It is recorded that at one time great hauls of salmon could be taken either in the rivers of Scotland or Ireland, and that in England salmon were also quite plentiful. One miraculous draught is mentioned as having been taken out of the river Thurso, on which occasion the enormous number of two thousand five hundred fish were captured. We shall never again see such a haul, unless we give the rivers a rest for a space of five years or so. A jubilee would greatly help to restore the _status quo_. The discovery of packing in ice by Mr. Dempster led, as was to be expected, to so large a trade in fresh salmon between Scotland and England, that it at once effected a great rise in the price of the fish. High prices had their usual consequence with the producer. Every device was put in requisition to catch fish for London and the Continent; and if this was the case at the beginning, it will be readily understood how rapidly the fish-trade rose in importance as new modes of transit became common. The demand and supply at once assumed such enormous proportions as to tell with fatal effect on the fisheries; and the high prices led at the same time to such extensive and organised poaching as I have attempted to describe, and which, notwithstanding much police organisation, still exists. At one time there were famous salmon in the Thames, and hopes are entertained of fish being successfully cultivated in that river. It is certain that much deleterious matter has been allowed to get into that stream and also into that famous salmon river the Severn; and in the rivers of Cornwall I believe the hope of ever breeding salmon has been entirely given up in consequence of the poisonous matters which flow from the mines. Many rivers which were known to contain salmon in abundance in the golden age of the fisheries are now tenantless from matter by which they are polluted, such as the refuse of gasworks, paper-mills, etc.