shoals to be met with in the channel; but by the assistance of Steamers, this difficulty can now be obviated, as vessels of large dimensions may be towed with safety. Vessels

drawing nineteen feet of water, have been towed up, though the usual limitation is sixteen or seventeen feet. At Moville, about two miles from the entrance into the Lough, large ships of war may anchor with security. In 1778, it being the centenary commemoration of the Siege of 1688– 89, (as has been already noticed,) a frigate sailed up to the City. The prevailing winds at Derry, are from NorthWest to South-West:-the latter is, however, most prevalent. Variation of the Needle, twenty-eight degrees West.*

Salmon Fishery of the Foyle.-As this is connected with our river, it may not be unnecessary to notice it; and the more particularly so, it having within a few years, been brought before the public, as the source of annoyance to those most interested in the receipt of its emoluments.

In the early stages of the Ulster Plantation, the litigation between the Irish Society and some of the Bishops of the Diocese, for the right of possessing part of the Foyle Fishery below the City, was frequent and expensive, as it was involved in the same mystery as the Abbey Lands, or the 1500 acres. It would appear that, long before, and down to the suppression of the monasteries in the 25th of Henry VIII. the Abbots and former Bishops of Derry had possessed an unlimited influence over the Salmon of the Foyle and the Bann, confirmed by the mandate of a Pope.t On the Royal investiture of Bishops for Ireland under James I. the Fishing of these rivers changed sides, not being considered any longer influenced by thunders from the Vatican; a claim, however, of the tithe of the Foyle Fishery, in favour of the new Bishops, was alleged (at least) by them, to be good. The differences between the Bishops and the Irish Society concerning the Fishery, &c. were finally settled by an Act passed, 3d and 4th of Anne, the Bishop then in possession of the See, renouncing his right to the Salmon and the 1500 acres, and the Society binding them

Ordnance Survey.

Probably not inferior to the influence exercised in days of yore by Saint Anthony, over the fishes of the Adriatic.-Broughton's Ecclesiastical Dictionary.

selves to pay a rent charge of £250 yearly to the Bishop, and his successors for ever! (which sum is still paid;) and to exonerate him from any rents or other demands whatsoever, for the palace and gardens in Derry.*

In 1616, an entire Salmon (about five or six pounds weight (was purchased in Derry for 4d. 6d. or 8d.-on an average 1d. pound. In 1835, the weight of Salmon taken was, according to the computation of Mr. Buist, the manager, about 1250 hundred weight, each hundred equal to 120 pounds, by the custom of the place. The lowest at Derry, in that year, and every year latterly, towards the end of the fishing season, (July and August) is 4d. and of that sent to Liverpool, &c. 6d. pound. The annual amount of the salmon caught, has been stated to be about £5600, free from all deductions, except for rent from the lessees (£600) nets, wages of fishermen, water-keepers, &c.t

pound;

With respect to the quantity of salmon exposed for sale in our market, it is but scanty, the most of it being sent off in ice to the English markets; in this respect, it is a complete monopoly, leaving only, to our citizens and the inhabitants of the surrounding district, "a taste to feed the market," the humbler classes of whom never taste it at all.Whether there is a clause in the charter to the effect, that the sale of the salmon should be confined to our own market, is a question that we cannot solve. But this we are certain of, it is a matter of indifference to them (the Citizens) who are, or who ought to be, entitled, the proprietary of the Salmon Fishery, since they are, for the most part, deprived of the fish.

Till of late years, Derry market was one of the best in Ireland for white fish, cod, turbot, sole, plaice, &c. but they too are now mostly taken off from the fishermen by contractors, in light vessels, stationed at the entrance of Lough Foyle, and around the coast of Donegal.

In the conclusion of the second Section of our Statistics, (beginning with the Plantation, 1612-13,) it may be necessary to make a short digression.

Having traced the commencement of our recent Civic

* Concise View.Ordnance Survey.-These premises had formerly been the "terra sacerdotalis, libera et sine censu.'

↑ Concise View.-Ordnance Survey,

improvements to the year 1800, it might be expected that the Annals of Derry should make some allusion to that political Era, as well as to the political state of Ireland in the years immediately preceding, viz. 1797-8-9.

With respect to the rebellion of 1798, it may be observed that, although it is stated to have been hatched chiefly among the descendants of the first Colonists of Ulster, yet it can be positively asserted that the Citizens of Londonderry were not, either directly or indirectly, materially implicated in the concoction, or in furthering the progress of that rebellion. In proof of this assertion, we can advance our own testimony, as well as that of many others. With the exception of two cases of public flogging in our City, under Martial Law, (of persons who lived at a considerable distance from Derry,) and of one execution in the town of Maghera, in the County of Londonderry, under the same law, no other capital punishments, that we can recollect, took place. That all the Citizens were then free from contamination, is what cannot be affirmed; but the result of the legal inquiries instituted, proved that the evil had not spread amongst us to any great extent; and the voluntary expatriation, of a few individuals from the neighbouring districts, was considered and accepted, by the authorities of the day, an atonement sufficient for the offence. The solitary case

of Brisland or Bryson, the poor peasant who was shot by a farmer near Burn-foot, when in the act of demanding firearms, and whose body was hung up in a gibbet near the Quay, has not been ascribed to any revolutionary movement among our Citizens, as the victim brought on his destruction by his own folly. It is not our intention to rake up the dregs of this dismal drama of the benighted affairs of unfortunate Ireland, to satiate the curiosity of the reader, nor yet to expose the vanity of the writer, as the principal causes of, and the harassing incidents in, the rebellion of 1798, have been ably set forth long since, in the general history of that period; and the local histories of the "Hearts of Oak, the Hearts of Steel, of the White Boys, Shakers, Break-of-day-Boys," &c. &c. will fully explain the objects of the "United Irish-men."

During the years to which we have just alluded, the Citizens of Londonderry, generally, enjoyed prosperity and comforts, to which the majority of the inhabitants now,