i 22 EXTINCT BRITISH ANIMALS. 



have discovered the medicinal properties of the Bath 

 mineral waters, by observing that cattle when 

 attacked and wounded by the Wolves went and 

 stood in these waters, and were then healed much 

 sooner then they would have been by any other 

 means. From this it may be inferred that Wolf- 

 hunting was found by the ancient Britons to be a 

 necessary and pleasurable, yet dangerous, pursuit. 



We do not find, says Strutt,* that during the 

 establishment of the Romans in Britain, there were 

 any restrictive laws promulgated respecting the 

 killing of game. It appears to have been an 

 established maxim in the early jurisprudence of that 

 people, to invest the right of such things as had no 

 master with those who were the first possessors. 

 Wild beasts, birds, and fishes became the property of 

 those who first could take them. It is most 

 probable that the Britons were left at liberty to 

 exercise their ancient privileges ; for had any 

 severity been exerted to prevent the destruction of 

 game, such laws would hardly have been passed over 

 without the slightest notice being taken of them by 

 the ancient historians. 



Anglo-Saxon Period. As early as the ninth cen- 

 tury, and doubtless long before that, a knowledge of 

 hunting formed an essential part of the education of 

 a young nobleman. Asser, in his " Life of Alfred the 

 Great," assures us that that monarch before he was 

 twelve years of age "was a most expert and active 

 hunter, and excelled in all the branches of that most 



* " Sports and Pastimes of the People of England." 



