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BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 1 868. 
 
BRITISH 
 
 SPORTS AND PASTIMES, 
 
 1868, 
 
 EDITED BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE. 
 
 LONDON: 
 VIRTUE & CO., 26, IVY LANE. 
 
 NEW YOKK : VIRTUE AND YOKSTON. 
 1868. 
 

 Meprinted from 
 
 SAINT PAULS MAGAZINE, 
 
 Edited by Anthoxy Teollope. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGK 
 
 On Hoese- racing 9 
 
 On Hunting 70 
 
 On Shooting . 130 
 
 On Fishing 158 
 
 On Yachting 193 
 
 On Eowing 227 
 
 On Alpine Climbing 257 
 
 On Cricket 290 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 In thus offering to the public the following essays 
 on the British out-of-door Sports and Pastimes of the 
 present day, reprinted from the pages of the Saint 
 Pauls Magazine, it has been the object of the writers 
 to explain, with as much accuracy as the narrow limits 
 of such work would allow them, the present condition 
 of those sports which are essentially dear to the English 
 nature, and which are at the present day so strongly in 
 vogue in England as to have a manifest effect on the 
 lives and characters of Englishmen. There have been 
 other sports which were formerly essentially English ; 
 but they have either passed away so entirely as to be 
 now not known among us, or they are so far gone 
 in the yellow leaf as not to be worthy of being now 
 classed with those to which the following pages are 
 devoted. Cock-fighting and Badger-baiting are to be 
 counted among the former. They are now at an end 
 
2 PREFACE. 
 
 practically, and no one cares to see a badger drawn, 
 or ever talks of a main of cocks. Of all these 
 Falconry was probably tbe finest ; — but to write of 
 Falconry as a living sport would be an absurdity. Of 
 the latter number. Prize-fighting is probably the one 
 which will most readily occur to the minds of sports- 
 men. Prize-fighting, which certainly would have been 
 included in any list of out-of-door British Sports, fifty 
 years ago, still lives ; — but it lives after such a fashion, 
 and is so fallen in general interest, that we do not 
 doubt but that we shall be thought to have shown a 
 proper discretion in excluding it from our little volume. 
 And there are other sports which are not dead or 
 dying, which are fine and noble in their way, and as 
 to which we feel that we shall be open to reproach 
 from their lovers in that we have omitted them ; but, 
 good as they are, we have not thought them to be of 
 sufficient general interest to warrant us in classing 
 them with the great British Games. Of these Foot- 
 ball may perhaps stand first. Foot-ball in latter days 
 has been making a name for itself, and has been 
 becoming famous by the strength of its own irregularity 
 and lawlessness. Because it is without an acknowledged 
 code, the disciples of this and that school of players 
 have been enthusiastic and eloquent. We by no means 
 grudge to Foot-ball the name it has won for itself; — but 
 
PREFACE. 3 
 
 it has hardly as yet worked its way up to a dignity 
 equal with that of Hunting and Shooting, or even with 
 that of Cricket and Boat-racing. Coursing we might 
 have included, but we confess to a prejudice against a 
 greyhound ; and think again that the interest taken 
 in Coursing is hardly wide enough to have brought the 
 amusement within our plan. That we owe an apology 
 in the matter of Golf to our friends at Edinburgh and 
 St. Andrew's, — an apology that will not be accepted, 
 — we are quite aware. JSTo owner of a favourite 
 for the Derby, no master of a stud of hunters in 
 the shires, no breech-loading slaughterer of his heca- 
 tombs is more assured of the rank, and dignity, and 
 undoubted pre-eminence of his sport than is the 
 regular attendant at the Links. And as the man 
 Avho spends his life in going about from race-meeting 
 to race-meeting is sure that he has adopted the one 
 serious work that is worth the attention of an en- 
 lightened human being, so does the golf-player feel con- 
 fident that within his grasp has fortunately come the 
 one amusement that is equal to the true spirit of semi- 
 divine manhood. Against this view of life in general, 
 we say nothing, but simply plead that the good things 
 of Golf have been confined to so few that we do not 
 dare to claim it as an ordinary British Sport. Croquet 
 too may fairly make a claim ; but of Croquet we have 
 
4 PREFACE. 
 
 considered tliat it is too delicate, too pretty, too refined 
 to be dealt with by men who profess that, in speaking 
 of British Sports, they have intended to speak of things 
 rongh and violent. Tennis is not now widely known, 
 but that, and Rackets, — which we regard as perhaps the 
 most perfect game that was ever invented, — are Games 
 rather than Sports, and can hardly be brought within 
 our limits. There remains that wide word Athletics. 
 Eacing, Jumping, Ball- thro wing and Hammer-throw- 
 ing, and the like, have undoubtedly pushed them- 
 selves into such prominent notice in late years as to 
 give them almost a claim to be reckoned among British 
 Sports ; but we have felt that they have fallen some- 
 what short of the necessary dignity, and have excluded 
 them, — not altogether with a clear conscience. 
 
 It has been our desire to describe the present general 
 condition of these out-of-door Sj)orts, which we have 
 included in our list ; not to do so with reference to 
 individual details, such as would have been handled 
 had we said that riding in this county was better than 
 riding in that, or that grouse on these moors were more 
 plentiful than on those, — but to explain what is at 
 present the nature of these Sports, how the}^ may be 
 enjoyed, what are their drawbacks, and in what spirit 
 they should be followed. It is undoubtedly a fact that 
 they have a most serious influence on the lives of a 
 
PREFACE. 5 
 
 vast proportion of Englishmen of tlie upper and middle 
 classes. It is almost rare to find a man under forty 
 who is not a votary of one of them ; — and among most 
 men over forty the passion for them does not easily die 
 out. An enormous amount of money is expended on 
 them, and more thought is applied to them than is 
 given to the government of the whole empire. Of 
 course there arises a very serious question whether the 
 money is expended beneficially, and the thoughts used 
 wisely ; — whether it may not be the case that we are 
 overdoing our Sports, and making it too grand in its 
 outlines, and too important in its details. 
 
