example to other landed proprietors, by his systematic destruction. of wood pigeons, which are a pest that cause more loss and expense to farmers as a body than even game. But they have increased to their present enormous numbers simply from extensive woods and plantations being devoted to the rearing of game, and by gamekeepers destroying all birds of prey. But to return to hares; I think it must be evident that their preservation in a cultivated country is quite irreconcilable with the interest of the general population. Whatever I have said as to hares, applies with double force in regard to rabbits. Let both, then, on all cultivated land, be considered by the law as vermin, and after that landlords may make what stipulations in their leases they choose regarding them. There is one thing I decidedly protest against, and that is licence being necessary for their destruction, however small the cost of it may be, any more than for the killing of rats and mice. If a farm were let on condition that rats were to be preserved for sport to the landlord, and should a farm labourer accidentally or even systematically destroy them, I do not think any penalties could be inflicted on such a person, or even on the tenant of the farm. But if licences are retained (unless the sanction of the proprietor is granted for destroying them), nothing will be gained by any change that can be proposed. I know it is said, why do not farmers make such stipulations in their agreement with their landlords as to ensure their freedom from game ravages? Doubtless it is in the power of a tenant to refuse to occupy land unless the game is let along with the right of cropping, but this is not, and has never been, the custom. The game has ever been universally reserved by the proprietor; it is impossible to obtain land on any other condition, and those who insist on having the game may make up their minds to retire from the profession of a tenant farmer. It is the law, and the law only, that enables the proprietor to carry out his terms in regard to game. The tenant is the weaker party, and surely it is not asking too much to have this law which enables the stronger party to carry out measures so detrimental to the whole rural population, at least modified to the extent indicated. But there are ways in which some farmers protect themselves from hares, and one is by having an active man on the farmi who knows how to set "a wire." This is much more common than is generally supposed, but it frequently leads to great evils. I have known some old men who have snared hares from their youth, and who never went further in crime; but as a rule it is merely a training for those who make midnight incursions into pheasant preserves. By a single night's work in these preserves as much money is realised as by a month of honest labour. Riotous dissipation and idleness are sure to follow. Necessity soon compels them to try it again and again. If caught at last, to jail with them is the order. The chaplain there finds it impossible to effect the slightest reformation on them, as they indignantly deny they are thieves. They confess to having broken a law, but then it is a law of man's making, not of God's creating, for no one can say these laws carry on their front the broad impress of truth and justice which all laws ought to have. One great improvement in the administration of these laws would be to have the trial of offences under them conducted before the paid magistrates in England, and the sheriffs of counties in Scotland in place of the justices of the peace, as at present. In the Night Poaching Act, sheriffs are mentioned and have jurisdiction, and all transportable offences must be tried by the Court of Justiciary. Now justices of peace are almost the only individuals interested in this matter, while their powers of punishment are great and arbitrary, and their judgment on the merits are final and conclusive. In both common and statute law, judges are debarred from sitting in judgment where they or their friends have the remotest interest, but these Game Laws have been enacted, and are maintained, for the sole benefit and pleasure of the very men specially selected to try the greater number of offenders against them. One of the worst features of the Game Laws is the cumulative penalties that may be heaped on an offender. A person trespasses in pursuit of game. He is taken in the act, and a justice of the peace fines him for such trespass. But he has killed a hare or pheasanta second fine is inflicted for being in unlawful possession of game, not being a qualified person. If he pays these two fines, he is next brought up for want of a certificate; and instances are by no means rare of persons being thus punished three times for the one offence. To show that these punishments are not light, I will try and state shortly what the Game Laws really are in Scotland. To kill game legally, it is first necessary to be in possession of a ploughgate of land, an undefined quantity, generally estimated at 60 or 70 acres. A person not so qualified, having in possession any game without leave from a qualified person, forfeits for the first offence, 20s., and for all others, £2, and in case of not paying within 10 days, suffers imprisonment for six weeks, in lieu of the former penalty, and three months in lieu of the latter. If charged with being also in pursuit of game without the qualification, the penalty, in addition to the above, is £8 68. 8d. A licence, or game-certificate, is also necessary. A person acting without one is liable to a penalty of £20, with costs, and also in the amount of the duty, and failing payment, imprisonment for six months. Prosecutions may be tried summarily, though the parties be absent, before two justices of the peace, or one justice, provided he is also a commissioner of supply, that is, the owner of land worth generally £100 a year. Sheriff Barclay, in his singularly instructive pamphlet, entitled "Curiosities of the Game Laws," remarks on this" It is declared that the conviction must be by two justices. But mark the strange addition-if a justice be also a commissioner of supply, this is held to be equivalent to two justices rolled into one. Because he can add to his signature the cabalistic letters of J.P. and C.S., he is held to be a judicial engine of two-justice power, capable of exercising the dynamics of two minds, or in fact, a man beside himself.' We venture to say, ran 6 sack the legislation of all ages, and all lands, and such a monstrous anomaly will not be found as this, which blots our statute book, and is in daily exercise in these highly favoured lands." A distinction is drawn in these laws between day and night poaching; the daytime being from the first hour before sunrise until an hour after sunset, the remaining time of the 24 hours being held to be night. A trespasser during the day forfeits a sum not exceeding £2, with costs. Where an individual is disguised, or five persons trespass, each person forfeits a sum not exceeding £5, with costs. If a trespasser refuses to leave the ground, and to give his name and address, he may be seized and conveyed to a justice of peace, and summarily fined £5 and the costs, or, as we say in Scotland, "the expenses of process." In default of payment the justices may imprison for two months, with or without hard labour. Under the Night Trespass Act, any person entering upon land, open or enclosed, with instruments for destroying game, is liable to be imprisoned for a period not exceeding three months, with hard labour, and