2(J4< THE GAME LAWS. 



ministers with the most rancorous abuse, declaim in bitter terms 

 on the invaded rights of the people, the galling oppression under 

 which they are sinking, and rave about reform almost as madly 

 as Platoff did for Buonaparte's head ; yet, only let the reform 

 of the game laws be distantly hinted, and they immediately strain 

 every nerve to continue a system at variance with reason and 

 justice, but which enables them, as land-holders or lords of 

 manors, to play the petty tyrant on a scale contemptible enough, 

 but well suited to the narrowness of their contracted ideas ! 



While poaching has most alarmingly increased, the means 

 resorted to for the preservation of game are not only disgusting, 

 but extremely dangerous ; and though accidents are of frequent 

 occurrence, and valuable lives occasionally lost, by steel traps 

 and spring guns, yet the system is obstinately pursued in this 

 enlightened age, and in a country too which boasts so much of 

 the freedom of its institutions, and the inherent rights of the 

 human race ! 



If a partridge could, like a sheep, be kept in a paddock, then 

 indeed the right of private property would be claimed with jus- 

 tice ; but as no limits can be put to its motions, as it is seen on 

 the ground of one man this hour, and on that of another the 

 next may feed on the corn of the peer in the morning, and 

 ravage the poor man's crop in the evening what can be more 

 ridiculous or unjust than to claim as a right that which, in the very 

 nature of things, can belong to no particular person whatever. 



Colonel Wood, a few years back, brought this subject before 

 the House of Commons with a view to remedy the evil here 

 complained of, but he did not succeed ; and the more recent 

 attempt of Mr. Brandt (fresh in the recollection of the reader, 

 no doubt) though entertained for some time, and triumphantly 

 debated, as far as reason and justice were concerned, was, never- 

 theless, ultimately rejected* This enlightened statesman had 

 no intention to abridge the privileges of the rich, but merely 



