2. See MacDonagh, O. O. G. M., “The Nineteenth-Century Revolution in Government: A Reappraisal,” Historical Journal, I (1958), 52–67CrossRefGoogle Scholar; MacDonagh, O. O. G. M., A Pattern of Government Growth (London, 1961)Google Scholar; Briggs, Asa, “The Welfare State in Historical Perspective,” Archives Europeenes de Sociologie, II (1961), 221–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hart, J., “Nineteenth-Century Social Reform: a Tory Interpretation of History,” Past and Present, No. 31 (1965), 39–61Google Scholar; Cromwell, V., “Interpretations of Nineteenth-Century Administration: An Analysis,” Victorian Studies, IX (1966), 245–55Google Scholar.

3. For general surveys see Clark, G. Kitson, The Making of Victorian England (London, 1962)Google Scholar; Burn, W. L., The Age of Equipoise (London, 1964)Google Scholar. For special studies see Lambert, R. J., Sir John Simon, 1816-1904, and English Social Administration (London, 1963)Google Scholar; Parris, H., Government and the Railways in Nineteenth-Century Britain (London, 1965)Google Scholar; MacLeod, R., “The Alkali Acts Administration, 1863-84: The Emergence of the Civil Scientist,” Victorian Studies, IX (1965), 85–112Google Scholar.

4. The Salmon Acts were, with the later Alkali Acts, “the first and … only Acts which sanction the expenditure of public money on inspection in cases where the object of such inspection is … mainly the protection of private property.” Report of the Royal Commission on Noxious Vapours, 1878 (C. 2159), XLIV, 27Google Scholar. This generalization is valid only for England and Wales. The establishment of the Irish Linen Control Board, about 1750, seems to have been the first such legislation in the British Isles as a whole.

5. See Angler, An [SirScott, Walter], “Salmonia or Days of Fly-Fishing,” Quarterly Review, XXXVII (1828), 534Google Scholar.

6. Only cereals were imported, since fresh meat could not yet be satisfactorily frozen and shipped. See Mitchell, J. T. and Raymond, J., The History of the Frozen Meat Trade (London, 1912)Google Scholar. In 1866 the Royal Society of Arts, in response to the problem, appointed a special Food Committee to investigate “the production, importation and preservation of food.” SirWood, Henry, A History of the Royal Society of Arts (London, 1913), p. 459Google Scholar.

7. Times, 28 Mar. 1861.

8. “A prime salmon is quite as valuable on the average as a Southdown sheep, and has been known at certain seasons to bring as much as ten shillings per pound weight in a London fish shop.” “The Salmon Question,” Quarterly Review, CXIII (1863), 389Google Scholar.

9. The term “fixed engines” referred to fixed nets and other fishing devices frequently employed in nonnavigable rivers. Technically, fixed engines included “stake nets, bag nets, putts, putchers, and all fixed instruments for catching or for facilitating the catching of fish.” See Parliamentary Papers, 1862 (243), IV, 241Google Scholar.

10. Times, 5 Sep. 1854. See Marshall, Henry, A Few Suggestions for Restoring and Preserving the Salmon Fisheries of Great Britain (London, 1885), p. 2.Google Scholar

11. Times, 17 May 1861.

12. Russel, A., The Salmon (Edinburgh, 1864)Google Scholar; “Mr. Russel on the Salmon,” North British Review, XLII (1865), 168Google Scholar.

13. “The Salmon Question,” Quarterly Review, CXIII, 389Google Scholar.

14. Times, 28 Mar. 1861. With the recurrence of unproductive fishing seasons, counsels of fear spread among the fishing communities, especially, and at first, in Scotland. One zealous Scottish pastor advanced a spirited proposal for “radical reform” of the fisheries, demanding either the drastic use of fixed engines to catch all fish swimming in a given river, or else governmental action “to buy up all the fisheries in the Kingdom, and to work them in strict accordance with rules based on the principles of natural science and the results of practical observation.” Edinburgh Review, XCIII (Apr. 1851)Google Scholar. On other “nationalization” proposals see Williamson, Dugald S., Thoughts on the Present Scarcity of Salmon (Stranraer, 1852)Google Scholar, p. v. See also “The Decline of the Salmon Fisheries,” Scotch Reformers' Gazette, 1853-54.

15. Report of the Select Committee Appointed to Inquire into the Present State of the Laws Affecting the Salmon Fisheries of England and Wales, 1868–1869 (361), VII, §8Google Scholar.

16. “The Salmon: Fishing, Breeding and Legislation,” Quarterly Review, CI (1857), 143Google Scholar.

17. See Field, XV (1860), 73, 174, 240Google Scholar.

18. Report from the Select Committee of the House of Lords on Salmon Fishing in Scotland, 1860 (456), XIX, 1Google Scholar. The salmon industry in Scotland had been discussed at length by a Select Committee in 1824 and had been partially improved by “Drummond's Act” in 1825 (9 Geo. IV, c. 39). This act, however, revealed little scientific understanding of salmon habits and was wholly reviewed ten years later, in 1836. This fresh Select Committee suffered under much the same disability of scientific knowledge as its predecessor, and the legislation resulting from its report was vexatious and futile. See [Williamson, D. S.], Remarks on the Proposed Changes in the Laws Regulating the Salmon Fishery of Scotland (London, 1836)Google Scholar; Robert Knox, F.R.S.E., Observations upon a Report by the Select Committee on the Salmon Fisheries of Scotland, 1836 (Edinburgh, 1837)Google Scholar; Young, Andrew, The Natural History and Habits of Salmon; with Reasons for the Decline of the Fisheries (London, 1854), pp. 1-16, 94–103.Google Scholar

