Acts of the General Assembly of the Province of New-Jersey, Chapter 540, An Act for the Preservation of Deer and other Game, and to prevent trespasing with Guns. Dec. 21, 1771. Chapter 540, §10, "Penalty for setting loaded Guns."
"AND WHEREAS a most dangerous Method of setting Guns has too much prevailed in this Province, BE IT ENACTED by the Authority aforesaid, That if any Person or Persons within this Colony shall presume to set any loaded Gun in such Manner as that the same shall be intended to go off or discharge itself, or be discharged by any String, Rope, or other Contrivance, such Person or Persons shall forfeit and pay the Sum of Six Pounds ; and on Non-payment thereof shall be committed to the common Gaol1 of the County for six Months."
(1.) "Gaol" is an archaic Brittish spelling of the modern word "jail." Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, s.v. “gaol,” accessed March 28, 2023, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gaol.
Samuel Allinson, Acts of the General Assembly of the Province of New-Jersey from the Surrender of the Government to Queen Anne, on the 17th Day of April, in the Year of Our Lord 1702, to the 14th Day of January 1776. To Which Is Annexed, the Ordinance for Regulating and Establishing the Fees of the Court of Chancery of the Said Province. With Three Alphabetical Tables and an Index, Compiled and Published under the Appointment of the General Assembly, and Compared with the Original Acts (Burlington, NJ: Isaac Collins, 1776), 346. Chapter 540, §10, "Penalty for setting loaded Guns."