SCARCELY a keeper can be found who has not got one or more tales to tell of encounters with poachers, sometimes of a desperate character. There is a general similarity in most of the accounts, which exhibit a mixture of ferocity and cowardice on the side of the intruders. The following case, which occurred some years since, brings these contradictory features into relief. The narrator was not the owner of the man-trap described previously.

There had been a great deal of poaching before the affray took place, and finally it grew to horse-stealing: one night two valuable horses were taken from the home park. This naturally roused the indignation of the owner of the estate, who resolved to put a stop to it. Orders were given that if shots were heard in the woods the news should be at once transmitted to head-quarters, no matter at what hour of the night.

One brilliant moonlight night, frosty and clear, the gang came again. A messenger went to the house, and, as previously arranged, two separate parties set out to intercept the rascals. The head keeper had one detachment, whose object it was to secure the main outlet from the wood towards the adjacent town—to cut off retreat. The young squire had charge of the other, which, with the under keeper as guide, was to work its way through the wood and drive the gang into the ambuscade. In the last party were six men and a mastiff dog; four of the men had guns, the gentleman only a stout cudgel.

They came upon the gang—or rather a part of it, for the poachers were somewhat scattered—in a ‘drive’ which ran between tall firs, and was deep in shadow. With a shout the four or five men in the ‘drive,’ or green lane, slipped back behind the trees, and two fired, killing the mastiff dog on the spot and ‘stinging’ one man in the legs. Quick as they were, the under keeper, to use his own words, ‘got a squint of one fellow as I knowed; and I lets drive both barrels in among the firs. But, bless you! it were all over in such a minute that I can’t hardly tell ’ee how it were. Our squire ran straight at ’em; but our men hung back, though they had their guns and he had nothing but a stick. I just seen him, as the smoke rose, hitting at a fellow; and then, before I could step, I hears a crack, and the squire he was down on the sward. One of them beggars had come up behind, and swung his gun round, and fetched him a purler on the back of his head. I picked him up, but he was as good as dead, to look at;’ and in the confusion the poachers escaped. They had probably been put up to the ambuscade by one of the underlings, as they did not pass that way, but seemed to separate and get off by various paths. The ‘young squire’ had to be carried home, and was ill for months, but ultimately recovered.

Not one of the gang was ever captured, notwithstanding that a member of it was recognised. Next day an examination of the spot resulted in the discovery of a trail of blood upon the grass and dead leaves, which proved that one of them had been wounded at the first discharge. It was traced for a short distance and then lost. Not till the excitement had subsided did the under keeper find that he had been hit; one pellet had scored his cheek under the eye, and left a groove still visible.

Some time afterwards a gun was picked up in the ferns, all rusty from exposure, which had doubtless been dropped in the flight. The barrel was very short—not more than eighteen inches in length—having been filed off for convenience of taking to pieces, so as to be carried in a pocket made on purpose in the lining of the coat. Now with a barrel so short as that, sport, in the proper sense of the term, would be impossible; the shot would scatter so quickly after leaving the muzzle that the sportsman would never be able to approach near enough. The use of this gun was clearly to shoot pheasants at roost.

The particular keeper in whose shed the man-trap still lies among the lumber thinks that the class of poachers who come in gangs are as desperate now as ever, and as ready with their weapons. Breech-loading guns have rendered such affrays extremely dangerous on account of the rapidity of fire. Increased severity of punishment may deter a man from entering a wood; but once he is there and compromised, the dread of a heavy sentence is likely to make him fight savagely.

The keeper himself is not altogether averse to a little fisticuffing, in a straightforward kind of way, putting powder and shot on one side. He rather relishes what he calls ‘leathering’ a poacher with a good tough ground-ash stick. He gets the opportunity now and then, coming unexpectedly on a couple of fellows rabbiting in a ditch, and he recounts the ‘leathering’ he has frequently administered with great gusto. He will even honestly admit that on one occasion—just one, not more—he got himself most thoroughly thrashed by a pair of hulking fellows.

