THE GROUND GAME ACT i8i 



magistrates at petty sessions has been overruled by 

 Courts of Appeal, while the utility of such a com- 

 mentary as we propose to offer will, it is hoped, be 

 acceptable to those readers who may perchance have 

 a copy of the Act at hand, but no notes of the im- 

 portant cases to which we shall refer. 



The full title of this Statute is ' An Act for the 

 better protection of Occupiers of Land against injury 

 to their Crops from Ground Game,' and it received 

 the royal assent on September 7, 1880. 



The object of the Act is not, as some persons 

 imagine, to transfer the right to kill hares and rabbits 

 from ' owner ' to ' occupier,' but to protect the crops 

 from injury by ground game, and this object is 

 equally attained whether the animals are killed by 

 either party. It is also a mistake to suppose that 

 the Ground Game Act gives the landlord anything. 

 It gives him no privilege nor concurrent right. It gives 

 the tenant the concurrent right to hares and rabbits 

 where they are reserved. As at common law, in the 

 absence of any agreement between landlord and 

 tenant with regard to ground game, hares and rabbits 

 are the property of the tenant as occupier of the soil^ it 

 is necessary in making agreements with tenants, that 

 hares and rabbits should be mentioned and reserved, 

 otherwise the landlord will have no right to kill them. 



