THE GROUND GAME ACT 197 



to give the tenant power to sublet the ground game ; 

 but Sir William Harcourt maintained that this would 

 defeat the object of the Bill, by enabling the tenant 

 to let to the landlord. Another member then suggested 

 that the tenant should have the power to let to any 

 other person than the landlord^ but Sir William Har- 

 court replied that he could not assent to so invidious 

 a distinction. Now, however, it has been held by a 

 Court of Appeal that there is such an invidious limita- 

 tion (when the occupier is entitled to sporting rights 

 otherwise than in pursuance of the Act), although it is 

 not expressly mentioned in the Statute. 



The position, therefore, seems to be that an 

 occupier of lands owning the exclusive right to the 

 ground game (as when a landlord in letting has not 

 reserved the game and rabbits) may let the sporting 

 rights and recover the rent, if his tenant is not his 

 landlord. If his shooting tenant were also his land- 

 lord, the Court might possibly hold the contract void, 

 and the rent irrecoverable — certainly a curious state 

 of things. But in either case the occupier who is 

 exclusive owner of sporting rights cannot divest him- 

 self of his concurrent right to kill the ground game, 

 and while nominally letting the exclusive right, he, 

 literally speaking, lets only the concurrent right, so 

 far as the ground game is concerned. 



