112 FACT AGAINST FICTION. 



who ^^ listen a bird up," shoot him, unci run away. 

 These are the most difficult of such depredators to 

 catch, as you never know when or where to have 

 them, and they are off at the first alarm. When 

 a keeper knows what he is about, he has it in his 

 power to make his master's well-enclosed woods 

 very dangerous to walk in at night. He has a 

 right to dig holes in his master's woods as deep 

 and as frequent as he likes ; he has a right to strain 

 very small but strong wire from tree to tree, al)out 

 the height from the ground of a middling-sized 

 man's face. A nocturnal villain has no business in 

 that wood, and if he cuts his nose nearly off against 

 a wire of this kind, he has no one to blame for it but 

 himself. Very strong pliant growers may also be 

 bent down, and held down with strong whipcord 

 and a peg to a hole in a strong post, which said 

 growers fly up Avith great emphasis if the peg that 

 holds them is displaced by the foot or leg of a 

 man, and if the grower should catch an intruding 

 chin, a jaw so struck Avill not masticate food for 

 some days. 



Those excellent but dangerous spikes for men or 

 dogs are said to be as illegal as the spring-gun, 

 so it is best not to set them, and, indeed, without 