 There is an old saying, — that whatever you do, you 
 should do well, — which like many other old sayings is 
 very untrue, and very dangerous in its lack of truth. 
 But nowhere is this more untrue than in reference to 
 our amusements. To play Billiards is the amusement of 
 a gentleman ; — to play Billiards pre-eminently well is 
 the life's work of a man who, in learning to do so, can 
 hardly have continued to be a gentleman in the best 
 sense of the word. Chess, perhaps, is of all recreations 
 the one most adapted for intellectual persons, but to be 
 pre-eminent at Chess is generally to be that and nothing 
 else. The same thing may be said with more or less of 
 justice in regard to all games of skill. In reference to 
 field sports it must be acknowledged that a mistake is 
 
6 PREFACE. 
 
 in course of progress, similar in its nature, though pro- 
 duced in a different way. They are being made too much 
 of, and men who follow them haye allowed themselves 
 to be taught that ordinary success in them is not worth 
 having. To shoot game as it can be found on simply 
 preserved ground is too slow for the sportsmen of to- 
 day. They must have it herded for them in immense 
 masses. We hear of hot corners, and are given to 
 understand that nothing is too much to pay for the 
 privilege of occupying them. To fish an ordinary 
 stream is below the notice of a fisherman. Men 
 grumble so loudly in the hunting-field if they are 
 not always galloping, that the huntsmen of the day 
 are learning the trick of carrying their hounds from 
 covert to covert as fast as they can ride with them, 
 following a pseudo-fox. We all know to what an 
 extent betting on the turf has been brought, till the 
 actual horse-race has become a matter of quite minor 
 interest to those who call themselves sportsmen 
 because they are connected with the Turf. An alpine 
 climber must have risked his neck on the Matterhorn 
 before he can satisfy himself or his friends ; and men 
 must row until there comes upon us a fear whether 
 they are not killing themselves, — or they are nothing. 
 Even Cricket has become such a business, that there 
 arises a doubt in the minds of amateur players whether 
 
PREFACE. 7 
 
 tliey can continue the sport, loaded as it is witli tlie 
 arrogance and extravagance of the professionals. All 
 this comes from excess of enthusiasm on the matter ; — 
 from a desire to follow too well a pursuit which, to he 
 pleasurable, should be a pleasure and not a business. 
 
 That English Sports may remain as long as England 
 remains, and that they may remain among the descend- 
 ants of Englishmen to days in which perhaps England 
 herself may exist no longer, is our wish as sportsmen ; 
 but it seems to us that the danger which we have 
 indicated is the rock against "^^hich our Sports may 
 possibly be made shipwreck. Should it ever become 
 unreasonable in its expenditure, arrogant in its demands, 
 immoral and selfish in its tendencies, or, worse of all, 
 unclean and dishonest in its traffic, there will arise 
 against it a public opinion against which it will be 
 unable to hold its own. With reference to one of our 
 great national pastimes, and that perhaps the one 
 which is most popular with the multitude, it is im- 
 possible not to see that there is a beginning of such 
 an evil. If care be not taken to prevent it, an English 
 horse-race will become as little desirable an amusement 
 as an English prize-fight. 
 
BRITISH SPOETS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 ON HOESE-EACma. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 It is a truth older than Aristotle,— although he is 
 the first known to have enunciated it, — that if you 
 seek to estimate the propagandist influence and assimi- 
 lative force of an imperial nation, you must trace 
 them in the imitation, not of laws, institutions, and 
 polity, but of social tastes, fashions, and public amuse- 
 ments which that nation is able to induce. As regards 
 dress, furniture, repasts, tastes, architecture, litera- 
 ture, theatrical diversions, and public pastimes, Spain 
 unquestionably set the fashion among civilised nations 
 during the seventeenth, and France during the 
 eighteenth century. If, as many think, England is 
 now at the zenith of her power and greatness, where 
 will the traces of her paramount influence upon the 
 nineteenth century be sought by the Euckles of two 
 centuries hence? jN'ot so much in the imitation by 
 other nations of our representative institutions, of 
 
 B 
 
10 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 trial by jury, of freedom of the press, or even in the 
 wide diffusion of English books, as in the reproduc- 
 tion all over the world of some of our lighter social 
 peculiarities, such as the chimney-pot hat, the late 
 dinner hour, the conventional laws of English etiquette, 
 and, most of all, in the contagious passion for our 
 national pastimes, such as fox-hunting, cricket, and 
 horse-racing. In regard to fox-hunting, the sport is 
 of such a nature as to forbid its deterioration in or out 
 of England by the fraud or dishonesty of its votaries. 
 Fox-hunting, like Italy, fara da se, — will protect itself 
 from harm. Much the same may be said of cricket, 
 although occasionally whispers are heard, and espe- 
 cially in the county of Kent, that there is less of honest 
 and manly love of the game for its own sake than of 
 yore, and that " gate-money " possesses powerfid. and 
 increasing attractions. But in regard to horse-racing, 
 which in perhaps a more special manner than either 
 of the others may be called our national pastime, there 
 is a constant, and, as England becomes richer, an in- 
 creasing danger that fraud and avarice will degrade a 
 noble sport until it becomes unworthy the pursuit of 
 an honest man. Between 1810 and 1830 the passion 
 for pugilism was not less general or less ardent than 
 the passion for the Turf is among us to-day. And yet, 
 when the impression became general that no man could 
 bet upon a prize-tight without the risk of subsequently 
 finding that the fight had been sold by one of the com- 
 batants, public favour di-ifted away from "the ring," 
 
