(The signature of one witness, specifying his place of abode, is sufficient).
Game-laws, s.
Hares may be killed at any time of the year. Pheasants from the 1st of October to the 1st of February. Partridges from the 1st of September to the 1st of February; penalty for killing them at other times 5l. Grouse from the 12th of August to the 10th of December. Black game (in Devonshire, Somersetshire, and the New Forest) from the 1st of September to the 10th of December. Black game (everywhere else) from the 20th of August to the 10th of December. Bustards from the 1st of September to the 1st of March; penalty for killing at other times 20l., or not less than 10l., for the first offence, and for every subsequent offence 30l., or not less than 20l.
Any person taking or killing game on Sundays or Christmas-days to forfeit, for the first offence, not more than 20l. nor less than 10l.; for the second offence from 30l. to 20l., and for the third and every subsequent offence 50l.
An unqualified person, killing, can only be convicted of one penalty in a day. That is, an unqualified person, or even a poacher, would have no more to pay for killing fifty head of game in the same day, than he would for killing one. Though the poacher, or unqualified person, would be liable to the other penalties, viz. 5l. each for every head of game which he sold, offered for sale, or which had even been found in his possession; and if a dog or gun (or any other engine) was used in the destruction of game, he would also be liable to 20l. penalty, provided he had not taken out a sporting certificate.
If a person go in pursuit of game with a dog and gun, he can only be charged with one offence, and convicted in one penalty for both. (7 Term Reports, 152.)
Killing from seven o’clock at night to six in the morning, between the 12th of October and 12th of February, and from nine at night to four in the morning, from the 12th of February to the 12th of October, (besides the other penalties before named) first offence, not more than 20l. nor less than 10l.; second offence from 30l. to 20l.; third and subsequent, 50l.
Servant of a lord of a manor may kill, and yet the lord of the manor may not, unless he is qualified.
Informations for penalties, relative to the game laws, should be brought so far as the conviction to take place within three months.
A penalty may be either recovered by information before a justice of peace, or sued for in any of the courts of record at Westminster. In the latter case, the action must be brought within six months after the offence committed.