The Sun.
London, England, 1824-04-13 00:00:00

COLOMBIAN LOAN.

Mr. BAIL-T (of the firm of BAILY and GOLD-
SMI D) one of the unsuccessful bidders for the new
Colombian Loan, read the following statement,
which was afterwards posted up in the House :

" NEW COLOMBIAN LOAN.
" For the information of the subscribers to our list, we think
it proper to make the fbllowing statement, and leave them to
draw their own conclusions as to the cause of our failure and the
consequences that may result therefrom. When we first an-
nounced our design of forming a list for the above Loan, we
wrote to M. RAVENGA, announcing our intention to bid for it.
To this communication no answer was received. Immediately on
the arrival of M. HURTADO, we expressed to him also our
intention. In reply thereto he stated, that he could not
enter into any communication till he had first consulted the
three other Commissioners. Not having received any commu-
nication from any of the parties, we waited on Messrs MON-
TAIJo and ACRUBLA on Friday, April 2, and, in the pre-
sence of M. RAVENGA, repeated our intention to bid for
the ensuing Loan. These two Commissioners who, we now
for the first time understood, were the only persons au-
thorized to negociate the Loan, informed us that they were
not then ready to make or receive any proposals ; but
that in the early part of the ensuing week, they would
decide whether the Loan should be contracted for by a
public or a private bidding ; and that in either case we should
have due notice sent to us. Not having heard any thing fur-
ther on the subject, we, on Thursday last, solicited an interview
with them, which was appointed for the following day. The
proposals then stated by them were as follows :—A loan for
millions sterling, independent of the Bonds issued by M. ZEa,
and rscently exchanged by M. IltrrtTARDO; Dividend thereon
6 per cent. per annum, payable half yearly ; the first dividend,
however, not to become due till six months after the deposit ;
deposit 25 per cent. payable immediately ; second payment 25
per cent. payable at the end of three months,. remaining pay-
ments 10 per cent. payable monthly. It was also stated that our
bidding must he delivered in on the following day (Saturday,
April 10), before five o'clock, as the Commissioners were desi-
rous of sending off the result of their negociation, by the mail
on that evening. In vain we urged the shortness of the period,
arising from circumstances depending entirely on themselves,
and which would not afford us sufficient time to forward the
usual circular letters to our different subscribers. In vain we
represented to them that the large amount of the deposit (un-
precedented in the annals of such Loans) would, unless divided
into two payments, even at the distance of a week, operate to
the disadvantage of the Contract.
" Notwithstanding these obstacles, and relying on the known
respectability and resources of our subscribers, we tendered our
bidding on their own basis before the time appointed. The
Commissioners wished to defer sending us an answer till the
following morning (although they had previously stated that
they wished to send off the result to their Government by seven
o'clock in the evening) ' • but, at our urgent request to have it on
the same evening, they forwarded it to us about half-past nine
o'clock, stating iat our bidding had not been accepted.
" A detailed account of these circumstances, and an official
statement of the terms of, our bidding will be forwarded to the
Government of Colombia, in order that they may be then and
there compared with the terms finally concluded and actually
complied with.
" The price bid by us was 88 par cent. (which of course was
exclusive of any present dividend), and a charge of 11. per
cent. on the sterling amount for remitting the instalments and
other incidental charges.
(Signed)
" April 12, 1824.

" V. and A. BAILY.
" I. L. GOLDS MID."

THE SALMON FISHERIES.

This subject,- so important to the great bulk
of the landed proprietors of Scotland, occupies at this moment
a considerable share of public attention ; and aware of its in-
tricacy and the multifarious character of the interests involved,
we have been careful not to hazard a rash and ill-founded opi-
nion. The parties opposed to each other are the proprietors
of estates watered by rivers, and the heritors of properties si-
tuated on the shores of estuaries, or on the margin' of the
open sea :—The former, secured from time immemorial in
a species of monopoly of the fishery, and fortified by statutes
enacted in the infancy of civilization, seek to confine the
killing of salmon to the ancient bounds, and to illustrate ob-
scure laws, by new definitions which shall have the effect
of suppressing certain newly invented modes of fishing. The
latter party having, since the conclusion of the last cen-
tury, ascertained that this valuable species of fish can be
caught in the open sea, and in prodigious quantity, by a
new description of net, anxiously desire to avail them-
selves of the advantages their estates derive from local
situation. The river proprietors are decidedly opposed to
their enjoying this privilege; in. any shape whatever. By a de-
cree of the Court of Session; afterwards affirmed on appeal in
the House of Lords, the reasons for which were found in those
obscure and antiquated statutes which have for centuries regu-
lated the salmon fisheries, they succeeded in expelling the ob-
noxious stake-net from certain estuaries, as an invention calcu-
lated to obstruct the entrance of spawning fish into rivers, and
also as detrimental to the young fry. Having accomplished
this much, they now seek to impose restrictions, still more ex-
tended in their operation,_ by securing to themselves authority
to interdict the use of stake-nets on the open coast, where their
erection has been attended with extraordinary success. The
decision that followed their former appeal to the laws favours
the supposition that in this instance they will be no less fortu-
nate, provided some new legislative enactment, better framed
for present times, does not originate from the labours of the
Committee recently granted by Parliament, to investigate the
question in its various bearings. Such is the most" material
point at issue. We shall now proceed to make a few remarks
on the general circumstances of the case.
In those semi-barbarous ages, when the laws still in force
came into operation, the public good was evidently the object
in view ; and if they now fail in answering the end intended,
it proceeds solely from the intelligence of man having made
discoveries against which they do not provide. We have no
authority for inferring that the acts regulating close time, and
the construction of cruives and yairs were framed for the be-
nefit of individuals. The politicians of those days legislated to
the best of their ability—they provided against all known cir-
cumstances likely to injure the fishery ; but there were many
facts of which they were ignorant, and against which they
could guard only by a law of general application, as liable to be
construed to the injury as to the protection of public rights.
So far as the history of the salmon is known, it would appear
that the regulations relative to close time are by no means ac-
curately defined, and that instead of being limited to three
months, and subjected to local innovation, it ought to be pro-
tracted to nearly double that period, and reduced to a clear and
uniform system. It is admitted that the salmon, impelled by
certain instincts, quit the sea in the month of August, and
ascend the rivers with wonderful impetuosity, for the purpose
of depositing their spawn. In November they arrive at their
spawning stations, and continue there till towards the end of
the following month ; by which time they have, with much so-
licitude and labour, deposited their ova in the gravelly and
shallow bed of the stream. Exhausted by their exertions, and
debilitated by the fesh water, they then drop back with the
current, to the ocean, which they are understood to reach in
March. In the end of this month the spawn becomes endued
with life, and the young fry burst from the gravelly beds in
which they have been buried, in a manner resembling the first
visible signs of vegetation in a corn field. When set at liberty,
they are swept by the current towards their natural home, the
ocean, instinctively adhering to the quiet water at the margin of
the stream, till they arrive at its confluence with the tide,
when they gradually disappear in the depths of the central
channel.

