No. 4.] RURAL LAW. 191 



had a right to do so. His public riglit to fish was as good 

 as the plaintift''8 right to cut the ice. In another dispute, 

 where the owner of an ice house scraped the snow from 

 half the ice and marlied it off, and the owner of another ice 

 house cut it, the hitter was lield free from liability, on the 

 ground that there was no private ownership until the ice was 

 cut; and it follows that, if the farmer, in his zeal to fill his 

 ice house for the uses of his creamery next summer, visits 

 one of the great ponds of the State, he had better cut and 

 carry home at night all the ice that he has marked out during 

 the day, or some enterprising neighbor may step in during 

 the evening and help himself in a way more legal than 

 courteous. 



Game. 

 It has been held in England that the owner of land has 

 property in animals killed thereon ; but if the game was 

 started on the land of another, the property is in the hunter, 

 and I presume that doctrine would be adopted by our supreme 

 court as the law of Massachusetts. In New Hampshire they 

 have game laws which forbid the killing of certain wild ani- 

 mals at certain periods. A curious case arose there some years 

 ago, in which Chief Justice Doe wrote a very long and elab- 

 orate opinion, discussing the whole ground of rights in wild 

 animals and the right to restrain the killing of them. A 

 certain farmer had a flock of geese, which was in the habit 

 of resorting to a pond near his house. One day he heard a 

 loud cackling from the pond, and, seizing his gun, hastened 

 to the relief of his feathered flock. Coming in sight of the 

 water, he saw his geese swimming with all their might for 

 the shore, followed by four minks, a dam and three young 

 ones. It was during the closed season. The owner gave a 

 shout of alarm, as the result of which the minks gave up the 

 pursuit and betook themselves to a small island in the pond, 

 where they sat huddled together, the mother in the centre. 

 The farmer fired his shot gun at the group, and killed all four 

 of them at one shot. He was arrested and tried for killing 

 the minks during the closed season ; but the court held that 

 he was blameless, on the ground that one may kill a wild 

 animal in order to protect his property, if necessary, even if 

 that wild animal is protected by the game law. I have 



