Star.
London, England, 1816-07-16 00:00:00

OF COMMON&

, Your Committee, in investigating this important
subject, proceeded to the consideration of the present
existing laws for the preservation of Game ; their
adequacy to their professed object, their policy and
justice, and their effects upon the habits and tnorals
of the lower orders of the community. In consider-
ing the existing state of the law upon this subject,
their attention was naturally directed, in the first place
to its state in_ the early periods of the common law,
and in that your Committee finds concurrent and un.
disturbed authorities for contemplating Game as the
exclusive right of the proprietor of the land ration:
so/t. In a law of Cannte's he thus expresses himsell:
Praterea autem concedo ut in propriis ipsius
prsdiis quisque tam in agris quam in sylvis exciter
agitetque feral ;" and in Blackstone, IL p. 415,
" Sit quil:bet homo dignus venatiune sua in sylva et
in agris situ propriis et in domino sun." In the
preamble of the Statutes, 11th Henry VIL c. 17. a
Parliamentary recognition of the 'Common Law is
most distinctly made, and in unequivocal language.
In the 4th Institutes, p. 304, it is laid down, that
seeing the wild beasts do belong to the purlieu men,
with raticne soli, so long as they remain iu his grounds
he may kill them, for the property ration: soli is in
him. 11 Coke's Reports, p. 876, it is laid down,
that for hawking, hunting, &c. there needest not any
licence, but every one may, in his own land, use them
at his pleasure, ,without any restraint to be made,
if mit by Parliament, as appears by the Statutes
.11 Henry VII. cap. 17, 23 Ella. cap. 10, and 3
James 1. c. 13.

In limitation, and to a certain degree in deroga:
lion of the common law, a variety of statutes has;
subjected to penalties persons, who not having certain
qualifications, shall even up sn their oan lands kill'
any of those wild animals which come under the de-
nomination of game.
[Various authorities for this are cited.]
It appears to your Committee, that the Statute 22
and 23 C. 11. is the first instance, either in our Sta.',
totes, Reports, or Law Treatises, in which Lords;
of Manors are distinguished from other Land 0 *ners
in regard to Game.
The same Statute, section 3, confines the qualiS-i
cation to kill game to persons having lands nt inheri •
Glace of 4100 per annum, or leases ot £l5O (to
which are added other descriptions of personal quell.
fications) ; and persons not having such qualification
are declared to be persons net allowed to have or keep
game dogs, &c.
The 22t1 and 23d C. 11. c. 25, was followed by 4
and 5 W. and M. c. 23, and the 28 Geo. 11. c. 12,
which enacted penalties against unqualified, and,
finally, against qualified persons, who shall buy,
sell, or (der to stll, any hare, pheasant, partridge,
&rod penahies are therein enacted againr•
oa-pla;;fieJ i,ersrins having game in their possession.
Sod' appears to your Committee to he the state oi
the laws respecting; game, as they at present stand.
The varhus and notaheiless Statutes which have been
'enacted opera the subject, and to which your Com.
mittee have not ihought it requisite to alude, hate
not been unobserved lay them ; but, seeing that they
are merely supplementary to those to which your
Committee has made reference, they have not felt it
important to enter into a detail of their enactments.
Your Committee cannot but conclude, that by the
Common Law.every possessor of land has an exclusive
right ratigne soli to all the animals feria naturs, found
upon ins land, and that he rn.ty pursue and kill them
hitn;elf, or authorize any other person to pursue ot
kill them ; and that he may now by the Common
Law, which in so far continues unestrained by any
Isubsectuent Statute, support an action against any
person who shall take, kill, or chase them.
The Statute.s to which your Committee have re.
(erred, have in limitation of the common law, sub.
jected to penalties petsons, who, not having certain
qualifications; snail exercise their common law right ;
but they have not divested the possessor of his right,
nor have they given power to any other persons to
exercise that tight, without the consent ot the pos.

bC19%01.
.It appears to your Committee, that the 22 and 23
C. 11. tilts merely the egect'of exempting from those
liabilities which were previously enacted against un-
qualified persons, such gamekeepers as shall receive
exemption from them by the Lords of Manors (and
which exemption the said Lords of Manors are thereby
empowered to give) but that the restraints upon the
sale of game equally affect the entire community.
..Your Committee conceive that, in the present state
of society, there is little probability that the laws
above referred to can continue adequate to the object
' for which they were originally enacted. The com-
mercial prosperity of the country, the immense ac-
cumulation of personal property, and the consequent
habits of luxury and indulgence, operate as a con-
stant excitement to their infraction, which no legisla-
tive interference that your Como;ittee could recom-
mend appears likely to counteract. It appears that,
under the present system, those possessors of land
who fall within the statotable disqualifications, feel
little or no interest in the preservation of the game,
and that they are less active in repressing the baneful
practice of
,poaching than if they, remained entitled
to kill and enjoy the game found upon their own
lands. Nor is it unnatural to suppose that the injury
done to the crops in those situations where game is
toperaboadaat, may induce the possessors of la4d