The Game Laws in Scotland, as our readers are aware, consist chiefly of various statutes designed to secure to landed proprietors what the common law, while it leaves them without the means of effectually securing, declares them entitled to, the exclusive possession and use of their land. The common law maxim, that an owner is entitled to the sole enjoyment of his own ground, the legislature has practically given effect to from time to time by passing various enactments pointing to that end. These somewhat numerous statutes are almost identical in effect in the three kingdoms, to which some of them extend; nor does the common law throughout materially vary. It is not our intention, however, to emulate Sir Roger de Coverley, whose explanations of the Game Acts used to gain great applause at quarter sessions, by entering upon a minute analysis of them here. We mean to confine ourselves simply to a critical examination of the various attacks to which they have been subjected, and an endeavour to make a brief and impartial survey of their effect on the prosperity of the Highlands. In entering upon the consideration of adverse criticisms, we find that they are easily resolved into two classes:--First, there are those as to what opponents term the unnecessary severity and injurious influence of the Game Laws upon poachers; and secondly, the injury indirectly effected by them upon tenant-farmers, agricultural and pastoral. Sympathy for the poacher is frequently proclaimed by anti-game law agitators. They will tell you that the disposition to pursue game is inherent in human nature; that the indulgence of this irrepressible propensity ought to be regarded with a lenient eye: that game cannot be identified as property, and that the man who takes it should not be considered or treated as a thief; dilating the while on the sad misfortunes that an occasional lapse into the fields in search of a hare or a rabbit may bring upon an agricultural labourer and his family, ultimately it may be involving them in ruin. These arguments, however, though at first sight appearing to have some foundation in reason, do not satisfactorily stand the test of serious scrutiny. They are such as could be brought to bear for what they are worth against the operation of almost all repressive laws in the kingdom. Smuggling, for instance, is not generally looked upon as a breach of the moral law, nor does it present itself to common eyes in an odious light; yet it is a crime punishable by penal laws for the sake of increasing revenue. The man who takes his own agricultural produce and converts it into a wholesome and refreshing beverage for his own domestic use is liable to a very much heavier penalty than he who steps on to his neighbour's property and puts out his hands to take what he has neither laboured for nor purchased. In the one case we can imagine an honest industrious labourer, actuated only by a desire for the comfort of himself and his