THE HARE AND THE LAWYERS 57 



vided grounds for subsequent litigation. It informs us 

 that, whereas great mischiefs did ensue by inferior 

 tradesmen, apprentices, and other dissolute persons 

 neglecting their trades and employments, in order to 

 follow hunting, fishing, and other game, to the ruin of 

 themselves and damage of their neighbours, it was 

 enacted that, if any such person as aforesaid should 

 presume to hunt, hawk, fish, or fowl on his own account, 

 he should be sued for trespass and mulcted in 

 damages. There is a smack of robust commonsense 

 about this statute, in spite of its somewhat pompous 

 phraseology. As to what should constitute ' a disso- 

 lute person' the lawyers disagreed ; even the judges 

 were divided as to whether a sporting village surgeon 

 and apothecary was or was not a dissolute person 

 within the meaning of the Act. 



There is a certain fatherliness about the statutes 

 of the Hanoverian period which is amusing to con- 

 template. The legislators of that era were practical 

 men, and believed firmly in the medicinal virtues of 

 the lash. They kept their private opinions in the 

 background, and dealt mildly with first offenders. In 

 the reign of George III., first and second offences of 

 night poaching (alas, poor Puss !) were followed by 

 fines not exceeding 20/. and 30/. A third conviction 

 was a very serious matter. The transgressor was 