19. See Report of the Royal Commission Appointed to Inquire into Salmon Fisheries (England and Wales), 1861 (2768), XXIII, xxiiGoogle Scholar. The Commission consisted of William Ffennell, Irish fisheries expert; Sir William Jardine, ornithologist, geologist, and natural historian; and Sir George Kettilby Rickards, sometime Drummond Professor of Political Economy at Oxford. Jardine had recently participated in attempts to apply scientific principles of artificial breeding, such as those introduced with government support in France, to salmon rivers in Scotland. See SirJardine, William, “Experiments in Artificial Breeding at Stormontfield,” Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, LXXII (1857), 203Google Scholar; his report to the British Association, 1834, p. 613; and his comprehensive British Salmonidae (London, 1839–1841)Google Scholar.

20. Report, Royal Commission, 1861 (2768), XXIII, xxxvGoogle Scholar.

21. Including twenty-six public and seven private acts. See Ashworth, Thomas, The Salmon Fisheries of England (London, 1868), pp. 5–9Google Scholar. Ashworth of Cheadle, Cheshire, bought the Galway (Corrib) fishery in Ireland in 1852 and acted on behalf of attempts to adopt Irish fishery laws in England. See Went, A. E. J., Irish Salmon and Salmon Fisheries (London, 1955)Google Scholar, Preface.

22. Report, Royal Commission, 1861 (2768), XXIII, xxxvGoogle Scholar.

23. Ibid., XXIII, xxxvi.

24. Which, it was feared, might impose on magistrates the necessity of “a very intimate knowledge of natural history.” 3 Hansard 163: 1374.

25. This, he felt, would interfere with the rights of persons having property in rivers. Ibid. 163: 1375.

26. Ibid. “The next thing,” he foresaw, “would be to appoint inspectors for the preservation of foxes, pheasants or any other game.” Ibid. 164: 938.

27. Ibid. 164: 770.

28. Field, XV (1860), 413Google Scholar. “With private enterprise and intelligence we would have been content until such knowledge, had been diffused at this point as to make trickery impossible … We foresee another fishery board … with a fishery police of inspectors and bailiffs, with salaries, places and patronage for a troup of corrupt place hunters whose chief recommendation will be that they know as much about the habits of salmon as they do of the icthyosphere.”

29. 3 Hansard 164: 1343.

30. In Oct. 1860 the Field urged Scottish and English proprietors to stop “hurrying and thirsting for commissions and boards,” and advised that “if we are to be taken in hand by a Board whose officers are to be appointed under ministerial patronage … then we say, let us alone.” The journal wished to see only a clarifying and consolidating measure. Once fixed engines were declared illegal, the Field thought county police would be sufficient to guard against contravention. Field, XVI (1860), 438Google Scholar; XVII (1861), 101.

31. See James Patterson (Special Commissioner for English Fisheries), The Objection to Compulsory Fishways in Our Salmon Rivers Considered and Answered (London, 1870)Google Scholar.

32. Field, XVIII (1861), 79.Google Scholar

33. Times, 28 Mar. 1861.

34. Progressive Liberal M.P. for South Durham, manufacturer, and coal owner, who believed in “strict economy in our national resources.” Dod's Parliamentary Guide, 1861, p. 265Google Scholar.

35. In the event that Quarter Sessions refused to pay the salaries of these officers, a subscription fund was set up to which the gentry lent their names and support. Times, 9 Oct. 1861.

36. Ibid., 25 Oct. 1861. The group reflected the widespread bipartisan spirit of conservancy, Naas was a Tory, and Steel and Lawson were Liberals. Wyndham was a Tory but was on record as not against “cautious progress.” Dod's Parliamentary Guide, 1861, p. 313Google Scholar.

37. William Joshua Ffennell (1799-1867), “fishery reformer”; former chairman of Suir Preservation Society and fishery inspector under the Irish Board of Works at the time of the 1848 famine. D.N.B. “With much energy and sturdiness of opinion, Mr. Ffennell preserved the bonhomie peculiar to Irishmen, which can arrange a difficulty pleasantly, and his part was one in which difficulties between conflicting interests, requiring great tact … were a constant occurrence.” Field, XXIX (1867), 207Google Scholar; XVIII (1861), 422. Similar testimony to his twenty-two years of fishery service is given in Land and Water, III (1867), 173.Google Scholar

38. Returns Relating to the Inspector of Salmon Fisheries, 1872 (368), LIIIGoogle Scholar, 2. The substance of these instructions, specified in the principal act at a time when inspectors often had to discover by personal experience both the object of their work and the means of doing it, suggests the impact of a straightforward Irish transplant to England.

39. 1st Annual Report of the Inspectors of Salmon Fisheries (England and Wales), 1862 (4301), XIX, 3–4Google Scholar; Times, 20 Nov. 1862; Field, XX (1862), 175.Google Scholar

40. Times, 1 Dec. 1862. In one case a £5 fine was levied upon a workman for selling a salmon allegedly found dead in a river during close time.

41. Ibid., 23 Dec. 1862.

42. See Day, Francis, British and Irish Salmonidae (London, 1887), p. 121Google Scholar; Bund, J. Willis, Salmon Problems (London, 1885), pp. 10et seqGoogle Scholar.

43. 2nd Ann. Rep., 1863 (84), XXVIII, 56Google Scholar. See Lambert, Sir John Simon.

44. 2nd Ann. Rep., XXVIII, 56Google Scholar. They added, “No Fishery Act of modern times has been received with so little opposition, and has so quickly gained over the greater proportion of opponents.” Compare the similar attitudes of the alkali manufacturers towards the Alkali Act of 1863.