HORSE-RACING. 1 1 
 
 and the countenance of all people who retained any 
 self-respect was withdrawn from its support. Nerer, 
 perhaps, has the Turf been more heartily patronised in 
 England by rich, powerful, and enthusiastic supporters 
 than at this moment. The favour of the heir to the 
 Crown is abundantly lavished upon the sport. For 
 something like nine months of every year there is 
 hardly a week in which Dukes, Marquises, Earls, 
 Viscounts, Barons, Baronets, and Squires may not be 
 found assembled upon racecourses throughout the 
 length and breadth of the island. There are many 
 weeks in course of which six or seven race-meetings 
 are simultaneously celebrated. In 1866 and 1867 her 
 Majesty's and Mr. Blenkiron's yearlings, — at the two 
 most important sales of young thorough-bred stock in 
 England, — realised prices imexampled in the annals of 
 Hampton Court and Eltham. The Duke of Hamilton's 
 bid of 2,500 guineas for the Lady Elcho colt in 1866 
 is unparalleled in the long list of sales over which Mr. 
 Tattersall and his father have for half a century pre- 
 sided. There are 700 horses in training at Xewmarket, 
 and John Day had under his charge at Danebury, 
 in 1867, such " a lot,'^ both as regards number and 
 quality, as has never been excelled in the past history 
 of any English trainer. Mr. Chaplin won upon the 
 Derby of 1867 such a simi of money as leaves Mr. 
 Merry, Sir Joseph Hawley, and all his other 
 triumphant predecessors, far in the lurch. The 
 number of thoroughbred foals bom in these islands 
 
12 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 is steadily and constantly on the increase. To take 
 tlie last three recorded years, 1,481 foals were born in 
 1862, 1,540 in 1863, and 1,567 in 1864. These, and 
 many other signs of the times, may lead breeders of 
 racing stock, and betting men in general, to conclude 
 that the Turf never was so prosperous, — that, as an 
 institution, it was never more firmly rooted in the 
 hearts of Englishmen. It is from no antipathy to the 
 sport, from no other sentiment than a desire to minister 
 to its perpetuity, that we whisper in the ear of the 
 professional frequenters of Epsom, Ascot, and New- 
 market, that a worm is at the root of their favourite 
 pursuit, and that, unless the men of influence among 
 them shall exert themselves, the admitted abatement 
 and increasing laxity of Turf morality will culminate 
 in the withdrawal from a racecourse of all men to 
 whom honour or honesty are something more than a 
 name. 
 
 It is our fixed and firm belief that the Turf, as it 
 existed from 1800 to 1850, was the noblest pastime in 
 which any nation, ancient or modern, has ever in- 
 dulged. In the eyes of the statesman or the philosopher 
 it is an essential condition of public games or sports 
 that the minds of the spectators should be as little as 
 possible brutalised or vitiated by contemplating scenes 
 of cruelty. If any man, intoxicated by the gorgeous 
 strains of Pindar, imagines that the public sports of 
 Greece were something much grander, more lofty, and 
 more heroic than our Derby or St. Leger, let him be 
 
HORSE-RACING. I3 
 
 reminded that at the Olympian games, — celebrated at 
 Olympia, in Elis, upon a plain girt upon the east and 
 north by insurmountable mountains, and upon the 
 south and west by the rivers Alpheus and Cladeus, — 
 it was death by law to any woman who crossed either 
 of the rivers to witness these contests. No one who 
 will take the trouble of studying the best modern* 
 treatise upon the public games of Greece that has as 
 yet been written, will have any reason to doubt that 
 they were stained by acts of such cruelty and such 
 indecency as to make the exclusion of women necessary 
 and intelligible. The Romans in their Ludi Circenses 
 went as far beyond their predecessors, the Greeks, in 
 cruelty, as they fell short of them in refinement. In 
 the Flavian Amphitheatre or Coliseum, the still exist- 
 ing ruins of which do more to attest the magnificence 
 of the Rome of Titus and Domitian than any other 
 building which time has spared, it was not unusual for 
 hundreds and thousands of wild beasts to be massacred 
 in a single day. Upon the consecration of this mighty 
 amphitheatre by Titus, Suetonius tells us that five 
 thousand wild beasts and four thousand tame animals 
 were immolated; and in the games celebrated by 
 Trajan, — one of the most humane of Rome's emperors, 
 — after his victories over the Dacians, Dion Cassius 
 narrates that not less than eleven thousand animals 
 were slaughtered. Coarse and unrefined as were the 
 
 * " Die Gymaastik und Agonistik der Hellenen." Krause, Leipsig. 
 1841. 
 
14 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 E-omans, no woman was allowed to take Iter seat in the 
 Coliseum and look on at the games of the Circus from 
 any other spot than the open^gallery which ran round 
 next to the sky, and which was removed hundreds of 
 feet from the arena or stage upon which gladiators 
 fought and lions were tortured. If Martial is to be 
 credited, such scenes were witnessed in the Coliseum, 
 in the days of Rome's degradation, as must have been 
 revolting, not alone to modest women, but also to all 
 men in whom any sense of decency survived. To come 
 to more modern times, bear-baiting was unquestionably 
 the most fashionable pastime of our ancestors during 
 the reigns of the Tudor and Stuart monarchs. In his 
 History of England, Lord Macaulay quotes passages 
 from the diary of a Puritan, written in 1643, in which 
 complaint is made that Henrietta Maria, queen to 
 Charles I., had returned to England from Holland, 
 *' bringing with her, besides a company of savage-like 
 ruffians, a company of savage bears, to what purpose 
 you may judge by the sequel. Those bears were left 
 about Newark, and were brought into country towns 
 constantly on the Lord's day to be baited ; — such is the 
 religion those here related would settle amongst us ; 
 and if any went about to hinder or but speak against 
 their damnable profanations, they were presently noted 
 as Roundheads or Puritans, and sure to be plundered 
 for it." In tracing the causes which led to the restora- 
 tion of the monarchy, and to the recall of Charles II., 
 Lord Macaulay records that nothing weighed so much. 
 