From this brief sketch of the habits of the salmon, we are
not only authorised to infer that close time ought to be much
farther extended, but that if danger to the species is to be ap-
prehended from any particular mode of fishing, the coble net,
when used at improper times, is of all others the most destruc-
tive to the fry. From its construction, and the way in which
it is worked, it is calculated to spread devastation over whole
beds of ova, when the fish first become animated, and, in lat-
ter stages, to drag ashore the fry in vast quantities. The stake.
net, again, is a stationary engine, erected on shores where the
salmon never deposits spawn, and which the fry rarely visit.
Its meshes, besides, are so large, that small fish can pass
through them as freely as the tide in which they exist ; and it
is a fact worthy of remark that spawning or foul fish are far
less frequently captured by it than by the coble net. The visits
of the fish to the upper streams are almost exclusively for the
purpose of propagating its species ; but it often repairs to the
estuaries:and shores of the open sea, for purposes of less im-
portance, and at periods when it is in a much fitter state for
being eaten by man. In this point of view, and we believe it
to be ajust one, it seems evident that stake nets are less destruc-
tive to the spawning fish and young fry, than the means of fish-
ing practised on rivers ; and that if the Legislators of ancient
times had been sufficiently acquainted with the fisheries, they
would have exerted themselves to restrict the use of coble nets,
and have favoured that mode of fishing which is now con-
sidered to be the least injurious, and which brings into
the market the greatest and
is,richest supply. One of the argu-
ments against the stake netthat it threatens to exterminate
the p
but this assertion will not hold for a moment._
clearly ascertained, that various inhabitants of the
purpoises and seals, prey upon salmon to an eli isa, s
seet species,
,sri,, a from the prodigious success that has followed its
introduction;
ex-
tent of which we can form no idea ; the stake net, therefore, is

only to be considered as an invention which deprives the rapa-
cious monsters of the ocean of a greater quantity of a food of
which they are fond But, in truth, there has been a much
smaller supply of salmon since the stake nets were destroyed,
than there was in the rivers when these same nets were- in
bu-
siest operation ; hence we must conclude, that some unknown
cause, in all probability unconnected with the modes of fishing,
has occasioned the fish to desert their natural haunts.—
In thus advocating the cause of the stake net, we are
not blind to the claims of the river proprietors. They
purchased their properties with the understandin that
certain statutes gave them an exclusive right to the nshery,
and whatever way the matter is arranged, individual grievances
must exist. At the same time we cannot, in strict justice, 4e'
the claims of any set of men, if protected by erroneous laws, in-
terfere with the interests of the community at large. If the
use of stake-nets serves to render this species of food more plen-
tiful, and consequently more withib the reach of all descriptions
of people, why should such an important national advantage be
withheld ? A law which failed to recognize the manifest right
of the Coast Proprietors to capture the fish that haunt their
neighbourhood, would be peculiarly oppressive. As well
might Government enact that the farmers of certain districts
were not to sow a certain kind of grain, simply because it de-
sired to enrich the agriculturists of another part by giving
them a monopoly. The appointment of a Committee of in-
telligent Members of Parliament to investigate the subject pre-
vious to any new law being passed, promises that every
sure will be adopted that can lead to harmonize conflicting le'
terests. We trust that men of the first local intelligence., no
matter of what rank in life, will be exardined—that their state-
ments will be duly compared and balanced, and that gentle-
men, eminent in science, will be consulted regarding the an-
nual transit and propagation of the salmon, subjects still in-
volved in mystery. Let the law be uniform, clearly defined,
and strictly impartial as far as affects private interests ; and let
its leading features be the public good.
We cannot conclude this article without recomitending to
the attention of the public, a small but interesting pamphlet on
this subject, Written we understand by Mr. Kerr of Dundee,
and entitled 4 Observations,' &c.—(Edinburgh Star, elprilB.)