192 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



always thought that the defendant in this case deserved his 

 acquittal for his excellent shot, if for no other good reason. 



Another curious freak of the law, I will not say of the 

 court, was a case arising some fifty years ago in Massachu- 

 setts, where a defendant was prosecuted for malicious mis- 

 chief in shooting wild geese, after having been previously 

 informed that it would throw an invalid into a fit ; and 

 the conviction was allowed to stand. This hunter seems not 

 only to have given the woman fits, but to have given the 

 geese fits too. 



Domestic Animals. 



The law afiecting the ownership of domestic animals is 

 always very interesting to the farmer. 



Bees are feroe Jiaturce, that is, wild animals, and in their 

 wild state of course they are not the subject of private 

 property ; but vrhen hived and reclaimed they become the 

 subject of ownership. If the owner of a swarm is able 

 to identify it, the property continues in him, even if that 

 swarm has flown onto the land of another and swarmed 

 there. Care should be exercised that the keeping of bees 

 does not interfere with the rights of a neighbor, for in Dela- 

 ware a man was enjoined against keeping bees that annoyed 

 the owner of the adjoining land. 



Doves are not the subject of larceny except when in a 

 pigeon house or in the nest and unable to fly ; and if doves 

 are killed by a stranger, at any rate on the ground of the 

 proprietor, an action of trespass may be maintained against 

 him, and damages recovered. 



Hens are strictly domestic animals, and are among the 

 chief annoyances of the farmer's life, whether it be his own 

 hens or those of his neighbor. In fact, it may safely be 

 affirmed that the neighbor's hens are generally the greater 

 annoyance. So far as I know, no satisfactory method has 

 yet been discovered of freeing oneself from this annoyance. 

 Of all the farmer's possessions, hens go astray most easily. 

 They crawl under the fence and they crawl through the fence, 

 or they fly over it at will. A carefully cultivated garden plot is 

 their supreme delight, and the ravages of the big rooster 

 therein are the source of more neighborhood bickerings and 

 troubles than all other things combined, except dogs. Some 