HORSE- RACING. 15 
 
 with our ancestors as the unpopularity of the Puritans, 
 occasioned by their austere repression of all public 
 pastimes. " Against the lighter vices/' to quote 
 Macaulay's own words, " the ruling faction waged war 
 with a zeal little tempered by humanity or by common- 
 sense. Sharp laws were passed against betting. Public 
 amusements, from the masques which were exhibited 
 at the mansions of the great down to the wrestling 
 matches and grinning matches on village greens, were 
 vigorously attacked. One ordinance directed that all 
 the maypoles in England should forthwith be hewn 
 down. Another proscribed all theatrical diversions. 
 E/Ope-dancing, puppet-shows, bowls, horse-racing, were 
 regarded with no friendly eye. But bear-baiting, then 
 a favourite diversion of high and low, was the abo- 
 mination which most strongly stirred the wrath of 
 the austere sectaries." If such were the pastimes of 
 Englishmen during the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
 turies, it cannot be pretended that Spain, then the 
 mistress of the world, was more scrupulous or more 
 merciful than England. For in the sixteenth, no less 
 than in the nineteenth century, the bull-fight was the 
 national fiesta of Spain ; nor can it be doubted that the 
 deterioration of the Spanish people is in no slight degree 
 attributable to their passion for a spectacle which, itself 
 the index and the stimulant of brutality, is more degrad- 
 ing to those who witness, than to those who take active 
 part in it. " So long,'' said Eichard Cobden, ^' as this 
 continues to be the popular sport of high and low, so 
 
16 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 long will Spaniards be indifferent to human life, and 
 have their civil contests marked with displays of cruelty 
 which make men shudder/' 
 
 We have glanced at the public sports of other nations, 
 and of England in other times, with a view to esta- 
 blishing the assertion that horse-racing, as it existed in 
 this island during the first half of the present century, 
 was a noble and unexceptionable national pastime. 
 There are few subjects upon which a painstaking man 
 of letters might better expend his energy than upon the 
 compilation of a narrative which should trace the rise, 
 improvement, and perfection of the British racehorse, 
 from the days when, about one hundred and seventy 
 years ago, the ancestors of Childers and Eclipse were 
 imported into England from the sands of Arabia, until 
 the present time. It is less than two hundred years 
 since the Duke of IS^ewcastle and Sir John Fen wick,* — 
 no mean authorities on such subjects in their own day, 
 — pronounced that the meanest jade ever imported 
 from Tangier would yield a finer progeny than could be 
 expected from the best of our native breed. Accus- 
 tomed as we now are to see emperors and kings, and 
 foreign noblemen, and merchant princes from New 
 York or Melbourne, flocking to London with a view to 
 securing, at enormous prices, the best thoroughbred 
 stock of England, it is hard for us to believe that, in 
 the almanacks of 1684 and 1685, the native horses of 
 
 * Vide " The Duke of Newcastle on Horsemanship," and " Gentle- 
 man's Eecreation. 1686." 
 
HORSE- RACING. 17 
 
 tliese islands were valued, one with another, at not more 
 than fifty shillings each. But interesting as would be 
 an exhaustive treatise upon the racehorse from a compe- 
 tent hand, we would recommend no writer ever to 
 attempt to moralise upon what may be called the his- 
 toire inedite of the Turf. In the first place, the eleva- 
 tion of a community's purity was never yet efiected 
 either by Act of Parliament or by the pen of journalist 
 or moralist. Secondly, it is idle for any writer to deal 
 with such a subject as the gradual deterioration of turf 
 integrity without a life -long familiarity with prominent 
 actors in the scenes which he describes. In order to 
 give vitality and truthfulness to his descriptions, it is 
 necessary for him to mention names and dates, to cry 
 aloud and spare not, to be precise in his particularisa- 
 tion of races, of horses, of jockeys, of trainers, and 
 of owners. Much may be done by the vigilance of 
 daily and weekly sporting papers to scotch malpractices ; 
 but no man who knows the Turf can pretend to believe 
 that any writer, whatever his authority, can be poten- 
 tial in killing them. Let any author, who is ambitious 
 of lashing evil-doers upon a racecourse, be at the pains 
 to read the " Essays on the Turf,'' published thirty 
 years ago by Nimrod, — the best sporting writer that 
 England has yet produced, — and let him thus learn, 
 vicariously, his own impotence. But the great and 
 essential difierence between Turf malpractices of to-day 
 and those which Nimrod denounced is, that formerly 
 noblemen and gentlemen, with few and rare exceptions, 
 
18 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 stood in little need of the lash of the censor. " Having 
 seen the English Turf reach its acme," wrote JSTimrod 
 in 1837, *' I should be very sorry to witness its decline ; 
 but fall it must, if a tighter hand be not held over the 
 whole system appertaining to it. Men of fortune and 
 integrity must rouse themselves from an apathy to 
 which they appear lately to have been lulled, and must 
 separate themselves from unprincipled miscreants, who 
 would elbow them off the ground which should be 
 exclusively their own." Yery different should be the 
 language of the Turf reformer of to-day. For, bewail 
 it as we may, it is no longer possible to deny that the 
 majority of noblemen and gentlemen who follow the 
 Turf as a profession lend themselves now-a-days to 
 transactions such as most of their forefathers would 
 have scorned. The Turf is fashionable, richly patron- 
 ised, and forms an apt and convenient delassement for 
 the largest and wealthiest leisure class that any country, 
 ancient or modern, ever boasted. Against such a pur- 
 suit, thus supported, it is idle for purists and scholars 
 like Mr. Hughes and Professor Gold win Smith to lift 
 up their parable. " The devil," said Gustavus Adolphus 
 of Sweden to his chaplain, who found him one day 
 reading the Bible, '' is very near at hand to those who 
 are accountable to none but God for their actions." 
 Many of the richest and most powerful patrons of the 
 Turf are secured, by the possession of great wealth and 
 high social standing, from earthly accountability in no 
 less degree than Gustavus Adolphus himself. Of what 
 
HORSE-RACING. 19 
 
 avail are the admonitions or suggestions of " Cato " or 
 '* Mentor " addressed to men of wliom not more than 
 five per cent, ever take in hand any other volume than 
 the Racing Calendar or the Stud Book ? 
 
