satisfied the fisheries cannot be prosperous. For the well-being of the river depends on the good-will and co-operation of all those who have a right of fishing it. More especially is necessary the goodwill of the upper men. That no force of watchers or bailiffs could stop winter poaching in the small streams of the hills or moors, unless they were aided by the local keepers and the local good-will, has been proved again and again in Scotland and Ireland, and still more lately in the case of the Wye. And these small streams are the most valuable portions of the rivers for breeding purposes. There is but one way of solving the question, and that is, in legislating upon it, to disregard the conflicting claimants altogether, and to keep exclusively in view the welfare of the public interest as a consumer. Any endeavour to make a compromise between the three classes of fishermen, upper and lower, must fail unless this rule be observed. I contend that all good fishery legislation has been based upon it; that by right, by law and by necessity the consumer's interest must be treated as paramount; that unless it be so regarded and so treated, the fisheries cannot exist; and that, if so treated, the private proprietors and public fishermen, as well as the public generally, will greatly profit, whilst to each class will be given all that they have a fair claim to demand. The right, however, of Parliament to deal with the fisheries on |