The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-06-12 00:00:00

SATURDAY, IVJ 1. .18E()

LORD STAMF.)RD AND THE GROUND
GAME BILL.

The Earl of Stamford and Warrington, in a
letter to the Standard, states that he is convinced
the more the provisions of the Ground Game Bill
are examined "the greater will be the dissatisfac •
'don felt by landlords, and tenants, to protect
whose interests this measure has been framed. In
the first place, looking at the bill morally and
politically, the tenant is placed by it in a false
position with his landlord. No landlord can really
wish to see crops injured by game, and it is in
every landlord's power to prevent this, and every
tenant can make arrangements with his landlord
to ensure his farm from damage without framing
a bill of a dangerous character, too likely to event-
ually prove fatal to all sport throughout the United
Kingdom, ignoring the rights of the landlord, and
rendering it no longar possible for any person but
the occupier to preserve ground game. Again, :
the injustice of the bill is shown in the fact that it
does away with any private contract between land-
lord and tenant for the reservation of game, hold- ,
ing any such to be absolutly null and void. A
further injustice is that it deprives the landlord of
valuable rights, either hereditary or acquired, of
considerable and increasing monetary value, which
have always been considered as attached to the
ownership of landed property. The injury is not
confined to landlords, but effects the tenant equally.
if not in a worse degree. For it is evident that a
good tenant, who is desirous to do the best by his
farm, cannot possibly find time to destroy ground
game himself, nor could be spare the capital to pay
others. Speaking of my own estates, I find the
system of allowing my tenants to destroy rabbits
from November to March answers admirably, as it
ensures no damage being done to pheasants or
partridges during the summer and autumn.
Amongst minor evils, if hares are to be indisarim-
inately got rid of as vermin, according to this
sweeping bill, then we may say adieu to coursing—
adieu to harriers and the sports so genial to thou-
sands of Englishmen As the bill sets forth, the
farmer can set traps wherever he chooses. the
simple meaning of which is the destruction of any
biped or quadruped going through the fences or
hedges of his farm. And as foxes will not remain
constantly in covers where there may be rabbits,
we may in a short time say that fox-hunting will
soon become a thing of the past in England.
Where then will the farmer find a market for his
oats, beans, and straw? The former will not even
care for breeding a good animsl for hunting par
poses. English gentlemen, finding all the
pleasures of the chase and field denied them, will
take their families and seek in foreign climes for
amusements and recreations hitherto little adapted
to their tastes. Thus it will be seen that by this
obnoxious bill landlords will be debarred from all
pleasures on their estates during the autumn and
winter. Neither will any especial advantage be
gained for the tenant farmer; but, as I have clearly
demonstrated, the measure will far more Pkely
prove his absolute ruM.