45. See Report, Select Committee on the Salmon Fisheries, 1868–1869 (361), VII, 525.Google Scholar

46. 2nd Ann. Rep., XXVIII, 57Google Scholar.

47. Some justices at Quarter Sessions had strenuously supported the act and had appointed conservators, but the latter had no specific powers and could only by voluntary means collect subscriptions, employ watchers (or “water bailiffs”), and direct prosecutions. 4th Ann. Rep., 1865 (193), XXIX, 8.Google Scholar

48. 2nd Ann. Rep., XXVIII, 66Google Scholar.

49. The fisheries tribunal was another Irish precedent. Parliament had forbidden fixed engines in Ireland by the Act of 1842, but the act was limited in effect by difficulties of enforcement. An amending act was passed in 1848, following agitation by river proprietors on behalf of draught-net fishermen, many of whom had been thrown out of work by the 1842 act. An act in 1850 clarified the applicability of the principal act to fixed engines but failed to resolve the issue. Finally, in 1863, a Special Commission was formed to study the problem of fixed engines and their relevance to fishery fluctuations between relative conditions of renovation and decay. Frederick Eden served on this Commission. See 4th Ann. Rep., XXIX, 13Google Scholar.

50. Ibid., XXIX, 21.

51. Field, XXI (1864), 336.Google Scholar

52. 3 Hansard 180: 363. A similar point of controversy about the legality of appointing inspectors to enter private property had already been settled in connection with the Factory Acts. The issue of property inspection along inland waterways arose again in the inspection of canalboats.

53. Ibid. 180: 857. Lord Stanley of Alderley carried the bill through the Lords, much as he had against opposition to the Alkali Act of 1863.

54. Field, XXV (1865), 22.Google Scholar

55. Soon many voluntary associations disbanded and reformed as ginger groups within boards of conservators. See Times, 27 July and 26 Aug. 1865. The proposed imposition of a “rate-in-aid” to supplement license fees predictably elicited protest from the Field, which thought the motion unworthy of an English country gentleman. Field, XXIV (1864), 456.Google Scholar

56. 5th Ann. Rep., 1866 (280), XX, 15.Google Scholar

57. Ffennell noted with satisfaction that “the legislature has provided a means by which these matters may be determined and set at rest forever without further delay, and at the same time relieving the fishery interests from the consequences of protracted and expensive litigation.” Ibid., XX, 5. The first three commissioners (Eden, Admiral Wallace Houston, and James Patterson) were appointed in Feb. 1866. In June and Sep. 1866 the first two were replaced, respectively, by Captain T. A. B. Spratt, R.N., and Major Henry Scott. See Returns of the Dates of Appointments of the Special Commissioners for English Fisheries, 1868–1869 (302), L, 1Google Scholar; Times, 12 Sep. 1867. Both Eden and Houston had seen service in Ireland, and Patterson, a barrister, had published a digest of the Salmon Act of 1861.

58. 5th Ann. Rep., XX, 4Google Scholar.

59. Ibid.

60. One reviewer cynically observed, “It seems to be quite an established part of our system now, whenever we do get a good man, to use him up as speedily as possible.” Field, XXVIII (1866), 414Google Scholar; Land and Water, III (1867), 173.Google Scholar

61. Field, XXVII (1866), 415.Google Scholar

62. PRO, Thomas Baker to Ernest Percival, Home Office, 14 Oct. 1868, HO 45/9342/1797.

63. See Baker, Thomas, The Insidious “Red Tape” System of Government in England (London, 1870), p. 207Google Scholar, where he cited the Privy Council's medical officer (John Simon) as a “capital illustration of how completely the great majority of Members of Parliament are in the hands of experts.”

64. Thomas Baker, a barrister by training, and former clerk to Southwood Smith at the General Board of Health, wrote several legal manuals and compendia: The Laws Relating to Burials in England and Wales (London, 1855; six eds. by 1898)Google Scholar; The Laws Relating to Public Health (London, 1865)Google Scholar; and The Laws Relating to Salmon Fisheries (London, 1866)Google Scholar. He was also an antivaccinationist and a confirmed believer in anticontagionist Chadwickian sanitary policy.

65. F. T. Buckland (1826-80), B.A. (Christ Church, Oxford); medical student, 1848-51; Assistant Surgeon, Life Guards, 1854; on staff of the Field, 1856-65; editor of Land and Water, 1866; author of many articles on natural history and fish culture, including: Curiosities of Natural History (London, 1857–1872)Google Scholar; Log Book of a Fisherman Zoologist (London, 1875)Google Scholar; Natural History of British Fishes (London, 1881)Google Scholar. See also Bompas, C., Life of Frank Buckland (London, 1885)Google Scholar; a memoir by Walpole, Spencer, “Mr. Frank Buckland,” Macmillan's Magazine, XLIII (1881), 303–09Google Scholar; Times, 1 Feb. 1867.

66. D.N.B. As the Field commented in 1880, “he never aimed at becoming a profound writer on science; his knowledge of species may not have received recognition among the scientific men of his day, but he had the great merit, as a pioneer of popular writing, of making natural history attractive for the multitude.” Cited in Rose, R. N., The Field, 1853-1953 (London, 1953), p. 70Google Scholar.

67. His home in Albany Street, filled with wide varieties of improbable animals, was one of the zoological showpieces of London. His practical knowledge and familiarity with the current state of the fisheries made him a valuable authority on the subject of fish economy, and his genial humanity made him a popular figure. Nature, XXXIII (1885), 385–86Google Scholar.