 These remarks, therefore, are not written in the 
 Quixotic expectation that they will be read by, or will 
 influence that singularly heedless and irresponsible sec- 
 tion of the community which is generally known under 
 the title of '' the sporting fraternity." It is with a 
 view of arresting the attention of thoughtful men in 
 every class of life, who may themselves never have 
 owned a racehorse, or been present at a race-meeting, 
 that we desire to point out that the threatened decline 
 and fall of the Turf may be a real misfortune to Eng- 
 land. It is an undoubted necessity that Englishmen 
 should have a national pastime, capable of afibrding 
 amusement to all classes, enacted in the open air, 
 devoid of all taint of cruelty, and conducted, as far as 
 possible, in accordance with the rules of fair play. 
 Man is unquestionably a gambling animal, and the 
 very energy which makes us strive to rise in life is 
 twin-born brother to the spirit which makes men 
 gamblers. We have done much in England to sup- 
 press such dens of iniquity as still flourish at Baden 
 Baden and Homburg, and the only open gaming which 
 exists among us is that which is enacted on racecourses. 
 Nor is betting upon races an unmitigated evil, — least of 
 all in the eyes of those who have seen trente et quarante 
 played in Germany, baccarat in Paris, monte in Mexico, 
 
20 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and faro in New York or Washington. Betting about 
 tlie speed and endurance of a racehorse is unquestion- 
 ably the noblest gambling in existence. Without bet- 
 tins: there would be much fewer owners of racehorses in 
 England ; for it has been abundantly demonstrated, and 
 by no one more clearly than by the late Lord Gfeorge 
 Bentinck, that it is impossible to make racehorses pro- 
 fitable, if taken one with another, unless their owner 
 employs his knowledge of their capabilities, before they 
 have ajDpeared in public, by judicious backing. For 
 these reasons let it not be supposed that it is our desire 
 to write a diatribe against betting. That which we do 
 desire to protest against is, that racing should be con- 
 ducted, — as it is now, — not with betting as its acces- 
 soire, but with betting as its sole and only object and 
 aim. It is against this that every true lover of the 
 turf will join us in lifting up his voice, for it is incon- 
 testable that the " heavy plunging " of the present day 
 will be fatal, not only to its perpetrators, but to the 
 noble pastime which it degrades. With a view to a 
 temperate statement of the inevitable tendencies of the 
 heavy betting and short races now in vogue, and in the 
 hope of awakening if possible the interest of thinking 
 men who recognise the inherent merits and advantages 
 of the Turf, and who do not wish to see it relegated to 
 the limbo whither steeple-chasing and the prize-ring 
 have preceded it, these few remarks are ofi'ered for the 
 consideration of those whom they may concern. 
 
 The dangers which threaten the Turf appear to be 
 
HORSE-RACING. 21 
 
 two in number : I. The deterioration of the breed 
 of racehorses : II. The deterioration of the owners 
 of racehorses. Let us deal with them in the order of 
 enumeration. 
 
 I. The thoroughbred English horse of the last half- 
 century is as much the forced product of our high and 
 artificial civilisation as is the choicest textile fabric 
 that Manchester or Belfast ever produced. The well- 
 known "flyers," whose "portraitures/' — to borrow 
 the phraseology of the Newmarket artists of the last 
 century, — adorn many a wall, and whose pedigrees 
 and exploits are better known throughout the length 
 and breadth of these islands than the names and 
 deeds of our most eminent statesman, Lord Chancellor, 
 or prelate, grew by slow and gradual improvement to 
 the admitted perfection which they have long since 
 attained. Like the wheat-plant which we imported 
 from the East to enhance its productiveness one 
 hundred- fold, like the Persian apple which Western 
 Europe has converted into the peach, Yoltigeur, West 
 Australian, Stock well, and their progenitors and 
 descendants, are, in the main, exotic as to their 
 origin, and have been raised to perfection by English 
 culture. The oldest of our thoroughbred pedigrees 
 that can be traced with accuracy ends in Cromwell's 
 celebrated imported stallion named Place's White 
 Turk. Charles 11. , himself a great patron of the race- 
 course, imported mares in abundance from Barbary, 
 which figure as Royal Mares in our old stud-books 
 
22 BRITISH SPORTS AiS^D PASTIMES. 
 
 until this day. Prince George of Denmark, tlie 
 husband of Queen Anne, seems to have had no passion 
 so well developed as his passion for the Turf, with 
 which he strongly inoculated his royal wife. The 
 Curwen Bay Barb, the Byerley Turk, and the Barley 
 Arabian made their appearance in this reign, and 
 were followed, in the reign of George II., by the sire 
 to whom we are indebted for England's best racing 
 blood, — the celebrated Godolphin Arabian. Let any 
 man study the pedigrees of eminent racehorses during 
 the first half of the eighteenth century, and he will 
 find that their sires or grandsires, their dams or 
 grand - dams, were, without exception, of Eastern 
 blood. Take at hazard the quaint " description '* 
 which is appended to the '* portraitures " of horses 
 for which we are under obligations to John Cheny, 
 the Fores of the middle of the last century. Here, 
 for instance, is the text attached to — 
 
 " The portraiture of Childers, y® fleetest horse that 
 ever run at J^ewmarket, or (as generally believed) was 
 ever bred in the world. From an original painting 
 in the Duke of Devonshire's house at Newmarket. 
 
