272 BIRD LIFE IN ENGLAND. 



The farmer, again, may dislike to see total strangers 

 perambulating his beans and clover, but " cussin " partridges 

 or the shooting tenant is poor agriculture at best, and what 

 he wants is not what the Radicals prescribe. 



Mr. Brodie Innes* admirable sentences, prefaced to this 

 chapter, shows where the shoe pinches in the north, and the 

 real position of the question there. For myself, I will not 

 attempt to epitomise the fine subtilties of " 1 and 2 Will. 

 IV. cap. 32," or "24 and 25 Viet. cap. 96," or, indeed, any 

 other chapter or heading whatever, though there is a goodly 

 pile of tomes devoted to this literature at my elbow. Already 

 there is a keen desire on foot amongst the sensible yeomanry 

 of the midlands to amend the Ground Game Act, and 

 give the much persecuted hares a close time. Winged 

 game was never more plentiful or better appreciated than 

 it was last season ; and if the agriculturists can be got 

 to see that the abolishment of game is but a selfish propa- 

 ganda prettily bound a plausible repetition of Metternich's 

 formula, " Ote-toi de la, que je m'y mette," all will be well, 

 and we shall drop no substantial possessions for very shadowy 

 and more than mythical advantages. 



