128 Practical Game Preserving. 



we hope, when we come to consider it as vermin, to put a 

 less unfavourable construction upon the habits of several 

 of these beautiful feathered denizens of our isles. With 

 regard to grouse, however, the predacity of the hen-harrier 

 and the kestrel may be cited as conspicuous. 



The poaching to which grouse is exposed may be divided 

 into poaching proper and wanton destruction. Of the two 

 we much prefer the former. The men, again, who poach 

 grouse may be distinguished as those who poach for mere 

 sport and pleasure, and those who practise it purely as a 

 means of making money; the former are generally of a good 

 class, free-handed with their spoil, comparatively open in 

 their operations, and brave. The right of sporting used to 

 be theirs, they look upon preservers as interlopers, and if 

 necessary are prepared to defend themselves against arrest. 

 They are in every way true sportsmen and well worthy 

 of being won over if possible. The offences of such men, 

 if not barefaced and wholesale, we should be inclined to look 

 over, but let it be known that, once caught, they will be 

 subjected to stern measures. The poacher for profit is very 

 different and is recruited from the ranks of idle labourers, 

 bad shepherds and the frequenters of the ale house. He 

 prefers to carry out his operations in secret, unknown 

 to anyone, except his accomplices, and invariably resorts 

 to the most stealthy and unsportsmanlike methods; netting 

 in its dozen-and-one forms is the favourite trick, while 

 snaring and hingling and springing are also much resorted 

 to. This is the person who owns a consignment of grouse 

 arriving in London on the loth or nth of August, or 

 perhaps before, which is exposed for sale in London long 