68. Land and Water, I (1866), 25, 53, 467Google Scholar.

69. Spencer Walpole, the Home Secretary, offered Buckland the post of salmon inspector on Feb. 6, 1867, in a letter delivered during a dinner at the Piscatorial Society. Buckland accepted the post immediately; on Feb. 12 he visited the Fishery Office for the first time. Bompas, , Buckland, pp. 182–83.Google Scholar

70. D.N.B. (2nd Supplement, 1912).

71. Field, XXVII (1867), 245Google Scholar; XXIX (1869), 366.

72. Land and Water, V (1868), 237.Google Scholar

73. Ibid., V (1868), 227.

74. Ibid., V (1868), 247.

75. Walpole later recalled that “the old traditions of the office were snapped at the period of Mr. Buckland's appointment, and the new inspectors, without the experience of an experienced colleague, had to map out their own policy.” Holland, M., “Sir Spencer Walpole,” in Walpole, Spencer, Essays Political and Biographical, ed. Holland, Francis (London, 1908), p. 298Google Scholar. Land and Water, IX (1879), 10Google Scholar, soon altered its editorial policy in favour of the inspectors, although the Field continued to be cynically hostile.

76. This seemingly straightforward discharge was not completed without a long legal battle between Baker, who charged that he was being ousted through the nepotistic collusion of the Home Secretary and the younger Walpole. A suit for libel was begun by Baker, and correspondence between solicitors, which threatened to involve the Home Secretary himself, continued until compensation was agreed upon by Lord Stanley, acting as referee. Walpole wrote to his uncle, Ernest Percival, his father's private secretary: “This will show you that I have reason in saying with Cromwell — ‘the Lord deliver us from a lawyer.’” PRO, Walpole to Percival, 6 Oct. 1868, HO 45/9324/17,970. Thomas Baker recorded his struggles in A Battling Life, Chiefly in the Civil Service (London, 1885), pp. 128–31Google Scholar.

77. Field, XXXI (1868), 257.Google Scholar

78. 6th Ann. Rep., 1867 (44), XVIII, 4.Google Scholar

79. Ibid. One year later, after a complete survey of England and Wales, he reasserted: “There can be no doubt that a continuous and diligent inquiry, carried out in a scientific spirit, will demonstrate to us what are the requirements necessary to bring rivers to the highest state of civilisation and development of which they are capable…. Human knowledge of the nature of salmon fisheries and the great variety of circumstances in which they exist throughout the kingdom is by no means yet complete. To perfect it, a constant study of the questions of engineering and of the law must be pursued.” 7th Ann. Rep., 1867–1868 (160), XIXGoogle Scholar, Preface.

80. During the period 1867-70 the number of men employed in salmon fishing fluctuated between 4,600-5,980; prosecutions for offences between 260-413; and convictions under the Salmon Acts between 197-328. Fluctuations in salmon activity derived largely from unpredictable differences in the amount of rainfall during successive fishing seasons. See 10th Ann. Rep., 1871 (C. 320), XXV, 55–57.Google Scholar

81. 7th Ann. Rep., XIX, 87.Google Scholar

82. Ibid., XIX, 81-82; Times, 7 Apr. 1868. This provision was not made applicable to all rivers until 1948.

83. 10th Ann. Rep., XXV, 43Google Scholar. To critics who questioned his authority to range so far over policy issues, Walpole answered, “I conceive it my duty not only to give detailed account of my inspections, but also look forward to suggestions for regulation and improvement.” “It may seem presumptuous of me to suggest that greater powers should be given to the Inspectors of Fisheries than the present law has delegated to them, but the fact is that our present want of power is so palpable that it is absolutely necessary that additional powers should be accorded to us … If our inspection is to be real, it is clear that persuasion ought not, as it is now, to be our dernier ressort.” 7th Ann. Rep., XIX, 87Google Scholar; Times, 10 May 1869.

84. Chairman of the Tees Board of Conservators and M.P. for Stockton. See Dodds, J. P., The Salmon of the Tyne and Dams (London, 1856)Google Scholar; Times, 5 Mar. 1869; Biograph and Review, IV (1880), 453–56Google Scholar.

85. Field, XXXIII (1869), 414Google Scholar.

86. Evidence was heard from thirty-three witnesses: three inspectors; one special commissioner; three chairmen, six members, and two secretaries of boards of conservators; five engineers; one chief constable; two fishery lessees; six fishermen; two mill owners; and two others. See 10th Ann. Rep., XXV, 4Google Scholar.

87. Field, XXXIV (1869), 235Google Scholar, angrily demanded, “the country is paying these two gentlemen some £1200 or £1400 for their services and what have they done for it? … they have pottered about over the kingdom at vast extra expense; they have published reports which have certainly not been worth the cost of printing. How long the British taxpayer will stand this sort of thing remains to be seen.” When Walpole attempted to mollify opposition from the mill owners at the Select Committee, the Field denounced him for attempting “more mischief to the cause of the salmon fisheries than any other witness out of thousands who have been … examined.” Ibid., XXXV (2 Apr. 1870).

88. Report, Select Committee on Salmon Fisheries, 1870 (368), VIGoogle Scholar, §§6-8. The committee foreshadowed future organizational developments in fishery administration by suggesting that “jurisdiction in fishery matters should be transferred to the Board of Trade until, at least, the fisheries of the country are thought to be sufficiently developed to justify the establishment of a separate fishery department” (§6).

89. Ibid., VI, §16.

90. 10th Ann. Rep., XXV, 7Google Scholar.

