6 PARTRIDGES 



hundred who follow this sport are deserv- 

 ing members of the community, enjoying 

 well-earned holidays in a peculiarly harm- 

 less fashion. 



" Your partridges and your pheasants," 

 cries the Socialist and his like, " Nature's 

 produce, the rightful property of the 

 people, and only withheld by the mon- 

 strous injustice of the game laws, framed 

 only to suit the convenience of a privileged 

 class." Neither he nor his hearers care to 

 know that the landowner or lessee pays, 

 by the time he has shot them, something 

 like l a brace for this public property, 

 and that were game allowed to fend for 

 itself with no protection against its legion 

 foes, winged, biped, and four-footed, there 

 would very shortly be no game left in the 

 country for any one. 



Vindictive legislation could easily stop 

 the present class of sportsmen from enjoy- 

 ing their shooting, but such a short-sighted 

 measure would defeat its own ends, which 

 would be, presumably, the good of the 

 many. Sport would by no means be thus 



