66 were effected by means of "a false privy token or counterfeit "letter made in another man's name to a special friend or ac"quaintance;" but this extension of the law being found inadequate to repress the practices of the fraudulent, the stat. of 30 Geo. 2. c. 24. was enacted, by which it was made penal to obtain money, goods, wares, or merchandizes by "false pretences." But this latter statute did not include choses in action, and therefore by 52 Geo. 3. c. 64. s. 1. it was enacted, that "all persons who knowingly and designedly, by false pretence "or pretences, shall obtain from any person or persons, or from "any body politic or corporate, any money, goods, wares, or " merchandizes, or any bond, bill of exchange, bank note, promissory note, or other security for the payment of money, or any warrant or order for the payment of money, or delivery or "transfer of goods or other valuable thing, with intent to cheat "or defraud any person, &c. shall be deemed offenders against "law and the public peace, and shall be liable to be prosecuted "and punished in like manner as if they had knowingly and de"signedly, by false pretence or pretences, obtained any money, goods, wares, or merchandizes, from any person or persons, "with intent to cheat or defraud any person or persons of the "same." The punishment in the former statute of SO Geo. 2. c. 24. of which this is an extension, is "to be put in the pillory “(now abolished), or publicly whipped, or fined and imprisoned, "or transported not exceeding the space of seven years, as the "court shall in discretion think fit." 66 And by s. 2. of the same statute any justice, before whom any person is brought charged on oath with such offence, may commit or bail the party to answer the complaint at the next general or quarter sessions of the peace, or next sessions of oyer and terminer, and shall bind over the prosecutors by recognizance in a reasonable sum to prosecute, or in a sum not less than double the amount of the money or goods fraudulently obtained if they shall exceed 207. in value. By s. 20. the certiorari is taken away. The term "false pretences" is certainly a term of very extensive meaning, even a naked lie may be a false pretence; but whether it is to be so construed has never yet, I believe, received judicial determination, although the following case comes very near it. The defendant (Villeneve) applied to Sir J. Broughton, telling him he was instructed by the Duc de Lauzun to take some horses from Ireland to London, and that he had been detained so long by contrary winds that he had expended all his money; Sir J. Broughton was thereupon induced to lend him some money; but it turning out that the whole story was a fiction, the defendant was tried and convicted on the stat. 30 Geo. 2. (cited by Buller in R. v. Young, 3 T. R. 98.) This was a mere false statement of the defendant, although a circumstantial one, to give it the appearance of probability. Mr. J. Buller, in the case of the K. v. Young and others, says that the offence within the statute is "the obtaining by false pretences with intention to defraud," that if the intent were made out, and the false pretence used to effect it, the case was brought within the statute. With R. v. Young and others, 3 T. R. 98. With respect to false pretences, Lord Kenyon, in the same case, says, the statute extends to every case where a party has obtained money, &c. by falsely representing himself to be in a situation in which he was not, or any occurrence that had not happened, to which persons of ordinary caution might give credit. In the case of one Airey (2 E. R. 30.) the indictment charged that one Barrow at K. &c. delivered to the defendant, a common carrier, certain goods to be carried by him from K. to one Leach at L. and there to be delivered to him; that the defendant received the goods under pretence of delivering them to him, and undertook so to do, but intending to cheat Barrow of his money, he afterwards unlawfully, &c. pretended to Barrow that he had carried the goods from K. to L. for the purpose of delivering them to Leach, and had delivered them to Leach at L., and that Leach had given him, the defendant, a receipt expressing such delivery of the goods to him, but that he had lost or mislaid the same, or had left it at home; and that the defendant therefore demanded of Barrow 16s. for the carriage of the said goods, by means of which false pretences he obtained the money, &c. On a writ of error after conviction judgment was affirmed. So it is said all