91. Ibid. A factor which he felt would have the desirable side effect of keeping the “industrious mechanic” at the fishing stream rather than in the public house.

92. Ibid., XXV, 8.

93. Buckland described at length his policy towards the mill owners — the longstanding enemies of the salmon: “I have sometimes been called to task for not ‘fighting’ the salmon cause sufficiently against say, weir or mill owners. The element of ‘fighting’ is not, in the present days of enlightenment, at all called for. An injudicious zeal in the cause entrusted to an individual by the public, may often damage that cause more than promote it. As I have said in former reports, salmon do not form the sole food of the people; bread comes before salmon….

“I have found weir owners, as a class, most willing to advise fishery interests, … providing these interests do not interfere with their legal rights of water and their trade.

“In cases of this kind, where Parliament, I may almost say, appears to hesitate — or at all events is reluctant — to interfere seriously, I feel convinced that ‘persuasion is bettter than force’, and that private interviews and subsequent conversations will often succeed in obtaining for the salmon what no act of Parliament in the absence of the local executive could obtain.

“What the Public requires of me, as a Government officer, is to use my best endeavours to increase the supply of salmon. Long experience has shown how best to do this in individual cases. Those not actually engaged in the work can know nothing of the details required. Though my writings sometimes seem opposed to the salmon cause, yet I can assert, that what I say and do in this important matter is founded upon anxious thought and views of all sides of the question. Facts are the great things to be desired, and these can only be obtained by accurate observation out of doors, and by the dissecting knife and the microscope indoors. The science — for it ought to be elevated to a science — of salmon culture is yet in its infancy. I make it my daily business to endeavor to deduce from the facts that come before me the general laws of nature which are higher than the laws of man.” Ibid., XXV, 18.

94. 9th Ann. Rep., 1870 (C. 79), XIV, 29Google Scholar. The bill introduced in 1871 by J. P. Dodds, purporting to follow the committee's recommendations, varied from them in some essential particulars and was attacked by mill owners and both upper and lower water interests. The bill antagonized the conservators by its provision for representative elections and alienated the mill owners by proposing to extend the powers of the special commissioners. A deputation to the Home Office was led by John Whitwell (M.P. for Kendal, Westmorland), Nathaniel Buckley (M.P. for Staleybridge, Lancaster), the Duke of Beaufort, and Lord St. Vincent. The bill was also discussed at the Society of Arts, where these objections were aired. Land and Water, XI (1871), 227Google Scholar; XII (1871). Field, XXXVII (1871), 238, 360Google Scholar; XXXIX (1872), 212.

95. Dodds, owing to his chairmanship of the Tees Board, which supervised rather unusual river conditions, was reluctant to allow too many uniform compulsory powers to the Board of Conservators. The conservators in general, however, favoured having such powers. See Report, Royal Commission on Salmon Fisheries, 1902 (Cd. 1188), XIIIGoogle Scholar, Mins. Evid., Q. 22,645.

96. Field, XXXIX (1872), 264.Google Scholar

97. 3 Hansard 214: 1375.

98. H. A. Bruce added, “It was the business of the government representing the people to see that proper measures were taken in respect of salmon fishing with a view to the supply of food, and also to encourage the employment of the people.” Ibid. 214: 1379.

99. Field, XLI (1873), 291, 368Google Scholar. The editor admitted that salmon fishing was “surrounded by and connected with other rights and issues,” and supposed that nearly everyone who was involved in the bill found himself overpowered by these conflicting interests. Ibid., XLI (1873), 344.

100. Land and Water, XI (1871), 2.Google Scholar

101. “The Legislator,” Buckland wrote in 1874, “under proper advice has wisely fitted the law to the benefit of the salmon, for the simple reason that salmon refuse to take cognisance of the edicts of the law.” 13th Ann. Rep., 1874 (C. 971), XII, 9Google Scholar. In view of these changes, Home Secretary Bruce felt the work of the special commissioners was done. The commissioners were disbanded by the Salmon Fisheries Act, 1873 (36-37 Vict., c. 13). See 3 Hansard 215: 89.

102. Walpole reflected, “The elaborate regulations which the Act made for the due framing of by-laws ensure in every case their adequate consideration. The law might possibly be more vexatious if it were less complicated.” 13th Ann. Rep., XII, 91Google Scholar.

103. Ibid., XII, 75.

104. “It is quite certain that the Acts passed, since 1861, relative to salmon have greatly increased the supply of that fish. Why not, therefore, extend protection to other fish besides salmon?” As an afterthought he added, “having given my serious considerations to the cultivation of fish under every possible condition … I may, perhaps, be pardoned for introducing the subject in this place, as this Report is the only official means for bringing the facts related to the fisheries before Mr. Cross and the members of the Legislature, many of whom are practically interested in the subject.” 16th Ann. Rep., 1877 (C. 1751), XXIV, 22Google Scholar.

