Viscount Haldane:-

This is an appeal from a judgment of the Supreme Court of Canada, which reversed (by a majority consisting of Anglin, J., Brodeur and Mignault, JJ.; Idington and Cassels, JJ., dissenting) a judgment of the Court of King's Bench of Quebec, affirming a judgment of the Superior Court.

The question to be decided relates to the title of the appellant club to the fishing rights in a stretch of the Matapedia River opposite to a certain piece of land on one of its banks, and to the bed of the river itself at that place. It is common ground that there is title of some sort to a right of fishing there. The appellants contend that this title is not only vested in them, but is a right in perpetuity. The respondents maintain that it has never amounted to more than a right personal to the individual who originally acquired it, and terminable with his life.

A further point was raised on behalf of the respondents, which was in substance that even if Lord Mount Stephen, the original holder, possessed and had conveyed a transmissible right, that right no longer subsisted in the appellants by reason of failure in renewing the registration of the deed by which it was originally conveyed to Lord Mount Stephen. This point was, however, decided adversely to the respondents in all the Courts below, the Supreme Court of Canada having affirmed, so far as the point was concerned, a declaration made by the Court of King's Bench of Quebec on the subject. As the respondents have lodged no cross-appeal against the judgment of the Supreme Court on this point, their Lordships hold that it cannot be raised in the present appeal. The only question before them therefore is that as to the character of the title acquired by Lord Mount Stephen and transmitted by him.

In order to see what this title really was it is in the first place necessary to examine the character of the deed of 6th September, 1890, by which Lord Mount Stephen, then Sir George Stephen, acquired it. That deed was one of exchange, and, under it, one Randolph Alexander Blais, purported to cede by way of exchange all the rights of fishing in the River Matapedia vis-a-vis the lot of the cedant, as described in a plan annexed, "with right to the said Sir George Stephen to pass over the said lot, on foot or in vehicles, for the exercise of the said right of fishing." There was ceded in counter-exchange by Sir George Stephen on his part a certain piece of land in the deed described. Consequently, "the parties diseased themselves respectively of what was above ceded by them in exchange and counter-exchange, and took seisin of it reciprocally." The deed was registered. It will be observed that the language of the deed itself is unrestrained, so far as the duration of the rights granted under it is concerned, not less completely in the case of the cession of the fishing rights to Sir George Stephen than in that of the cession of land by way of exchange to Blais. The introduction of the words relating to reciprocal disseisin and seisin point to an intention to convey in perpetuity in each case. Unless the words "right of fishing" import in the character itself of the title granted something, short of a perpetual right, there is no restriction in the deed itself on the duration of the right.

The action out of which the appeal arises was brought by the appellants against the predecessor-in-title of the respondents, because the latter had interfered with the alleged exclusive title of the appellants to the fishing rights in question, and had formally denied its validity. The action was for a declaration that the appellants were the sole proprietors of the part of this river and of its bed so far as these fronted the bank at the locus in quo, as well as of the fishing rights, and for possession. The defence, which admitted that the river was unnavigable and non floatable, and that there existed the alleged formal documents of title relied on by the appellants, denied possession in the past, and a