PREFACE. XI 



south, east, or west, and sport everywhere at your 

 pleasure ; no man will attempt to stay your course 

 over any field, or through any wood. The only close 

 season for this unlimited sport is during the breed- 

 ing season — from the 15th of April to .the 4th of 

 July — and even during that period you may kill 

 hares, deer, birds of passage, water-fowl, bears, 

 panthers, and all noxious animals. The only birds 

 subject to the game-laws are the partridge (quail), 

 grouse, turkeys, &c., above ail, woodcocks. Woe be 

 to you, if you are found shooting woodcocks during 

 the close time. The first-comer, even though he be 

 but a simple ploughman, will summons you for the 

 fact, and you will be mulcted by the nearest magis- 

 trate in the sum of five dollars for every " long- 

 beak" found in your game-bag. It happened to 

 myself one day, the 25th of June, 1842, to be 

 arrested by a wood-cutter, a few leagues from New 

 York, with eleven woodcocks in my pocket. I was 

 taken forthwith before the authorities at Hastings, 

 and should have been compelled to pay the large 

 sum of eleven pounds if I had not been able to prove 

 to the satisfaction of the judge that, being a foreigner, 

 I was unacquahited with the laws of the country. 

 My excuse was admitted, and I was let off on confis- 

 cation of my game — which the judge's clerk (as I 

 afterwards learnt) proceeded to make into a capital 

 pie. 



