The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1873-05-10 00:00:00

JOSEPH ARCH ON THE GAME LAWS.

On Friday afternoon the Committee of the House of
Commons appointed to inquire into the operation and
eff.cts• of the Game Laws was entirely occupied in
hearaig the opiaions of Mr. Arch, the President of the
Agricultural L sbcurers' Union, whipe efforts as a la-
bourer in the cue of his fellows have male him
famous. Mr. Ward-Hunt presided, and there was a
full attendance of members.

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The witness, who ehowed a great deal of quietly des
6ant self-pgaseedon, said, in the-course of an examina-
Hon of four hour.' duration, that poaching was not looked
upon by the majtritcy of agricultural labourers as re-
spectable and proper, though doubtless they did not
think it was not so in their hearts. It warn the law
that made the poacher a vagabond in the
general pnblic eye. Personally he thought poach-
ing ti be no crime whatever, and if his wife
ac i family were in want of food moist certainly
he would kill for them either a rabbit, a hare, or
a phermant. lle knew that the pursuit of poaching,
e.alled illegal, del not lead men to commit felonious
offences, and, more than that, he knew that, as •
general rule, labourers, adequately paid, did not take
to imaching. His main objection to the Game Laws
was that by them men were tempted to trespass, an i
afterwards were punished both fcr the trespass and for
the game pursuing. He did not approve trespassing,
because no man had. right to infringe upon or to take
possession of that which was not his own. But, he
umbel, who were the real owners of hares and rabbits?
Where was the indentiticatioa ? Mr. Winterbotham
asked how could the labourer be better off by the re-
moval of the Game Laws, since still the witness
would maintain punishments for trespassing ?—Wit-
uses said there would be little or no temr.ation to
troupess if there were no Game Laws. Mr. C. Heed
asked him whether he thouJit it would be • breach of
the law to smuggle or to sell spirituous drinks
without a licence or payment of ditty, and the witness
said, "Yen, most dwidedly," adding that things upon
whirls duty was paid bore a stamp, but rabbits and
hares were not marked in any such way. He went on
to say that anima's preserved as game would come and
"h-eakfamt "in his cottage garden, and afterwards run
off di the fields of the o wrier of the estate, or elsewhere,
and if he there SAW one of them and killed it for dinner
he WAS seized, condemned, and disgraced, and, being
unable afterwards to get work, tnnied out a regular
poacher, and went, as the witness pot it, "the whole
hog." Many ani nnocent, harmless sort of roan he had
known to be ruined ever after through the severity of
the Game Laws upon the first, perhaps quite acci-
dental, offence. As to tire magisterial inquiries under
the Game Laws, the witness said he had not the
least hesitation to pronounce them altogether one-
sided and unjust; for on the one band there were
the magistrates (themselves game prsservere) and
the hired game watchers, and on the other Was
the helpless labouring man, who, having once happened
to knock down a hare in his path, was made a marked
man, branded always alter LAS an outlaw and a scamp.
Mr. Winterbotham reminded the witness that treepas-
sing did not Le cewari y imply a pursuit of game, and
the witness said he knew that, but She knew, also, that
local magistrates generally believed the hired watch, re,
who would say there warn pursuit of game whether there
was or not. Only a day or two ago he saw • man in his
district who paid—el 19'. 6d. in avoidance of imprison-
-1:11,11t on a charge of trespassing in pursuit of game,
whom he privately well knew to have only gone
into a wood to collect liverwort, a well known
medicinal herb. In answer to further questions, the
witness adhered to his statements, and maintained that
there wire other ways in which game preservation seri-
ously affected the agricultural labourers. It destroyed
the farmers' crops and kept down wages, while it kept
many thousands of cultivable acres fallow. Any
men, be thonght, ought to be able to take, and kill, and
appropriate game whenever they could come across it
without trespassing. If that were allowed, then tree.
passing in pursuit of game, and, in fact, the Game
Laws, would be practically at an end.