MORE POACHERS 153 



took away his gun. I then summoned him for the trespass, for 

 which he was convicted, the magistrate directing that his gun 

 should be restored, and telling me that, though I had a right, 

 if he refused to desist, to apprehend him and convey him before 

 the nearest justice of peace, I had no right to seize his gun. 

 Now, if the magistrate is correct in his definition of the law, 

 what a ridiculous law it is ! A man has a right to protect his 

 rabbits, and is told he is to take an offender, twenty-six years of 

 age, thirteen stone, and six feet high, and bring him instantly 

 before a magistrate whose residence is three or four miles off. 

 Suppose the owner of the rabbits is able personally to encounter 

 and capture the offender. He may sit on his prostrated body, 

 and, as my friend Lord Arundell suggested, he might pull from 

 his pocket the Morning Herald or the Times, and peruse the 

 paper till the fallen combatant was tired of being sat on, but, 

 if the worsted hero has no intention to walk, and, moreover, if 

 pulled along by the heels, has an inconvenient way of clutching 

 at the legs of his conveyor, or on to the stiles and gate-posts 

 which occur on the road, I will defy any man in the course of 

 four-and- twenty hours to produce such a load of sinew and objec- 

 tion at the place of justice intended by the law. By taking the 

 gun I protected my property, and I maintain I was fully justi- 

 fied in doing so at the time, whatever I might have been in 

 regard to the future. In fact, I could not take the man without 

 first mastering his weapon. I restored the gun, and, shortly 

 after, I met the other young farmer on his father's farm with a 

 couple of rabbits in his man's hand. I met them just in time, 

 or they would have been out into a green lane ; they were going 

 off, so my order to that effect was forestalled. I therefore con- 

 tented myself with the forcible seizure of the rabbits. This man 

 was also summoned by me, and convicted. The only part 

 of his case which is unalterably stamped on my remembrance 

 is, that at the end of the proceedings, held at Sharnbrook, 

 he charged the presiding magistrate, as constable, half-a- 

 crown for the trouble he had in serving the summons on 

 himself, and the magistrate, not having a wholesome remem- 



