In order to discountenance poaching, G. is declared not to be a legal article of sale except by licensed game-dealers; this license costs £2. The game-dealer can only buy his G. from licensed sportsmen, and it is an offense for any of the public to buy G. except from the licensed dealers, or to sell G. without a license; but sportsmen are not prohibited from making presents of G. to any person.
As regards these are now of two kinds: one is annual, and costs £3; the other lasts about half the year, and costs £2. A gamekeeper's license costs These licenses are necessary, not merely to kill G.,- but also to kill deer, woodcocks, snipes, quails, land-rails, and conies or rabbits. An exemption, however, exists, as regards hares and rabbits, when the owner or occupier kills these on his own inclosed ground, or directs another person to do so, in which case no license is necessary; but this exemption only applies when the lands are inclosed or fenced, and the owner or occupier has otherwise the legal right to kill the hares and rabbits. No license is required for merely hunting with staghounds, greyhounds, or beagles, or killing deer in one's own park. Moreover, attendants or friends going out with licensed sportsmen, provided these merely assist, and do not play a principal part, do not require a license. But in all other cases it requires a license, not only for killing, but for pursuing G., and it is thought for taking away dead G. from a highway or field. Assessed taxes must a'so be paid for dogs—viz., for each dog 5s., but no license for the gun. See Paterson's Game Laws of the United Kingdom.
The policy of the game-laws has often been questioned. Mr. Bright obtained a com mittee of the house of commons in 1845, who examined the subject. These laws are
represented, ou the one hand, to be far too stringent, to be badly administered by inter ested justices, and, lastly, to be opposed to the moral sentiments of the lower orders, who persist in treating such offenses as venial, if not praiseworthy. On the other hand, owners of land say that they are entitled to protection against trespassers, and this is the only way by which they can be protected.
In Scotland, several of the foregoing statutes, such as the night poaching act and the game licenses act, also apply. There is a similar act as to day-poaching—viz., 2 and 3 Will. IV. c. 68, and as to hares, 11 and 12 Viet. c. 30. The provisions in the English act as to game-dealers and the sale of G. also apply. But in Scotland, not only a game certificate, but a qualification, is requisite to enable a person to shoot, except he has the permission of a qualified person. In Scotland, the close season differs slightly from that of England, and so does the definition of game. In Scotland, if nothing is said in the lease, the right to the G. belongs to the landlord, and not to the tenant. A tenant has also a right of action against the landlord for excessive preserving, if extraordinary injury is thereby done to his crops—a right which does not exist in England or Ireland. The game-laws amendment (Scotland) act of 1877, by transferring G. cases to the sheriff-courts, saves justices of nib peace from trying cases to which they are parties, and provides the sheriff with some means of measuring the damage done by game.
In Ireland, the law is nearly the same in substance with that of England; but there still remain a few minor differences as to the qualification to kill G., as to the defini tion of G., of close-time, etc.