Tomkins said, that it was very hard that he should have to pay so heavy a fine, only for having a few hares in his cart; and did not see how he was more to blame than the poulterer, to whom he was going to send them, or than the gentlemen who bought them of the poulterers. Mr. Hale replied, that he and his brother justices sat there to execute the laws, and had not time to discuss the propriety of them, or the cases of other offenders who were not before them. "As for you, Mr. Tomkins," he continued, "for the reasons which I have given, I do not think your punishment at all too severe: at all events, it is the punishment prescribed by law, which we are bound to inflict. As for those other persons to whom you allude, a poulterer exposing game for sale, and a gentleman or other person _buying it_[b], are liable to the same penalty, and if they should be brought before us with sufficient evidence against them, it would be our duty to convict them. Perhaps I might also feel it right to give them the same admonition that I have given you. I might feel it right to hint to them, as I have done to you, that they are encouraging poor men to break the laws by poaching, and that they are in one point of view more to blame than the poachers themselves. A poacher often pleads distress and poverty. This is no excuse for him, but can certainly often be pleaded with truth. Now, certainly, a poor, uneducated man, who breaks the laws through distress--though mind, I again say, that that is no excuse for him--must in one point of view at least, be considered as less blameable than he who knowingly breaks them for the purpose of mere gain, or, than he who violates them for the sake of gratifying his appetite or his vanity, by seeing game upon his table." [Footnote b: See Note [B.]] Tomkins had nothing more to say, excepting that he had not the money by him, and wanted a little time to raise it. The justices therefore allowed him to defer the payment till that day fortnight. When the culprit returned into the market-place, he pretended to make light of the affair; and calling at the Red Lion for a pot of ale with some gin in it, drank "good luck to poaching," and affected to laugh at the magistrates. Fifteen pounds, however, was really a heavy pull upon Tomkins's purse, and whatever he might pretend, it weighed upon his mind a good deal.