 " This surprising horse was bred by Leonard 
 Childers, Esq., of Yorkshire, by whom when young 
 he was disposed of to his Grace y® late Duke of Devon- 
 shire. He was got by y^ Darley Arabian. His 
 dam was called Betty Leeds. She was got by y® 
 late Marquess of Wharton's Careless, which was got 
 by Spanker, a son of the Darcy Yellow Turk. 
 
HORSE-RACING. 23 
 
 Childers' grand-dam was got by the Leeds Arabian. 
 His great-grand-dam was got by Spanker. His great- 
 great- grand-dam was a natural Barb mare. 
 
 *' Childers never run at any place but at New Market. 
 He there, in April, 1721, beat the Duke of Bolton's 
 Speedwell, 8 stone 5 pounds, 4 miles, 500 guineas. 
 In the succeeding October, he received forfeit, 500 
 guineas, of Speedwell, He beat y*^ Earl of Drogheda's 
 Chanter, 10 stone, 6 miles, 1,000 guineas. In y® 
 following November he received 100 guineas forfeit 
 of y® Earl of Godolphin's Bobsey ; upon which he 
 was taken out of keeping and has ever since been 
 a stallion in possession of their Graces the late and 
 present Dukes of Devonshire. 
 
 ''Published this 21 day of June, 1740, by John 
 Cheny." 
 
 In the above " description " there are three points 
 to which we desire particularly to call notice. In the 
 first place it will be remarked that upon both sides 
 Childers's blood was Arabian or Turkish. Secondly, 
 it will be remarked that, inasmuch as he was foaled 
 in 1715, and ran for the first time at Newmarket in 
 1721, he was six years old when he made his first 
 appearance. It is on record that before he figured 
 as a racehorse he was long ridden by the Duke of 
 Devonshire's groom in the hunting-field. Thirdly, 
 let it be remarked that the two races upon which the 
 tradition of his extraordinary fleetness is based, were, 
 in one case, over four miles, in the other, over six 
 
24 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 miles of ground. We will reserve our application 
 of these three points until hereafter. 
 
 We have not space to copy in full more than one 
 other " description," which will disclose that the high 
 stakes of the present day were not wholly unknown 
 150 years ago. ''The portraiture of Fox, late the 
 property of the Earl of Portmore," informs us that — 
 
 "This eminent horse was the property of Thos. 
 Lister, Esq., of Yorkshire. He was got by Clumsey, 
 which was got by Old Hautboy, bred by the Darcy 
 family out of a Royal Mare, and got by the Darcy 
 White Turk. Fox's dam was Bay Peg. Her grand- 
 dam. Young Bald Peg, both bred by Mr. Leeds, and 
 got by his Arabian. His great- grand- dam was called 
 the old Morocco Mare. She was bred by the old Lord 
 General Fairfax out of a foreign mare, and got by a 
 Barb of his lordship's, called the Morocco Barb. 
 
 " Fox in 1719, then 5 years old, won the Lady's 
 Plate at York, in the hands of Mr. Lister, who sold 
 him to his Grace the late Duke of Rutland ; in whose 
 possession he beat the Duke of Wharton's Stripling 
 at Newmarket. Upon the Duke's demise he was 
 disposed of to William Cotton, Esq., of Sussex, in 
 whose hands he won a 300 guineas prize at Quainton 
 Meadow. Beat Lord Hillsborough's Witty Gelding 
 in a match run (as reported) for near or full 20,000 
 pounds. Beat Lord Drogheda's Snip 3 matches for 
 great sums ; and was never beat until attended with 
 disorders. He was the sire of many horses of high 
 
HORSE-RACING. 25 
 
 form, and died in 1738 at 23 years old ; the property 
 of the said Earl of Portmore/' 
 
 It will be noticed, in addition to the magnitude of 
 the sums for which matches were made early in the 
 last century, that Fox's blood was on both sides 
 Oriental, that he made his first appearance at five 
 years old, and that all his victories were achieved over 
 a distance of ground. From these two racehorses, 
 Childers and Fox, which may be regarded as repre- 
 sentatives of their class between the years 1709, when 
 the first races of which any record exists took place 
 at Newmarket, and 1750, three general inferences 
 may be drawn. First, that all our eminent racehorses 
 in 1867, being the lineal descendants of Childers, 
 Fox, Starling, Old Cartouch, and their contemporaries, 
 owe their origin to Oriental dams and sires. Secondly, 
 that during the last century, and especially during the 
 first half of it, it was unusual for a racehorse to make 
 his appearance in public at an earlier age than five 
 years old. Thirdly, that it was an unheard-of thing 
 for races to be run over a less distance than four miles 
 of ground. In the eyes of our ancestors it seemed 
 of little moment that a horse or mare should possess 
 speed unless they also possessed what, in these quaint 
 "descriptions," of which we have given two specimens, 
 was called '' goodness," or ability to stay. It is no 
 unimportant matter to recall this fact at a moment 
 when there is not one five-year- old in England who 
 can compete with three-year-olds, at weight for age, 
 
 c 
 
26 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 over a cup course, and when there is not a single six- 
 year-old or aged horse in training who can hold his 
 own in good company over the Beacon Course at 
 Newmarket. 
 
