MR. STAFFORD HOWARDasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, If he can state why it is that, whilst all the stake nets on the English side of the Solway were done away with by "The Salmon Fisheries Act, 1861," those on the Scotch side have been allowed to remain; and, whether he can render any assistance in remedying what is felt by the English fishermen to be a great injustice?
MR. ASSHETON CROSS,in reply, said, he was not in any way responsible for the legislation of 1861, but the fact unfortunately was, that the law on the two sides of the Solway were different. The subject was mentioned in the Reports of the Inspectors of Salmon Fisheries for 1875, who said it was desirable to remove the anomaly, but the Scotch proprietors were indisposed to adopt the necessary legislation. The Esk was under the English Acts; but there would be a strenuous opposition among the proprietors on the north side of the Solway, which was only the estuary of the Esk, to come under the same law.