§ MR. MACFARLANE (Argyll)I beg to ask the Lord Advocate if his attention has been called to the case of John Cameron, crofter, of Ardnamurchan, who was tried on the 5th inst. before Sheriff M'Kechnie on a charge of poaching, the defence being that he was trapping rabbits with the consent of the occupier; whether he is aware that the Sheriff, after bearing the evidence, decided that, according to the technical wording of the Statute, John Cameron had committed the offence, and fined him £1 with £4 4s. of "modified expenses"; and whether he will remit a part, or the whole, of such sentence?
§ *MR. J. B. BALFOURJohn Cameron was found by a gamekeeper upon ground under his charge with a gun and two ferrets, and he had newly-killed rabbits in his possession. The keeper asked him to leave the ground, but he refused, stating that he had permission from the tenant, whose name he gave. The gamekeeper then went to the person named and inquired whether he had given Cameron the permission alleged, and the person denied this. The gamekeeper returned to Cameron and again asked him to leave the ground, but he again declined to do so. It was proved at the trial that be had no such permission as he alleged, and the conviction appears to have been fully warranted by the evidence. I have no power to remit the fine even if there had been ground for doing so, and the right to the 757 costs is with the proprietor by whom the prosecution was instituted.
§ MR. MACFARLANEIf the costs in a small matter of this kind amount in the modified form to four guineas what would the total be in an unmodified form?
§ *MR. J. B. BALFOURI admit it does seem a large amount, and I can only account for it by the fact that the persons concerned had a long distance to travel.
§ MR. MACFARLANETwenty-five miles.