 We have shown that the English thoroughbred of 
 to-day is an exotic, and that he traces his pedigree 
 up to Arabian, Turkish, or African dams and sires. 
 Now nothing is more well established than that the 
 characteristic excellence of Oriental horses was that, 
 in addition to their speed, they possessed extraordinary 
 powers of endurance. Few readers of Sir Walter 
 Scott's ''Talisman" will have forgotten the ride 
 through the desert of Sir Kenneth of Scotland and 
 the disguised Arabian physician, who was none other 
 than Saladin the Soldan himself. The small party 
 of Saracens by whom Sir Kenneth, half prisoner, half 
 guest, was escorted, discerned, it will be remembered, 
 at the distance of a mile or more, a dark object moving 
 rapidly on the bosom of the desert, and which was 
 recognised as a party of cavalry, much superior to 
 the Saracens in numbers, and who proved to be 
 Europeans in their full panoply. Flight was obviously 
 a necessity for the Arabians, and in what manner 
 it was put in practice had best be told in Sir Walter's 
 words : — 
 
 "So saying, the Arabian physician threw his arm 
 aloft, and uttered a loud and shrill cry, as a signal to 
 those of his retinue, who instantly dispersed them- 
 selves over the face of the desert, in as many different 
 
HORSE-RACING. 27 
 
 directions as a cliaplet of beads when the string is 
 broken. Sir Kenneth had no time to note what 
 ensued, for at the same time the Hakim seized the 
 rein of his steed, and putting his own to its mettle, 
 both sprung forward at once with the suddenness of 
 light, and at a pitch of velocity which almost deprived 
 the Scottish knight of the power of respiration, and 
 left him absolutely incapable had he been desirous to 
 have checked the career of his guide. Practised as 
 Sir Kenneth was in horsemanship from his earliest 
 youth, the speediest horse he had ever mounted was 
 a tortoise in comparison to those of the Arabian sage. 
 They spurned the sand from behind them, they seemed 
 to devour the desert before them, miles flew away 
 with minutes, and yet their strength seemed unabated 
 and their respiration as free as when they first started 
 upon the wonderful race. The motion, too, as easy as it 
 was swift, seemed more like flying through the air than 
 riding on the earth. It was not until after an hour 
 of this portentous motion, and when all human pursuit 
 was far, far behind, that the Hakim at length relaxed 
 his speed. ' These horses,^ he said, * are of the breed 
 called the Winged, equal in speed to aught except the 
 Borak of the Prophet. They are fed on the golden 
 barley of Yemen, mixed with spices. Thou, Nazarene, 
 art the first, save a true believer, that ever had 
 beneath his loins one of this noble race, a gift of the 
 Prophet himself to the blessed Ali, well called the 
 Lion of God. Time lays his touches so lightly on 
 
28 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 these generous steeds tliat the mare on whicli thou 
 sittest has seen five times five years pass over her, yet 
 retains her pristine speed and vigour.' '' 
 
 These words have been selected for quotation because, 
 although extracted from a work of imagination, they 
 are, like everything that Sir Walter Scott wrote, based 
 upon truth. 'Not would it be easy, within a shorter 
 compass, to find a passage so indicative of the power of 
 endurance, or, in other words, the ability to stay, pos- 
 sessed by the highest strain of Arabian horses. "We 
 shall perhaps be told, on the strength of certain trials 
 of speed and endurance, enacted many years ago 
 between English and Egyptian horses upon Egyptian 
 soil, that the Arabian horse of to-day is immeasurably 
 surpassed by the English racehorse. It might be 
 answered that the last twenty years have greatly 
 diminished the staying powers of the English thorough- 
 bred, and that if we were now called upon to send 
 twenty racehorses to the East, to gallop for ten miles 
 across the desert against twenty Arabs, it would per- 
 plex us not a little, in spite of the five hundred horses 
 in training at Newmarket, to get together a lot of 
 twenty that would do credit to England. But the 
 truer answer would be that, setting aside the superior 
 advantages of training always possessed by the English 
 horse, we have never yet come into competition with 
 the finest blood of Arabia. It is only within the last 
 few years, and especially since Burton and Palgrave 
 have partially lifted the curtain which concealed Arabia 
 
HORSE-RACING. 29 
 
 from our view, that we have been admitted to any 
 knowledge of that vast and mysterious province of the 
 sun. We learn from Palgrave that the finest and 
 purest Arabian horses are to be found, not in Egypt, 
 or Persia, or Turkey, or Morocco, or Muscat, or Meso- 
 potamia, — from all of which countries many so-called 
 Arabian horses were imported into England during the 
 last century, — but in the uplands of Nedjed, or Central 
 Arabia. " Nedjed," says Palgrave, ^'is the true birth- 
 place of the Arab steed, the primal type, the authentic 
 model. Although their stature is somewhat low, they 
 are so exquisitely shaped that want of greater size 
 seems hardly a defect. Eemarkably full in the 
 haunches, with a shoulder of a slope so elegant as 
 to make one, in the words of an Arab poet, * go raving 
 mad about it ; ' just a little saddle-backed, a head 
 broad above and tapering down to a nose fine enough 
 to drink from a pint pot ; a most intelligent and yet 
 singularly gentle look ; full eye ; sharp, thorn-like ear ; 
 legs that seem as if made of hammered iron, so clean 
 and yet so well twisted with sinew ; a neat, round 
 hoof; coat smooth, shining, and light ; the mane long, 
 but not overgrown or heavy. JSTedjed horses are espe- 
 cially esteemed for great speed and endurance of 
 fatigue ; indeed, in this latter quality, none come up 
 to them. To pass twenty- four hours on the road 
 without drink and without flagging is certainly some- 
 thing ; but to keep up the same abstinence and labour 
 conjoined, under the burning Arabian sky, for forty- 
 
30 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 eight hours at a stretch, is, I believe, peculiar to the 
 animals of this breed. Other Arab horses, with all 
 their excellencies, are less elegant, nor do I remember 
 having ever seen one among them free from some 
 weak point. The genuine breed is to be met with 
 only in Nedjed itself." 
 