‘Some keepers,’ he says, ‘are always summoning people, but it don’t do no good. What’s the use of summoning a chap for sneaking about with a cur dog and a wire in his pocket? His mates in the village clubs together and pays his fine, and he laughs at you. Why, down in the town there them mechanic chaps have got a regular society to pay these here fines for trespass, and the bench they claps it on strong on purpose. But it ain’t no good; they forks out the tin, and then goes and haves a spree at a public. Besides which, if I can help it, I don’t much care to send a man to gaol—this, of course, is between you and me—unless he uses his gun. If he uses his gun there ain’t nothing too bad for him. But these here prisons—every man as ever I knowed go to gaol always went twice, and kept on going. There ain’t nothing in the world like a good ground-ash stick. When you gives a chap a sound dressing with that there article, he never shows his face in your wood no more. There’s fields about here where them mechanics goes as regular as Saturday comes to try their dogs, as they calls it—and a precious lot of dogs they keeps among ’em. But they never does it on this estate: they knows my habits, you see. There’s less summonses goes up from this property than any other for miles, and it’s all owing to this here stick. A bit of ash is the best physic for poaching as I knows on.’

I suspect that he is a little mistaken in his belief that it is the dread of his personal prowess which keeps trespassers away—it is rather due to his known vigilance and watchfulness. His rather hasty notions of taking the law into his own hands are hardly in accord with the spirit of the times; but some allowance must be made for the circumstances of his life, and it is my object to picture the man as he is.

There are other dangers from guns beside these. A brown gaiter indistinctly seen moving some distance off in the tall dry grass or fern—the wearer hidden by the bushes—has not unfrequently been mistaken for game in the haste and excitement of shooting, and received a salute of leaden hail. This is a danger to which sportsman and keeper are both liable, especially when large parties are engaged in rapid firing; sometimes a particular corner gets very ‘hot,’ being enfiladed for the moment by several guns. Yet, when the great number of men who shoot is considered, the percentage of serious accidents is small indeed; more fatal accidents probably happen through unskilled persons thoughtlessly playing with guns supposed not to be loaded, or pointing them in joke, than ever occur in the field. The ease with which the breech-loader can be unloaded or reloaded again prevents most persons from carrying it indoors charged; and this in itself is a gain on the side of safety, for perhaps half the fatal accidents take place within doors.

In farmsteads where the owner had the right of shooting, the muzzle-loader was—and still is, when not converted—kept loaded on the rack. The starlings, perhaps, are making havoc of the thatch, tearing out straw by straw, and working the holes in which they form their nests right through, till in the upper story daylight is visible. When the whistling and calling of the birds tell him they are busy above, the owner slips quickly out with his gun, and brings down three or four at once as they perch in a row on the roof-tree. Or a labourer leaves a message that there is a hare up in the meadow or some wild ducks have settled in the brook. But men who have a gun always in their hands rarely meet with a mishap. The starlings, by-the-bye, soon learn the trick, and are cunning enough to notice which door their enemy generally comes out at, where he can get the best shot; and the moment the handle of that particular door is turned, off they go.

The village blacksmith will tell you of more than one narrow escape he has had with guns, and especially muzzle-loaders, brought to him to repair. Perhaps a charge could not be ignited through the foulness of the nipple, and the breech had to be unscrewed in the vice; now and then the breech-piece was so tightly jammed that it could not be turned. Once, being positively assured that there was nothing but some dirt in the barrel and no powder, he was induced to place it in the forge fire; when—bang! a charge of shot smashed the window, and the burning coals flew about in a fiery shower. In one instance a blacksmith essayed to clear out a barrel which had become choked with a long iron rod made red-hot: the explosion which followed drove the rod through his hand and into the wooden wall of the shed. Smiths seem to have a particular fondness for meddling with guns, and generally have one stowed away somewhere.

