BEATERS AND STOPS 225 
able. You have at least a counter-claim for more 
than equivalent damages, especially if they spring a 
strike on you immediately after a good lunch. I do 
not know of any decided cases for settling difficulties 
which may arise from wet, snow, and other causes 
necessitating shooting being put off. Take, for 
instance, the case in which beaters do their work 
till it is decided, say, at lunch-time or after, that the 
weather is too bad to continue shooting. I should 
think him a very mean man, and no sportsman at 
all, who suggested anything short of a full day’s 
pay. 
But suppose beaters are booked for a shoot which 
is put off not later than the day before, so that their 
usual occupation, if any, is not interfered with, I 
should say there is no obligation on the part of 
those by whom they were engaged ; but it is usual 
to give all so put off the refusal of beating when the 
shoot does come off. When the morning is con- 
sidered too wet to make a start, and you keep the 
men waiting on the chance till lunch-time, then it 
would be fair to give them their lunch and a half- 
day’s pay, even though they did no beating. If the 
weather about the usual time for starting is so 
hopeless that any prospect of shooting is out of the 
question for the day, then beaters who have turned 
up should be given their lunch. Without throwing 
money about carelessly, all such questions should be 
dealt with on lines of liberality—not only in the 
15 