105. “I am gradually collecting facts, which, when put together, will I trust, be deemed sufficiently weighty to induce the legislature to preserve the fry of fish which are bred in our freshwater lakes, rivers, ponds, etc., as well as upon our own foreshores, and thus develop what ought to be a valuable natural industry, now so cruelly neglected and allowed to run to waste.” 15th Ann. Rep., 1876 (C. 1466), XVI, 27.Google Scholar

106. PRO, Walpole to Henry Winterbotham, Home Office, 10 May 1873, BT 13/36. Cf. Report on the Fisheries of the English Lake Districts, 1878 (C. 2004), XXI, ixGoogle Scholar. “The science of fish culture has indeed now advanced so much that it is difficult, if not impossible, to consider one kind of fish without at the same time becoming aware that the interests of the other fish may be in the same way affected; thus for example, the fry of sea fish and shrimp are of great value as food for the salmon; or to take another instance out of many, the supply of mussels to the public market is most valuable … In a Salmon Report, it would be out of place to go further into this important matter; suffice to say that, considering the present high price of food, and the gradual increase of population no attempt should be neglected to cause every acre of water to produce fish food in some form or other.” 16th Ann. Rep., XXIV, 5.Google Scholar

107. Sir Thomas Henry Farrer (1814-99), educated Eton and Balliol; called to the bar in 1844; joined Board of Trade, 1848, when Sir Stafford Northcote, a friend from Eton days, was Assistant Secretary; became Assistant Secretary of the Marine Department, 1854; Permanent Secretary of the Board, 1865-86; dogmatic free trader and noninterventionist; established brilliant administrative reputation at the Board of Trade, and wrote frequently on fiscal and monetary policy. See Farrer, T. H., The State in Its Relation to Trade (London, 1883)Google Scholar.

108. PRO, “Jurisdiction Respecting Sea Fisheries,” Board of Trade, Departmental Memorandum, T. H. Farrer, 16 Dec. 1879, p. 4.

109. Ibid., p. 3. See Report of Inspectors of Fisheries for England and Wales and Commissioners for Sea Fisheries, on Sea Fisheries of England and Wales, 1879 (C. 2449), XVII, v.Google Scholar

110. “Any official,” he wrote, “would incur grave responsibilities who neglected to impress the importance of such consolidation on the Government.” 19th Ann. Rep., 1880 (C. 2587), XIV, 77.Google Scholar

111. Field, XLIX (1877), 346.Google Scholar

112. Ibid., LVII (1882), 301. During his inspectorship Walpole frequently contributed articles on finance and trade to the Pall Mall Gazette and wrote, in 1874, a life of his grandfather, Spencer Perceval. In 1878, after he received a legacy of £10,000 from Lord Egmont, Walpole produced the first two volumes of his History of England from 1815, all of which was written by “flickering light of railway oil lamps.” See Walpole, , Essays Political and Biographical, pp. xiii–xiv.Google Scholar

113. A reviewer noted that “Mr. Buckland's report is seventy five pages of the total report, or more than half of the whole, … Mr. Walpole continues to say all that is required of him in twenty pages.” Field, XLVII (1876), 510.Google Scholar

114. “He lost no opportunity,” Walpole added, “of familiarising the public with the subject; he was in constant communication with the leading fish culturists both in this country and abroad. It is in part to his exertions that Australia owes the introduction of trout in its waters. In this country his name among fishermen has become a household word.” 20th Ann. Rep., 1881 (C. 2901), XXIII, 3.Google Scholar

115. 15th Ann. Rep., XVI, 61Google Scholar.

116. This was in contrast to the evaluation of £18,000 in 1863, and £30,000 in 1868. See Walpole's report, 16th Ann. Rep., XXIV, 53Google Scholar.

117. Field, XLIX (1877), 346.Google Scholar

118. Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Sir William Harcourt to T. H. Huxley, 23 Dec. 1880, Huxley Papers, XVIII, fol. 5. These papers provide an invaluable insight into Huxley's association with the Home Office and the fishery interests, as well as into his many other activities. A complete index to the holdings at Imperial College exists in Dawson, W. R., The Huxley Papers (London, 1946)Google Scholar.

119. Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Harcourt to Huxley, 25 Dec. 1880, Huxley Papers, XVIII, fol. 11. In the Commons Harcourt was asked to appoint a “thoroughly practical man”; he replied that the new appointment had been postponed so “that the whole matter could be considered and the department made more useful.” Field, LVII (1882), 301.Google Scholar

120. He therefore received £600 for his post at the Royal School of Mines, Jermyn Street, £200 for his lectureship in biology at the Normal School of Science, and £700 for his inspectorship. Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Huxley, 11 May 1885, Huxley Papers, XXX, fol. 136; Harcourt to Huxley, 27 Jan. 1881, ibid., XVIII, fol. 18.

121. Bibby, C., T. H. Huxley: Scientist, Humanist and Educator (London, 1959), p. 128Google Scholar. Bibby's otherwise excellent book makes no other reference to Huxley's contributions in the field of fisheries.

122. Huxley had given evidence before the Scottish Select Committee on Salmon in 1860, the Royal Commission on Trawling for Herring in 1862, and the Royal Commission on the Sea Fisheries in 1864-65.

123. Huxley to Col. John Donnelly, 27 Dec. 1880, in Huxley, Leonard, Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley (London, 1903), II, 290Google Scholar.

124. Huxley to Farrer, 18 Jan. 1881, in ibid., II, 291. On his first inspection Huxley reportedly ordered a man to sit down and later wrote to his wife, “We have begun very well, we have sat upon a duke.” Ibid., II, 299. His enthusiasm was caricatured by Punch, Mar. 1881.

125. Field, LVI (1881), 346.Google Scholar

126. Huxley, L., Life and Letters of T. H. Huxley, II, 292Google Scholar.

127. Walpole and Huxley also became good friends. See Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Walpole to Huxley, 17 Feb. 1881, Huxley Papers, XXVIII, fol. 122; dinner invitations, 18 Mar. 1882, etc., ibid., fol. 124. Leonard Huxley even asked Walpole to assist in writing the Life and Letters of his father. See ibid., II, 292-98. Walpole recalled marvellous conversations with Huxley “founded on knowledge, enlarged by memory, and brightened by humour.” Ibid., II, 295. And Huxley once wrote, in a letter to his wife from Wales, “Walpole is a capital companion — knows a great many things and talks well about them, so we get over the ground pleasantly.” Ibid., II, 299.