It was not wonderful that accidents happened with the muzzle-loaders, considering the manner in which they were handled by ignorant persons. The keeper declares that many of the cottagers, who have an old single-barrel, ostensibly to frighten the birds from their gardens, do not think it properly loaded until the ramrod jumps out of the barrel. They ram the charge, and especially the powder, with such force that the rebound sends the rod right out, and he has seen those who were not cottagers follow the same practice. A close-fitting wad, too tight for the barrel, will sometimes cause the rod to spring high above the muzzle: as it is pushed quickly down it compresses the air in the tube, which expands with a sharp report and drives the rod out.

Loading with paper, again, has often resulted in mischief: sometimes a smouldering fragment remains in the barrel after the discharge, and on pouring in powder from the flask it catches and runs like a train up to the flask, which may burst in the hand. For this reason to this day some of the old farmers, clinging to ancient custom, always load with a clay tobacco pipe-bowl, snapped off from the stem for the purpose. It is supposed to hold just the proper charge, and as it is detached from the horn or flask there is no danger of fire being communicated to the magazine; so that an explosion, if it happened, would do no serious injury, being confined to the loose powder of the charge itself. Paper used as wads will sometimes continue burning for a short time after being blown out of the gun, and may set fire to straw, or even dry grass.

The old folk, therefore, when it was necessary to shoot the starlings on the thatch, or the sparrows and chaffinches which congregate in the rickyards in such extraordinary numbers—in short, to fire off a gun anywhere near inflammable materials—made it a rule to load with green leaves, which would not burn and could do no harm. The ivy leaf was a special favourite for the purpose—the broad-leaved ivy which grows against houses and in gardens—because it is stout, about the right size to double up and fold into a wad, and is available in winter, being an evergreen, when most other leaves are gone. I have seen guns loaded with ivy leaves many times. When a gun gets foul the ramrod is apt to stick tight if paper is used after pushing it home, and unless a vice be handy no power will draw it out. In this dilemma the old plan used to be to fire it into a hayrick, standing at a short distance; the hay, yielding slightly, prevented the rod from breaking to pieces when it struck.

Most men who have had much to do with guns have burst one or more. The keeper in the course of years has had several accidents of the kind; but none since the breech-loader has come into general use, the reason of course being that two charges cannot be inadvertently inserted one above the other, as frequently occurred in the old guns.

I had a muzzle-loading gun burst in my hands some time since: the breech-piece split, and the nipple, hammer, and part of the barrel there blew out. Fortunately no injury was done; and I should not note it except for the curious effect upon the tympanum of the ear. The first sense was that of a stunning blow on the head; on recovering from which the distinction between one sound and another seemed quite lost. The ear could not separate or define them, and whether it was a person speaking, a whistle, the slamming of a door, or the neigh of a horse, it was all the same. Tone, pitch, variation there was none. Though perfectly, and in fact painfully, audible, all sounds were converted into a miserable jangling noise, exactly like that made when a wire in a piano has come loose and jingles. This annoying state of things lasted three days, after which it gradually went off, and in a week had entirely disappeared. Probably the sound of the explosion had been much increased by the cheek slightly touching the stock in the moment of firing, the jar of the wood adding to the vibration. This gun belonged to another person, and was caught up, already loaded, to take advantage of a favourable chance; it is noticeable that half the accidents happen with a strange gun.

Shot plays curious freaks sometimes: I know a case in which a gun was accidentally discharged in a dairy paved as most dairies are with stone flags. The muzzle was pointed downwards at the time—the shot struck the smooth stone floor, glanced off and up, and hit another person standing almost at right angles, causing a painful wound. It is a marvel that more bird-keepers do not get injured by the bursting of the worn-out firelocks used to frighten birds from the seed. Some of these are not only rusty, but so thin at the muzzle as almost to cut the hand if it accidentally comes into contact with any force.

A collection of curious old guns might be made in the villages; the flint-locks are nearly all gone, but there are plenty of single-barrels in existence and use which were converted from that ancient system. In the farmhouses here and there may be found such a weapon, half a century old or more, with a barrel not quite equal in length to the punt-gun, but so long that, when carried under the arm of a tall man, the muzzle touches the ground where it is irregular in level. It is slung up to the beam across the ceiling with leathern thongs—one loop for the barrel and the other for the stock. It is still serviceable, having been kept dry; and the owner will tell you that he has brought down pigeons with it at seventy yards.

