AN EXPENSIVE BIRD.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 224, 21 September 1929, Page 8

AN EXPENSIVE BIRD.

I 111 {lie good old days before the war it used ' to be estimated that every kept pheasant shot in England cost a guinea. Possibly the cost is double that to-day, but, in Mr. Kipling's words, the pheasant is still mast r of many a shire. Eemuera, however, can go one better. A mail shot a pheasant there the other day, and had io pay £5 and costs. The case has some curious and humorous features. Possibly the grave view of the offence taken by the Acclimatisation Society could be included in the second category. The plea that the bird was damaging the offender's garden seems to} have little more effect on the Society than the complaint of an English farmer has on a game-! breeding squire. The defendant should have! complained to the Society and it would havej had the bird destroyed. May we ask ho\v?j Would the Society's ranger take post in the! garden at dawn these cold mornings and wait J patiently for the criminal, or would the house-j holder, when he saw the bird eating his spring ! peas, ring up that official ? In the latter case, ] of course,- the bird would obligingly wait. Or would the ranger proceed by the old method of putting salt on its tail ? Also, what would liapuen if the ranger shot the wrong bird; rt ould he proceed against himself for a breach j if the tew? However, the magistrate did not j ake a very serious view of the ease. He did lot impose the but let defendant iff with a line of £5. Many a man; has >n,ioved a good bout of wife-beating at lesi :ost.