128. Field, LXI (1883), 76.Google Scholar

129. Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Walpole to Huxley and Mrs. Huxley, 18 Mar. 1882 - 19 Dec. 1886, Huxley Papers, XXVIII, fols. 125, 127, 128, 130, 132, 134.

130. The last of these efforts was probably the most important. In Dec. 1881 Huxley left for Wales to study the epidemic of salmon disease which had appeared in Conway. Rejecting fears that the epidemic was caused by chemical pollution, Huxley reported that the cause was biological. “We must look for the origin of the disease to the Saprolegniae which infest dead organic bodies in our fresh waters. Neither pollution, drought or overstocking will produce the disease, if the Saprolegniae is absent. The most these conditions can do is to favour the development or the diffusion of these materiens morbi where the Saprolegniae already exist.” Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Huxley Papers, LVII; Huxley, T. H., “A Contribution to the Pathology of the Epidemic Known as the ‘Salmon Disease,’” Proc. Roy. Soc., XXXIII (1882), 381–89Google Scholar.

131. Huxley, L., Life and Letters of T. H. Huxley, II, 303–04Google Scholar. In 1881, for example, Huxley was offered the Linacre Professorship at Oxford but declined on grounds of overwork. In the same year he delivered a paper to the International Medical Congress on the “Connection of Biological Science with Medicine” and read a paper on the “Rise and Progress of Paleontology” to the B.A.A.S. at York. In 1881-82 he sat on the Royal Commission on the Medical Acts and filled the intervals between his scientific lectures and speaking engagements with scientific articles.

132. Cf. Huxley, T. H., “Oysters and the Oyster Question,” Proc. Roy. Inst., X (1884), 336–58Google Scholar.

133. Sir Edward Birkbeck, Bt. (1833-1907), M.P. for North Norfolk, 1879-95, and East Norfolk, 1885-92; chairman, Royal National Lifeboat Association.

134. George Romanes, F.R.S., to Times, 30 Oct. 1883.

135. The Marine Biological Association opened a laboratory at Plymouth in June 1888 and a hatchery at Ormesby. The Plymouth laboratory was built at a cost of £12,000. Its income derived from the Fishmongers Company (£400 p.a.), from private subscriptions, and from a Treasury grant of £5000 outright, plus £500 p.a. for three years, rising to £1000 p.a. from 1892, which was won through the influence of its royal patron. In 1892 the income of the M.B.A. amounted to £2200. By contrast, the marine laboratory under Anton Dohrn in Naples cost £20,000 to build and £7000 p.a. to operate. At the same time the U.S. Fishery Commission had a budget of £70,000, and even the Scottish Fishery Board received upwards of £21,000 for fishery research. See PRO, Marine Biological Association to Chancellor of the Exchequer, 2 Nov. 1906, T 1/1069A/19726/1906.

136. Huxley, L., Life and Letters of T. H. Huxley, II, 333.Google Scholar

137. Ibid., II, 370.

138. Ibid.

139. Ibid., II, 298.

140. In May he received an honorary D.C.L. from Oxford and a Civil List pension; in 1892 he was made a Privy Councillor, reportedly “the first Man of Science … ever … admitted, on grounds of science, to that Charmed Circle.” Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Walpole to Huxley, 23 Aug. 1892, Huxley Papers, XXVIII, fol. 146.

141. Arthur D. Berrington was formerly a private secretary at the General Board of Health, 1854-55, and the Metropolitan Board of Works. He retired from the Usk Board in 1884 after helping for eighteen years to make the Usk “the first salmon river in England.” Field, LXVII (1886), 320Google Scholar. Second Report, Royal Commission on Civil Establishments, 1888 (C. 5545), XXVIIGoogle Scholar, Mins. Evid., Q. 18,514; Report, Royal Commission on Salmon Fisheries, 1902 (Cd. 1188), XIIIGoogle Scholar, Mins. Evid., Q. 22,564-22,569.

142. “An Inspector sitting merely in London cannot possibly give a useful opinion on the delicate points which come before him. His attendances in different parts of England and Wales should be frequent, and he can do more good work on the river bank than at the Home Office. In this way he will be brought into a closer personal contact with the Conservators, and it may be hoped that a feeling of mutual confidence will spring up which must greatly facilitate the smooth working of the fishery laws.” 25th Ann. Rep., 1886 (C. 4713), XV, 15.Google Scholar

143. The change was gratefully received by the practical-minded fishery boards, one of which commended Berrington as “a gentleman with all the qualities and knowledge essential for the satisfactory execution of the duties attached to the office as they were carried on by Messrs. Walpole and Buckland.” PRO, John Ridley, Tyne Conservators, to A. J. Mundella, 27 July 1886, BT 13/36 (E. 7481).

144. Second Report, Royal Commission on Civil Establishments, 1888 (C. 5545), XXVIIGoogle Scholar, Mins. Evid., Q. 18,552. J. W. Bund was a chairman of the Severn Fishery Board and a frequent author on fishery affairs. See Bund, Salmon Problems.