Every man believes that his particular gun is the best in the locality to kill. The owner of this cumbrous weapon, if you exhibit an interest in its history, will take you into the fields and point out a spot where forty years ago he or his immediate ancestor shot four or five wild geese at once, resting the barrel on the branch of a tree in the hedge and sending a quarter of a pound of lead whistling among the flock. The spot the wild geese used to visit in the winter is still remembered, though they come there no more; drains and cultivation having driven them away from that southern district. In the course of the winter, perhaps, a small flock may be seen at a great height passing over, but they do not alight, and in some years are not observed at all.

There is a trick sometimes practised by poachers which enables them to make rabbits bolt from their holes without the assistance of a ferret. It is a chemical substance emitting a peculiar odour, and, if placed in the burrows drives the rabbits out. Chemical science, indeed, has been called to the aid of poaching in more ways than one: fish, for instance, are sometimes poisoned, or killed by an explosion of dynamite. These latter practises have, however, not yet come into general use, being principally employed by those only who have had some experience of mining or quarrying.

There is a saying that an old poacher makes the best gamekeeper, on the principle of setting a thief to catch a thief: a maxim however, of doubtful value, since no other person could so thoroughly appreciate the tempting opportunities which must arise day after day. That keepers themselves are sometimes the worst of depredators must be admitted. Hitherto I have chiefly described the course of action followed by honest and conscientious men, truly anxious for their employers’ interests, and taking a personal pride in a successful shooting season. But there exists a class of keepers of a very different order, who have done much to bring sport itself into unmerited odium.

The blackleg keeper is often a man of some natural ability—a plausible, obsequious rascal, quick in detecting the weak points of his employer’s character, and in practising upon and distorting what were originally generous impulses. His game mainly depends upon gaining the entire confidence of his master; and, not being embarrassed by considerations of self-esteem, he is not choice in the use of means to that end. He knows that if he can thoroughly worm himself into his employer’s good opinion, the unfavourable reports which may be set afloat against him will be regarded as the mere tittle-tattle of envy; for it is often an amiable weakness on the part of masters who are really attached to their servants to maintain a kind of partisanship on behalf of those whom they have once trusted.

Such a servant finds plentiful occasions for dexterously gratifying the love of admiration innate in us all. The manliest athlete and frankest amateur—who would blush at the praise of social equals—finds it hard to resist the apparently bluff outspoken applause of his inferiors bestowed on his prowess in field sports, whether rowing or riding, with rod or gun. Of course it frequently happens that the sportsman really does excel as a shot; but that in no degree lessens the insidious effect of the praise which seems extorted in the excitement of the moment, and to come forth with unpremeditated energy.

The next step is to establish a common ground of indignation; for it is to be observed that those who unite in abuse of a third person have a stronger bond of sympathy than those who mutually admire another. If by accident some unfortunate contretemps should cause a passing irritation between his master and the owner of a neighbouring estate, the keeper loses no opportunity of heaping coals upon the fire. He brings daily reports of trespass. Now the other party’s keepers have been beating a field beyond their boundaries; now they have ferreted a bank to which they have no right. Another time they have prevented straying pheasants from returning to the covers by intercepting their retreat; and a score of similar tricks. Or perhaps it is the master of a pack of hounds against whom insinuations are directed: cubs are not destroyed sufficiently, and the pheasants are eaten daily.

Sometimes it is a tenant-farmer with a long lease, who cannot be quickly ejected, who has to bear the brunt of these attacks. He is accused of trapping hares and rabbits: he sets the traps so close to the preserves that the pheasants are frequently caught and mortally injured; he is suspected of laying poisoned grain about. Not content with this he carries his malice so far as to cause the grass or other crops in which outlying nests or young broods are sheltered to be cut before it is ripe, with the object of destroying or driving them away; and he presents the mowers whose scythes mutilate game with a quart of beer as reward, or furnishes his shepherds with lurchers for poaching. He encourages the gipsies to encamp in the neighbourhood and carry on nightly expeditions by allowing them the use of a field in which to put their vans and horses. With such accounts as these, supported by what looks like evidence, the blackleg keeper gradually works his employer into a state of intense irritation, meantime reaping the reward of the incorruptible guardian and shrewd upright servitor.

