THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
exceeding one pound, as to the justices shall seem meet, together with 
the costs of conviction. 
On the application of the grand jury of any county, the Lord -Lieutenant 
may vary the close time and publish the order in a paper circulating 
in the said county, and in the “Dublin Gazette.’* More than thirty such 
orders have been made from time to time and a list of them will be found 
in Farran’s “ Game Laws of Ireland,” 1907 (p. 116). In the majority of 
cases the close season has been extended by making it commence three 
weeks earlier, so as to be from April 1 to August 12. 
The tracking of hares in the snow, and killing hares at night, or on 
Sunday, are all prohibited in Ireland by 27 Geo. HI, c. 35, under a penalty 
not exceeding five pounds. 
THE GROUND GAME ACT, 1880 
43 and 44 Viet., c. 47 
Having referred to the statutes which relate to hares and rabbits 
separately, we may now consider the Ground Game Act which deals with 
both these animals collectively. This is intituled “ An Act for the better 
protection of occupiers of land against injury to their crops from ground 
game,” and the preamble runs as follows: “Whereas it is expedient 
in the interests of good husbandry and for the better security for the capital 
and labour invested by the occupiers of land in the cultivation of the soil, 
that further provision should be made to enable such occupiers to protect 
their crops from injury from loss by ground game.” Accordingly, under 
section 1, subject to certain conditions, presently to be mentioned, the 
tenant, or “occupier,” as he is termed in the Act, is given a concurrent 
right with the landlord, or “ owner,” to kill or take ground game on 
land in his occupation, that is to say, in cases where hares and rabbits 
have been reserved by the landlord in his agreement. As at common 
law in the absence of any agreement between landlord and tenant with 
regard to ground game, hares and rabbits are the property of the tenant 
as occupier of the soil, it is necessary, in making agreements with tenants, 
that hares and rabbits should be mentioned and reserved, otherwise the 
landlord will have no right to kill them. 
Sub -section 1 provides that the occupier himself and one other person 
authorized by him in writing shall be the only persons entitled to kill 
ground game with firearms, and that one person must be either a member 
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