frauds affecting the crown and public at large are indictable as cheats at common law, as in the following case. One Treeve was a contractor with government to supply bread to the French prisoners of war confined in Eastwood hospital. He was indicted for that he "knowingly, wilfully, deceitfully, and "maliciously did provide, furnish, and deliver 500 lbs. weight of "bread to be eaten as food by the said prisoners of war, such "bread being then cured, made and baked in an unwholesome " and insufficient manner, and then and there being made of and "containing dirt, filth, and other pernicious and unwholesome "materials and ingredients, and not fit to be eaten by man; and "the said defendant then and there well knowing the said bread "to be made and baked in an unwholesome and insufficient manner, and to be made of and to contain dirt, filth, and other "pernicious and unwholesome materials and ingredients not fit "to be eaten as aforesaid; whereby the said prisoners of war "did then and there eat of the said bread, and thereby then and "there became distempered in their bodies and injured and "endangered in their healths, to the great damage of the said "French prisoners, &c." 66 After conviction it was objected, in arrest of judgment, that the offence as laid was not indictable; as it did not appear it was done in breach of any contract with government or of any moral or civil duty. But the judges all held the conviction right, and indeed it was clearly an offence against the public health, for the selling of unwholesome provisions not fit for man to eat is undoubtedly an indictable offence. (E. P. C. vol. 2. p. 821. 4 Bl. Com. 162.) So in the case of an apprentice having enlisted into a regiment of foot, without the knowledge of his master, who reclaimed him, and thereby the king was defrauded of the bounty money paid to him as a recruit. The defendant was convicted for the cheat, cheat, though the conviction was held bad upon another ground. (E. P. C. 2 vol. 322.) It has been held, that the statutes of 33 H. 8. c. 1. and 30 Geo. 2. c. 24. are in pari materiâ, and that the latter is an extension of the former. But whatsoever has been determined in the construction of one of them, is a sound construction as to the other. And it has been ruled, FIRST, as above observed, That to bring a person within the statute of H. 8. there must be more than a mere false assertion, and that the party offending must use a false privy token. + Sect. 8. SECONDLY, That it is not sufficient to aver in an Rex v. Munoz 1 Sess. Cases, indictment on 33 Hen. 8. c. 1. that the offence was effected by 201. a false token, or on 30 Geo. 2. c. 24. by a false pretence, but that Rex v. Mason, it must shew what the false token in the first case, and the false 2 Term Rep. pretence in the second, was. 581 + Sect. 9. THIRDLY, That where the pretence is conveyed by Rex v. Young, words spoken by one defendant in the presence of others who 3 Term. Rep. are acting in concert together, they may be all indicted jointly. 98. Sect. 10. FOURTHLY, That it is no objection in arrest of Rex v. Young, judgment, that the indictment contains several charges of the 3 Term. Rep. same nature in the different counts. 66 Cheating at Play. + Sect. 1. By 16 Car. 2. c. 7. “If any person shall by any "fraud, unlawful device or other ill practice in playing at cards, "dice, tables, tennis, bowls, skittles, shovel-board; or by cockfighting, horse-racing, dog-matches, foot-races, or other pas"times, or games, or by bearing a share in the stakes, or by betting on the side of such as shall play, act, ride, or run as aforesaid, win any sum or other valuable thing, he shall forfeit "treble the value in the manner the act directs." 98. 2 Abr. Eq. 4 Com. Dig. 70. set a fine upon Sect. 2. By 9 Ann. c. 14. "If any person shall by any Vide Strange, "fraud or shift, cozenage, circumvention, deceit, or unlawful 1048. The "device, or ill practice whatsoever, in playing at cards, dice, where it was King v. Lookup, "tables, tennis, bowls, or any the games aforesaid, or bearing a determined that "share in the stakes, or betting on the sides of such as do play, the court cannot "win any sum of money, or other valuable thing, on conviction the offender on "by information or indictment, he shall forfeit to such as shall a conviction "sue for the same, five times the value, be deemed infamous, upon this act; that the only "and suffer corporal punishment as in cases of perjury.” judgment they can give is, that he is convicted, &c. CHAP. XXIV. MALICIOUS, WANTON, AND