At the same time, in the haze of suspicion he has created, the rascal finds a cloak for his own misdeeds. These poachers, trespassers, gipsies, foxes, and refractory tenants afford a useful excuse to account for the comparative scarcity of game. ‘What on earth has become of the birds, and where the dickens are the hares?’ asks the angry proprietor. In the spring he recollects being shown by the keeper, with modest pride, some hundreds of young pheasants, flourishing exceedingly. Now he finds the broods have strangely dwindled, and he is informed that these enemies against whom all along he has been warned have made short work of them. If this explanation seems scarcely sufficient, there is always some inexplicable disease to bear the blame: the birds had been going on famously when suddenly they were seized by a mysterious epidemic which decimated their numbers.

All this is doubly annoying, because, in addition to the loss of anticipated sport, there has been an exorbitant expenditure. The larger the number of young broods of pheasants early in the year the better for the dishonest keeper, who has more chances of increasing his own profit, both directly and indirectly. In the first place, there is the little business of buying eggs, not without commissions. More profit is found in the supply of food for the birds: extras and petty disbursements afford further room for pickings.

Then, when the game has been spirited away, the keeper’s object is to induce his employer to purchase full-grown pheasants—another chance of secret gratuities—and to turn them out for the battue. That institution is much approved of by keepers of this character, for, the pheasants being confined to a small area, there is less personal exertion than is involved in walking over several thousand acres to look after hares and partridges.

By poisoning his master’s mind against some one he not only covers these proceedings but secures himself from the explanation which, if listened to, might set matters right. The accused, attempting to explain, finds a strong prejudice against him, and turns away in dudgeon. Such underhand tricks sometimes cause mischief in a whole district. An unscrupulous keeper may set people of all ranks at discord with each other.

In these malpractices, and in the disposal of game which is bulky, he is occasionally assisted by other keepers of congenial character engaged upon adjacent estates. Gentlemen on intimate terms naturally imagine that their keepers mutually assist each other in the detection of poaching—meeting by appointment, for instance, at night, as the police do, to confer upon their beats. When two or three are thus in league it is not difficult for them to dispose of booty; they quickly get into communication with professional receivers; and instances have been known in which petticoats have formed a cover for a steady if small illegal transport of dead game over the frontier.

For his own profit a keeper of this kind may indeed be trusted to prevent poaching on the part of other persons, whose gains would be his loss, since there would remain less for him to smuggle. Very probably it may come to be acknowledged on all sides that he is watchful and always about: an admission that naturally tends to raise him in the esteem of his employer.

Those who could tell tales—his subordinate assistants—are all more or less implicated, as in return for their silence they are permitted to get pickings: a dozen rabbits now and then, good pay for little work, and plenty of beer. If one of them lets out strange facts in his cups, it signifies nothing: no one takes any heed of a labourer’s beerhouse talk. The steward or bailiff has strong suspicions, perhaps, but his motions are known, and his prying eyes defeated. As for the tenants, they groan and bear it.

It is to be regretted that now and then the rural policeman becomes an accomplice in these nefarious practices. His position of necessity brings him much into contact with the keepers of the district within his charge. If they are a ‘shady’ lot, what with plenty of drink, good fellowship, presents of game, and insidious suggestions of profit, it is not surprising that a man whose pay is not the most liberal should gradually fall away from the path of duty. The keeper can place a great temptation in his way—i.e. occasional participation in shooting when certain persons are absent: there are few indeed who can resist the opportunity of enjoying sport. The rural constable often has a beat of very wide area, thinly populated: it is difficult to tell where he may be; he has a reasonable pretext for being about at all hours, and it is impossible that he should be under much supervision. Perhaps he may have a taste for dogs, and breed them for sale, if not openly, on the sly. Now the keeper can try these animals or even break them in in a friendly way; and when once he has committed himself, and winked at what is going on, the constable feels that he may as well join and share altogether. At outlying wayside ‘publics’ the keeper and the constable may carouse to the top of their bent: the landlord is only too glad to be on good terms with them; his own little deviations pass unnoticed, and if by accident they are discovered he has a friend at court to give him a good character.

