44 THE KEEPER'S BOOK 



to appropriate dead meat. But it is not ordinary theft 

 to take game before it has become the property of some 

 one, that is to say, in the usual case, before it is killed 

 and bagged. This leads to a curious result : if, for in- 

 stance, a man, passing alongapublic roadwhilepheasants 

 are being shot on the adjoining land, picks up a dead 

 bird that falls at his feet and walks off with it, he is 

 not guilty either of theft or of breaking the game laws. 

 The Courts have so decided in Scotland, and although 

 there is no decision quite so clear in England or Ireland, 

 the law is understood to be the same. 



In England and Ireland the property in game is 

 sometimes affected by the peculiar privileges belong- 

 ing to royal forests, chases, purlieus, parks, free warrens, 

 and manors. The keepers on such estates have also 

 exceptional powers, but such privileged places are not 

 so numerous as to require notice here. 



Shoo ting rights. The right of huntingand shooting 

 game (which is a different thing from the property in the 

 game) belongs naturally to the owner of the ground. I n 

 Scotland this right remains with the proprietor, though 

 he lets the land on an agricultural lease, unless the lease 

 contains an express stipulation that the tenant should 

 have the game rights. In England and Ireland the 

 agricultural tenant has the game rights unless the lease 

 contains a contrary stipulation. This, however, is sub- 

 ject to what must afterwards be said about the Ground 

 Game Acts, which apply to all three countries. Of 

 course the owner of the land may let the game rights 