FRAUDULENT MISCHIEF. PROPERTY is often destroyed or injured, from various motives in the wrongdoer, sometimes from motives of malice and ill-will towards the proprietor-sometimes in mere wantonness Y 2 without Vide a critical commentary upon this act, without any distinct motive of ill-will towards any one in parti- 1. Mischief to Freehold Property. By destroying and damaging 3. To Public Works. By breaking down sea and river banks- 4. To certain particular Works:-viz. Powdike in marsh landthe Bedford level—certain marshes in Norfolk-certain lands in Devon-the West India docks in London, and vessels lying within them. 5. To Cattle. By killing, maiming, and wounding-by cruel usage to animals. 6. To Chattels. By burning piles of wood-by breaking and 8. To the King's Ships, Docks, &c. By wilfully firing the same. 1. Mischief to Freehold Property. Destroying Fences. + By 13 Edw. 1. st. 1. c. 46. it is enacted, "That where "sometime it chanceth, that one having right to approve, doth "then 66 ner, 93. "then levy a dyke or an hedge, and some by night or at another 2 Inst. 473. season, when they suppose not to be espied, do overthrow the See also cases hedge or dyke, and it cannot be known by verdict of the assize upon it, Skin" or jury who did overthrow the hedge or dyke, and men of the C. Car. 281. "towns near will not indict such as be guilty of the fact, the 440.580. "towns near adjoining shall be distrained to levy the hedge or 339. Dyer, 47, 316. dyke at their own cost, and to yield damages."-And by 3 4 Co. 38. and 4 Edw. 6. c. 6. “6 such person as shall bring an assize 11 Co. 74. thereupon, and have judgment to recover, shall have his da"mages trebled, by the judgment of the court." 66 66 1 Roll. 365. The stat. 6 Geo. 1. c. 16. entitled " An act to explain and amend" a former act (of (a) 1 Geo. 1. st. 2. c. 48.), reciting certain (a) Vide next mischiefs after mentioned; and that " some doubts have arisen Section, Trees. "whether the offences committed in the day-time mentioned in "that act are punishable by the said act. And whereas there is "no provision made in the said act for punishing the offences "committed by persons who shall break open, throw down, "level, or destroy the hedges, gates, posts, stiles, railing, fences, "ditches, banks, walls, or other inclosures of such woods, wood grounds, plantations, and coppices: therefore, for the explaining and amending the said act, and for remedying the several "mischiefs hereinbefore mentioned, and for the better preserving "of all such wood springs, or springs of wood, poles, quick"woods, plantations, underwoods, coppice woods, gates, posts, "stiles, railing, fences, hedges, walls, and other inclosures of "woods, from being unlawfully cut, taken, spoiled, broken, "burnt, destroyed, defaced, or carried away; and for the better discovering and more effectual punishment of such offenders "therein, their aiders and abettors; and for the providing satis"faction for the damages the respective proprietors thereof shall "sustain thereby," enacts," that if any person or persons, after "the 24th of June, 1720, shall, either by day or by night, cut, take, destroy, break, throw down, bark, pluck up, burn, deface, "spoil, or carry away, any wood springs or springs of wood, "trees, poles, wood, tops of trees, underwoods, or coppice "woods, thorns, or quicksets, without the consent of the owner "of such woods, wood grounds, parks, chaces, or coppices, plantations, timber trees, fruit trees, or other trees, thorns, or "quicksets, or of the persons chiefly entrusted with the care " and custody thereof; or shall break down, throw down, level, " or destroy any hedges, gates, posts, stiles, railing, walls, fences, "dikes, ditches, banks, or other inclosures of such woods, wood"ground, parks, chaces, or coppices, plantations, timber trees, "fruit trees, or other trees, thorns, or quicksets;" the party grieved shall recover damages against the parish, &c. in the same manner and form as for dikes and hedges overthrown by persons in the night, or at another season when they suppose not to be espied, as is provided by the stat. 13 Edw. 1. st. 1. c. 46. 66 66 Then by s. 2. it is further enacted and declared, "that if any person or persons, at any time after the said 24th of June, in "a riotous, open, tumultuous, or in a secret and clandestine manner, forcibly, or wrongfully, and maliciously, and without "the consent of the proprietor, wood-reeve, wood-keeper, or person chiefly entrusted with the care, oversight and custody "of |