145. The Harbour Department was merged with the Fisheries Department in 1898.

146. Field, LXXV (1890), 841.Google Scholar

147. Ibid., LXXVI (1890), 622. In 1889 a Treasury Committee quoted Huxley in support of transferring the museum and the Buckland Professorship in Fish Culture to the Marine Biological Laboratory at Plymouth or to the Natural History Museum. See Report of the Committee Appointed by the Treasury to Enquire into the Science Collections at South Kensington, 1889 (C. 5831), XXXIV, 7Google Scholar. Again, in 1898, a Select Committee recommended that the museum be closed, on grounds that it was obsolete and that its alcohol preservatives were dangerous to the public. A memorial was circulated by Walpole and Bund, and Walpole led a deputation to the Board of Trade to complain that “successive governments have come and gone, betraying no interest whatever in the Museum.” Field, XCV (1900), 168Google Scholar. “With a very moderate expenditure,” Walpole mused, “and with intelligent supervision it might have been made, by this time, a complete and comprehensive collection, illustrating the science and practical aspect of the fisheries of this country.” Ibid., XCV (1900), 185. By 1901, however, the museum had not been closed.

148. “The fishery department … is rapidly gaining a reputation for dilatoriness as the L.G.B. unconcernedly possessed for many years past. Nor does it seem, as in the case of the L.G.B., that the recent delay in dealing with various pressing questions has been owing to the pressure of business, for many of the points … could be settled by a competent inspector without a moment's hesitation.” Ibid., XCIX (1902), 347.

149. These were created by the Sea Fisheries Regulation Act, 1888, which provided for the formation of districts including contiguous estuaries and inland waters. Sea fisheries committees clashed with salmon conservators over modes of fishing permissible at different times of the year and over the jurisdiction of different authorities over pollution and sewage. Ibid., LXXII (1888), 165.

150. Report, Royal Commission on Salmon Fisheries, 1902 (Cd. 1188), XIIIGoogle Scholar, Mins. Evid., Q. 22,818.

151. The Board of Agriculture, thus transformed into the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, became the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries in 1919, and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in 1955. The Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries Act, 1923, consolidated earlier legislation and is still in force. The River Boards Act, 1948, placed each river system under a single local authority, which became responsible for the unified control of salmon, trout, and freshwater fish, canal drainage, and the prevention of river pollution. The cost of the river boards is now met out of county rates, supplemented by license fees. Each board is limited to forty members and has one member appointed jointly by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. Since local authorities appoint about 60 per cent of each board's membership, the representation of the fishing interests per se has been considerably reduced. See Report of the Committee on Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries, 1960–1961 (Cmnd. 1350), XV, §§14-22Google Scholar.

152. Cited in Eden, F., “The Salmon Fisheries,” Fortnightly Review, XXX (1881), 629–30Google Scholar; see also Young, Archibald, “Scotch Salmon Fishery Legislation: Its Defects and Their Remedies,” Trans. National Association for the Promotion of Social Science (1880), pp. 254–55Google Scholar.

153. 15th Ann. Rep., XVI, 4Google Scholar; Times, 3 May 1876.

154. Henry Ffennell, “A Resuscitated Industry,” ibid., 30 Dec. 1892; ibid., 29 Dec. 1894.

155. In 1876 Buckland had observed that “the best method of obtaining the future purification of our rivers will be to discover methods by which waste materials now thrown away, may be converted into saleable and commercial value.” 16th Ann. Rep., XXIV, 33Google Scholar. “The legislature had determined not to deal with the question of river pollution on fishery grounds, and I have neither the desire not the right to dispute their decision.” 17th Ann. Rep., 1878 (C. 2096), XXI, 53.Google Scholar

156. Ibid. As late at 1919, in reviewing wartime attempts to cultivate fish as food, the Secretary to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries wrote: “Our salmon rivers are a sadly neglected national asset, and it is a somewhat melancholy duty for the Board, which has no effective powers for preserving or developing their resources, to publish an annual report which must in effect be a report of annual decline. As long as there is no effectual check on industrial or sewage pollution, and as long as this evil is aggravated by continuous abstraction of water and the presence of artificial obstructions, the progressive decline of our salmon and freshwater fisheries is inevitable. A few of our salmon rivers are still reasonably pure and comparatively prolific. A Board armed with effective powers could conserve and develop these, and might rescue others before their ruin has been completed. But if these ends are to be secured, the Administration must be in a position to regulate not merely fishing operations but the fisheries themselves, and must be provided with the means of checking or controlling the causes which threaten the rivers with extinction.” Report of the Proceedings under the Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries Acts for the Years 1915, 1916, 1911, and 1918, 1920 (Cmd. 497), XXII, PrefaceGoogle Scholar.

157. Cf. John Goldthorpe's illuminating analysis, “The Development of Social Policy in England, 1800-1914,” Trans. Fifth World Congress of Sociology (Washington, 1964)Google Scholar.

158. D.N.B. (2nd supplement, 1912).

159. Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Walpole to Huxley, 19 Dec. 1886, Huxley Papers, XXVIII, fol. 134. Two decades later Walpole, en route to the secretaryship of the Post Office, confided again to Huxley: “The Fishery People [i.e. the Fishery Department] have gone far beyond the ideas of two such old fashioned folk as you and I, and seem to be bent on interfering with fishermen everywhere and in everything. I sometimes wish that they would meditate on your advice that fishermen should be free to fish how they like, when they like and where they like. However, I reflect that it is no longer any affair of mine; and that it never answers for anyone who has left an office to interfere in the management of his successor; so I fell back (like you will) upon Silence.” Imperial Col. of Sc. and Tech., Walpole to Huxley, 22 June 1893, ibid., fol. 147.

160. Walpole, Spencer, The History of Twenty-five Years (London, 1903), III, 331Google Scholar. It is interesting to observe that no mention of the revolutionary regulatory precedents of salmon legislation appears in Walpole's earlier History of England (London, 1890), VIGoogle Scholar.