

1828.] The Game L<uot. 123 



or geese that shew marks of having been stolen. But partridges or 

 pheasants may be taken almost without hazard : when taken, they can 

 hardly by possibility be identified : though known to be stolen, they are 

 readily bought by every body : and that which perhaps goes still 

 farther to promote the perpetration of the offence public opinion favours 

 the offender. Every man will stop the robber of a pig-stye or a hen-roost; 

 but few people except a landowner or a game-keeper would inform 

 against a poacher, though they saw him at work. The facility with which 

 an exposed property like game may, under all circumstances, be taken, 

 is aided by the practice (of modern introduction) of assembling vast 

 quantities of it within very narrow limits. There only wanted one cir- 

 cumstance to make the attacks upon it certain and incessant a market 

 for the spoil : and that requisite, the admirable policy of our law has 

 most liberally provided ! 



It remains to inquire, then, what objections arise to an alteration of 

 the law : for the existing mode of preserving game, by weekly combats 

 and bands of armed keepers, is inconvenient. It seems to be rather 

 inefficient too for the market is supplied, in defiance of it. And it 

 would be likely to be so, because the force of numbers is against the pro- 

 prietors a manor will always be able to supply ten poachers at a less 

 expense than the lord of it can furnish one keeper ; and the former have 

 only to assemble in very large bodies (as they are getting the habit of 

 doing), and the power of resistance is at an end. But, in looking to 

 the objections of those parties who still resist alteration, we suspect we 

 should begin by digging out some little hidden weaknesses which those 

 who indulge them are careful to conceal, and which they may be tempted, 

 even when challenged with them, to disavow. That which we propose 

 involves no abatement of any rational or equitable right. On the con- 

 trary, it assists, and sets up, and adds to, all such rights, very materially. 

 When these advantages are obstinately rejected, there is cause to sus- 

 pect some principle at work, which the possessor is not proud of, and 

 which he is conscious it is for his convenience, as far as possible, to 

 deny. 



There is a little reluctance incidental sometimes to the human mind 

 generally little talked about, but not on that account less treasured 

 to part with any symbol of distinction, however weak or valueless, our 

 own possession of which seems to vex or annoy our neighbours. We 

 all love parties, clubs, coteries, clicks, circles every circumstance that 

 savours of exclusion. To have, at " No. 8," is nothing, unless the gen- 

 tleman at " No. 10" be without : the more deserving and fit he is to 

 hive also, the greater our joy and triumph. This is a feeling hopeless of 

 eradication from the minds of individuals ; but it is one which a legis- 

 lator should refuse to indulge. We may laugh at the Spanish wool and 

 ice-cream dissensions at " Almack's," or the cuttings and blackballings 

 that take place between the people that wear stays and mustachoes on one 

 side of Bond-street, and those that exhibit them on the other : but it 

 is work for blood, and disorder, and revolt, and malice, when the (" ex- 

 clusive") Protestants of Dublin will " dress King William's statue " 

 because Protestants alone do this ; and the (scarcely less obstinate and 

 bigotted) Catholics, hug their grievances (as a bond of "union") so fondly, 

 that one half their number would be sorry to have them redressed (and 

 taken away) to-morrow. And the state of things is not considerably more 



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