The worthy pair have an engine of oppression in their hands which effectually overawes the cottagers: they can accuse them of poaching; and if not proceeding to the ultimatum of a summons, which might not suit their convenience, can lay them under suspicion, which may result in notice to quit their cottages, or to give up their allotment gardens; and a garden is almost as important to a cottager as his weekly wages. In this way a landlord whose real disposition may be most generous may be made to appear a perfect tyrant, and be disliked by the whole locality. It is to the interest of the keeper and the constable to obtain a conviction now and then; it gives them the character of vigilance.

Sometimes a blackleg keeper, not satisfied with the plunder of the estate under his guardianship must needs encroach on the lands of neighbouring farmers occupying under small owners; and so further ill-will is caused. In the end an exposure takes place, and the employer finds to his extreme mortification how deeply he has been deceived; but the discovery may not be made for years. Of course all keepers of this character are not systematically vicious: many are only guilty occasionally, when a peculiarly favourable opportunity offers.

Another class of keeper is rather passively than actively bad. This is the idle man, whose pipe is ever in his mouth and whose hands are always in his pockets. He is often what is called a good-natured fellow—soft-spoken, respectful, and willing; liked by everybody; a capital comrade in his own class, and, in fact, with too many friends of a certain set.

Gamekeeping is an occupation peculiarly favourable to loafing if a man is inclined that way. He can sit on the rails and gates, lounge about the preserves, go to sleep on the sward in the shade; call at the roadside inn, and, leaning his gun against the tree from which the sign hangs, quaff his quart in indolent dignity. By degrees he easily falls into bad habits, takes too much liquor, finds his hands unsteady, becomes too lazy to repress poaching (which is a weed that must be constantly pulled up, or it will grow with amazing rapidity), and finally is corrupted, and shares the proceeds of bolder rascals. His assistants do as they please. He has no control over them: they know too much about him.

It is a curious fact that there are poaching villages and non-poaching villages. Out of a dozen or more parishes forming a petty sessional district one or two will become notorious for this propensity. The bench never meet without a case from them, either for actual poaching or some cognate offence. The drinking, fighting, dishonesty, low gambling, seem ceaseless—like breeding like—till the place becomes a nest of rascality. Men hang about the public-houses all day, betting on horses, loitering; a blight seems to fall upon them, and a bad repute clings to the spot for years after the evil itself has been eradicated.

If a weak keeper gets among such a set as this he succumbs; and the same cause hastens the moral decay of the constable. The latter has a most difficult part to maintain. If he is disposed to carry out the strict letter of his instructions, that does not do—there is a prejudice against too much severity. English feeling is anti-Draconian; and even the respectable inhabitants would rather endure some little rowdyism than witness an over interference with liberty. If the constable is good-natured, and loth to take strong measures, he either becomes a semi-accomplice or sinks to a nonentity. It is difficult to find a man capable of controlling such a class; it requires tact, and something of the gift of governing men.

By contact with bad characters a weak keeper may be contaminated without volition of his own at first: for we know the truthful saying about touching pitch. The misfortune is that the guilty when at last exposed become notorious; and their infamy spreads abroad, smirching the whole class to which they belong. The honest conscientious men remain in obscurity and get no public credit, though they may far outnumber the evil-disposed.

To make a good keeper it requires not only honesty and skill, but a considerable amount of ‘backbone’ in the character to resist temptation and to control subordinates. The keeper who has gone to the bad becomes one of the most mischievous members of the community: the faithful and upright keeper is not only a valuable servant but a protection to all kinds of property.

THE END.

Printed by R. & R. CLARK, Edinburgh.