FEUDAL SYSTEM OP BARBAROUS NATIONS. 3 



it onl}^ to his capital feudatories or greater barons ; and 

 accordingly we find in the feudal constitution one and 

 the same law prohibiting the rustici or peasants from 

 can-ying arms, and also forbidding the use of nets, 

 snares, or other engines for the destruction of game. 



It is observed that in those nations where the feudal 

 policy remains the most unaltered, the forest or game 

 laws continue in their most severe rigour. In France, 

 before the revolution, all game belonged properly to 

 the king, and in some parts of Grermany it was death 

 for a peasant to be found hunting in the woods of the 

 nobles. In Grreat Britain also hunting has ever been 

 esteemed a most princely diversion and exercise. In 

 the time of the ancient Britons the whole island 

 abounded in game of various species. The people lived 

 in a wild and pastoral manner, without enclosure or 

 any improvement in their grounds, and derived their 

 chief subsistence from the chase, which was enjoyed by 

 everybody ; but at the conquest of the island by the 

 Saxons*, the art of agriculture was introduced, the land 

 improved and enclosed, and the wild animals naturally 

 took refuge in the forests and woods, and not having 

 been disposed of in the first distribution of lands, were 

 therefore held to belong to the Crown. These forests 

 and woods were well stocked wdth game, which the royal 

 sportsmen reserved for their own diversion, on pain of 



* Hume mentions in his History of England that in tlie reign of the 

 Saxon king Edgar the wolves in England -were extirpated. He persevered 

 in hunting these ravenous beasts, and on finding that those who escaped 

 him had taken refuge in the mountains and forests of Wales he changed 

 the tribute of money imposed on the "Welsh princes into an annual 

 payment of 300 heads of -w-olves, ■which produced such diligence in 

 himting them that they were no more seen in England or Wales. — 

 Hume's History of England. 