at the expiry to find caution himself in £10, and security for the same amount for avoiding such offence for a year. Under this statute, the Sheriff of Haddington, not very long ago, sentenced an individual to one week's imprisonment, with hard labour, but failing to find security, he underwent six months' imprisonment, in addition, with hard labour. So, for an offence for which the sheriff considered a week's imprisonment the proper penalty, the poor man, for being unable to find security, had to endure six months in jail, with hard labour. For the second offence the primary imprisonment is extended to any period not exceeding six months, and the security required amounts to £30 altogether, also the term of bail to two years, and the imprisonment, failing caution, to 12 months-making in all, 18 months' imprisonment, with hard labour. The third offence may be punished with transportation for seven years, or imprisonment, with hard labour, for a period not exceeding two years. Persons to the number of three entering on land for the purpose of killing game, with firearms, bludgeons, or other offensive weapons, are liable to be transported beyond seas for not less than seven or more than seventeen years, or to imprisonment, with hard labour, for a term not exceeding three years. Transportation beyond seas having now been changed to penal servitude for the like period, there arises an obvious conflict between the two modes of punishment. By an Act of 1844, this Night Trespass Act was extended to the taking of game or rabbits on any public road, in the like manner as upon any land; but the actual taking of game is necessary for conviction under this statute. It will be observed there is a very great distinction between the penalty or punishment for a game law offence, depending on whether it has been committed during the day or night. For a day offence, the penalty is a pecuniary one, subject to modification, while for a night one, it is imprisonment with hard labour, which cannot be modified. The offences are distinct and separate, and it must be stated under which Act the prosecution is conducted, as a minute of time or less would have the effect of placing the offence under either the one or other of the statutes. It is often difficult to determine whether offences committed in the morning or evening, belong to the day or night, and the proof is frequently very unsatisfactory as to the exact hour the offence was committed, or the time the sun rose or set at the place. It would surely be better to return to the hours fixed for summer and winter by the old Act, repealed I think in 1831, than having the time fluctuating as it is now, both morning and evening. Any person killing, selling or buying, or having game in possession in forbidden time, forfeits £5 for each bird, and in case of failure to pay within ten days, is liable to two months' imprisonment for each £5. These penalties admit of no modification. In one case, the combined penalties against one individual, amounted to £220, and the consequent imprisonment to seven years and five months. But the private prosecutor restricted his complaint to four birds, or £20 of fine. But surely this is a power too enormous for any private prosecutor to possess in the punishment of individuals. Public carriers, too, are liable to it, though they may even be in ignorance that they have in their possession anything so precious as muirfowl or other game. That this law must be systematically broken, is evidenced by the fact that the greater part of the licensed dealers in game in London and elsewhere, present for sale any quantity of the different varieties of game on the morning of the day on which their being killed is lawful. At the close of the Parliament of 1862 an additional game law was placed on the statute book. It applies to the whole kingdom, and its chief provision was to enable the police to act as gamekeepers, to empower them in any highway or public place to search any person they suspect to be a poacher, and also to stop and search any cart or other conveyance in or upon which they suspect game to be carried. But this search can only take place on a highway or public place, so that the poachers have only to leap a hedge and set their pursuers at defiance. In some counties in Scotland, gamekeepers have been sworn in as constables to meet this difficulty. Gamekeepers thus become the servants of the Queen, though remaining the paid retainers of private individuals. This Act was vigorously but unsuccessfully opposed. It contains several anomalies which render it still doubtful how far it is workable in Scotland and Ireland. It places rabbits again in the list of game animals, and even increases the penalties for game offences; for simple trespass, for instance, from £2 to £5; and as the previous Act is not repealed, it is probable an offender may be mulcted in the penalties under both statutes. The resolutions adopted by the Scottish Chamber of Agriculture, were 1st. That hares and rabbits be dropped from the game list. 2nd. That all prosecutions for offences against the Game Laws be transferred from the justices to the sheriffs of the respective counties. 3rd. That cumulative penalties for the same offence be abolished. 4th. That damages be made exigible by statute in all cases of injury caused by increase of game during the currency of the lease— the amount to be determined under the authority of the sheriff. If effect were given to these resolutions by legislative enactment, it would satisfy by far the larger proportion of agricultural tenants, and if the complexities of these laws were simplified, and their cumulative severity diminished, it would tend much to make a better feeling in society; and even the object at which they aim would be better attained, by enlisting more generally in their favour the feelings of the community. On the Closing of Public Houses on Sunday. By ROBERT MARTIN, M.D. Ir the object of this Association be more especially to consider the best means of promoting the social improvement of the people, then I know of no subject more worthy of its very careful attention than that of closing public houses on Sunday. There is good reason for believing that there are few legislative enactments of anything like equal importance, which could be more easily obtained, because there are few against which valid objections are more difficult to be found, were it sought in the right manner; whilst there are few measures which would be so generally welcomed, because few which are likely to diffuse such general advantages. By no class of persons would this change be more highly appreciated, if brought about in a friendly spirit, than by the respectable portion of the publicans, many of whom are exceedingly desirous of being set free from the necessity of opening their places of business on Sunday. At present, the individual who closes on that day gives his rival an important advantage; nevertheless some make the sacrifice, in order to secure for their families and themselves, the quietude and seclusion enjoyed by every other class of tradesmen. It is by no means uncommon to find publicans expressing a wish that there were a law, compelling all to close alike. Four years ago the Liverpool publicans were thoroughly canvassed, by the Rev. Dr. White and other gentlemen, in order to ascertain how far they were disposed to go, in reference to closing their houses on Sunday, and the following were the results : Signed the document in favour of total closing......756) ... 870 252 97 90 6 85 1,400 |