In one sleepy village known to us both the rural postman and the parish clerk were poachers. The latter carried his game in the black bag which usually held the funeral pall. The smith at the shoeing forge was a regular receiver, and there were few in the village who had not poached at some time or other. The cottage women netted fish, and shut the garden gates on hares and rabbits when they came down to feed in winter. Upon one occasion a poacher, taking advantage of a country funeral, had himself and a large haul taken to the nearest market town, the hearse disgorging its questionable corpse behind the nearest game shop. Another of the poachers, nicknamed the "gentleman," was wont to attire himself in broad-brimmed hat and frock coat similar to those worn a century ago by the people called Quakers. In the former he carried his nets, and in the capacious pockets of the latter the game he took. These outward guarantees of good faith away from his own parish precluded him from ever once being searched. Of late years egg poaching has been reduced to a science; and this is one of the worst phases of the whole subject. In certain districts it is carried on to a large extent, and comes of artificial rearing. The squire's keeper will give six pence each for pheasants' eggs and four pence for those of partridges. He often buys eggs (unknowingly, of course) from his own preserves, as well as from those of his neighbours. In the hedge bottom, along the covert side, or among gorse and broom, the poacher notices a pair of partridges roaming morning after morning. Soon he finds their oak-leaf nest and olive eggs. These the keeper readily buys; winking at what he knows to be dishonest. Plough-boys and farm-labourers have peculiar opportunities for egg-poaching. As to pheasants' eggs, if the keeper is an honest man and refuses to buy, there are always London dealers who will. Once in the covert, pheasants' eggs are easily found. The birds get up heavily from their nests, and go away with a loud whirring of wings. In this species of poaching women and children are largely employed. At the time the former are ostensibly gathering sticks, the latter wild flowers. A receiver has been known to send to London in the course of a week a thousand eggs--probably every one of them stolen.