The Express.
London, England, 1846-10-13 00:00:00

. went on when I got across. Then the keepers did not take the water
atter youl—No, they did not take the water."
Bowing says be has little difficulty in finding men to
help him an executing an order for game. He could get
fifty or sixty men in the neighbourhood, and after harvest
a hundred men. " Low wages and the fear of the union
house" fill his ranks. According to chief-constable
Hatton there was 11 great deal of crime in the neighbour-
hood of Snape, and on inquiry he found that all partimi
generally speaking, that were concerned in burglaries and
other outrages were poachers. But Goering is quite in-
dignant at the accusation ; and when asked whether any
of the fifty or sixty men whom ho employed were occa-
sionally thieves, he answered :
"No, certainly not; a poacher is not a thief. Where it is •
regnlapaacher that knows his business, be gets more by game than
he will by fowls. I have been a poacher the last eighteen years. I
should not thieve the farmer's fowls or his pig, when I can go into
this oak cover or that birch wood, and cum a sovereign In the course
of half an hour. If I were to snail a pair of chickens they would
transport me • but poaching this game out of that oak wood or birch
wood, or wherever ;t is, will not transport me. I should get three
menthe, for a night offence."
It would nut do for a systematic personage like (lowing
to encourage acts of liolence. Ile says, in his district the
poachers have no affray with keepers :
' They do nut go armed with bludgeons—they go after game, they
410 not go after men; that he always directs them net to carry arms
at all, nor any bludgeons, and to go with as small a Tarty as they can,
and if they ore at all attacked hy gamekeepers, to tea ape mid get
away, as the men are after their duty, and not to fight."
An idea of the sort of security with which °owing carries
on ha emerations may be formed from the answer he gave to
the question
" The committee may look upon you as • proof of the little security
of the game laws'—You may look, of course, as you think proper as
to that ; as to this Act, it is of no use to talk about it ;it is the greatest
opening in the world for any MIL Any person may have game, and
go about with it, so that he grin it Into Eis hand. lam taken before
the magistrates at Woodbridge Shire-hall, foe instanee; they meet
mete my cart with a lot of pheasants or hares and wild game ; I am
Draught before the is nth of magistrates; there is Earl Stradbroke,
Lord hendlealmin, Squire Thomas, end many mare that I could WM-
tiOll. • Where dal you get the game, Goring r Of course lam not
going to fell them where I got the game; that is my game; who eon
way it is theirs! ' Lord Iterallesham, is it year's!' No, it is not.'
• Fir! Strarlbruke, is it your's!' 'No, it is not.' ' Squire Shaw, is it
your's!' They are not allowed to swear to it, of coulee not, that is
my game."
All that a man who has taken out a certificate has to care
for is to avoid being caught in the act of poaching. (lowing
keeps an armoury of air-guns, and his poachers take the
pheasants by night from the roost with these guns. " There
are many besides me," he says, " who have air-guns. I can
go into four or five towns where there are plenty of air-guns:"
We shall, in another article, offer a few further rematks on
one or two points in this man's evidence. For the present,
we shall only add the following extract, from which it will
be seen that he occasionally keeps good company. After
alluding to the folly of going with noisy guns, he continues :
tt If I am, there, I could soon beat them hollow; I could take the
game all :twee, pretty neatly. That is the way we beat the Wcod-
rows, when they first came to the Marquis of Ilertford's as his game-
keepers. They came to the alarquls's as very notably clever keepers,
and when they came they said they were informed that there were a
vast number of poachers there. They raid they would soon do away
with the isiaellers, for they knew bow to do away with the peacbers;
but they soon lost all the game, so that the Marquis of Hertford emit
for me after I had swam through the Over. Ile was diesatisfied with
the keeled's. The Duke of Wellington was there at the time.
Mr. IL Woodrow was the bead kemwr. His Lordship says—' Where
me we going to-morrowr The keeper say., to such a place. They
go there, and they do not find 80111:My M the keeper had estimated.
Isis lordshlp dues not find half enough I Leasinta for his friends to
shoot; next day they go ant again and tind it the same, and he is
di satisfied amis. At last he gets talking about it after dinner ever
the wine, and Horace Seymour says to his loulship, 'There have teen
fellous taking the game; there is a fellow that swam through the
river la•-i spring.' His loraship hearkens to it ; he says, ' The fellow
has bee:it:Ling off the game since lie c arse out of gaol. Tue marquis
directly sent to me, and desired Me to meet him that night, when he
came home from shooting. I could net meet him that night, fur I
was going away that very evening to London; but I got home, awl I
met him a slay or two after. I went into the drawing-room : the
Duke of Wellington was there, and some other gentlemen, and he
began by roking me two questions; that is, he asked air my name;
I told !dm ; he says, " Cowing, you are a small man, do you know my
keepers!' ' Yee, my lord, I know your keepers.' ' Well, and did
they chase you 011er r • Yes,' I said. k What distance!" So and
so, four miles.''slow did you get away from them !' toys I, ' I
swam across the river.' Says be, And did you suffer fur that after
you SWAM scrota the river 1' • Yes,' I said, was committed to
Woodbridge for three months.' Says he, ' You ought not to hare
been committed for three months after swimming across the river.'
Ills Lordship was in Italy at the time, and knew nothing of it till
Horace Seymour told him of it ; he saves, ' I want to knew if you have
got any game off my estate since you casino out of gaol?' I thought
that was rathce a curious question. I did not know what to say to
his Lordship. I said, 'My Lord. if I tell you the truth I shall, per-
haps, offend you.' Ile sap, No, if you do rot tell me you will offend
me more. I should very much like to know, for certain reasons;
that is, that he had been deceived by hie keepers; had I told him that
I certainly had been in certain places. and what I had got withia a
little, to the amount of padeles something like 2 or 3 or 400 head of
pheasants. It was a place sailed the Church Car that he chicly swat
to. Ile went there expecting to find about 300 pheasants, and he found
re,reolv half what he expeet.si, fur the reason that I had been there
and taken them. That was before the laid Game Act."