 It is very possible that, by reason of the failure of 
 the late Colonel Angerstein and others • in their 
 attempts to improve the English racehorse by going 
 back again to Arabian sires, little heed will be given 
 to these words of Palgrave. But it is an undoubted 
 fact that the few Oriental sires imported into this 
 country during the present century have had nothing 
 to do with the purest strain of Arabian blood. The 
 stallions given to William TV., and which stood during 
 the fourth decade of this century at Hampton Court 
 paddocks, were presents from Indians Imaums. The 
 Viceroys of Egypt, the Sultans of Turkey,* and the 
 Emperors of Morocco, have, during the last half- 
 century, not unfrequently presented horses to the 
 Sovereigns of Western Europe ; but they were not 
 veritable Arabian, but African, or Turcoman horses. 
 Colonel Angerstein was a private individual, and, 
 
 * " Eight magnificent thorough-bred Arabian horses have just 
 arrived as a present from the Sultan of Turkey to the Emperor of 
 Austria." — Extract from Vienna Correspondent of Times Letter, in Times 
 of Aug. 31, 1867. 
 
 " The seven splendid Arab horses, sent as a present to her Majesty, 
 have just arrived, in charge of Mouraffen Bey, at the Royal Stables, 
 Buckingham Palace. Accompanying these were two others for the 
 Prince of Wales and the Duke of Beaufort." — Observer, Sept. 8, 1867. 
 
HORSE-RACING. 31 
 
 although unwearied in his efforts to possess himself of 
 the best blood of the East, was unable to command 
 such pecuniary resources as would have sufficed sub- 
 stantially to alter the strain of our English thorough- 
 bred stock by infiltration of Arabian or Persian blood. 
 A writer of much experience, speaking last year upon 
 this subject, says : — "There is certainly considerable 
 alteration in the structure of our English racehorse 
 from his Arabian ancestor. I should say he was really 
 more like the Toorkoman or Persian horse. His 
 shoulders are not so well thrown back as the pure 
 Arab's, his quarters more inclined to droop. My belief 
 is that there has been some change in the last twenty 
 years. This alteration of form gives a longer back, 
 a longer barrel, and perhaps greater appearance of 
 length, but it is not so really. The structure is 
 altered for the worse, the various parts are not so collo- 
 cated as to act with advantage, and it is contrary to 
 the form of his Arabian ancestor. It is no unfrequent 
 thing to see short jumped-up, long-legged horses 
 stripped on the course. I have recently seen with 
 regret many more of that sort than I like. Many are 
 coarse, weedy, and positively ugly." 
 
 If we assume as a fact incapable of denial, that 
 within the last twenty years the stamina and stay- 
 ing powers of English racehorses have been mani- 
 festly on the decline, it seems not unprofitable at this 
 moment to record, first, that we owe the excellence 
 of our English breed to the Darley Arabian and the 
 
32 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Godolpliiii Arabian in a higher degree than to any 
 other sires of the last century. Secondly, that all 
 authorities agree in praising the endurance of the 
 best Arabian horses even more than their speed. 
 Thirdly, that within these last two years we have 
 been taught by a traveller of unquestioned authority 
 in what part of Arabia the purest and noblest strain 
 of Arabs is to be found. There is, — we write it with 
 regret, — but little probability that any English breeder 
 of racehorses will have energy or enterprise sufficient 
 to import a few sires and dams from Nedjed. The 
 Royal Stud has for years been administered more with 
 a view to obtaining a good average for the yearlings 
 sold at Hampton Court than to repairing the faults in 
 the blood, structure, and the endurance of the animal 
 himself. Mr. Blenkiron breeds for fashion ; and the 
 importation of Arabian sires would be an experiment 
 little likely to be productive of profit for six or eight 
 years to come. There is nowhere in England what 
 may be called a philosophical breeder of racehorses. 
 If rumour be correct in stating that Lord Grosvenor 
 is not indisposed to revive hereafter the traditional 
 glories of the Eaton stud, it is possible that, in the 
 event of his enterprise being equal to his wealth, he 
 may think it not unworthy of him to endeavour to 
 arrest the decadence of the English racehorse. But 
 there is more probability that in North America and 
 Australia, — those two young and exuberant nations 
 of the future which we have inoculated with the virus 
 
HORSE- RACING. 33 
 
 of our Englisli passion for liorsc-raciiig, — attention 
 will within the next twenty years be given to this 
 subject, and that the pur sang steed of Nedjed will 
 sooner or later find his way to the burning prairies of 
 the Mississippi valley, or be welcomed to Australian 
 plains, scorched by a sun scarcely less fervid than the 
 sol criador of his native Arabia. 
 
 The question whether our English strain of blood 
 has deteriorated, and requires reinvigorating from the 
 East, is, after all, a speculative question. We have 
 stated at some length the reasons which induce us to 
 think that during the last thirty years there has been 
 too much in-and-in breeding amongst us, and that it 
 could not but be advantageous to turn once more to 
 the home of the Darley and Godolphin Arabians. 
 But the deterioration in the stamina of the racehorse, 
 which has resulted from the short courses and two- 
 year-old racing now so much in vogue, is not a matter 
 of speculation, but will be admitted by all who take 
 any interest in the noble animal himself. Perhaps 
 the best way of enforcing the lesson that colts and 
 fillies, brought out to run ten, fifteen, or twenty times 
 as two-year-olds, are very rarely to be found in train- 
 ing at four and five years-old, and are still more rarely 
 stayers, will be by briefly reviewing the careers of a 
 few modern horses, which stood training for several 
 years, and were eminent for their staying powers. It 
 will be seen that some of them made their first appear- 
 ance as three-year-olds, — others very late in the year 
 
 > 
 
34 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 as two-year-olds, — but that in no instance did they 
 run often during- their first year. We submit it to the 
 Jockey Club or to those who desire to win Ascot Yases 
 and Goodwood Cups with horses four and five years 
 old, that the inference to be drawn from the record of 
 the past is irresistible and pregnant ,with warning. 
 We shall limit our search to the last thirty-five 
 years. 
 
 In the long annals of the Turf no animal has ever 
 appeared so often in public as Mr. Barrow's b. m. 
 Catherina, by Whisker, out of Alecto. Her first 
 appearance was, as a three-year-old, in the Oaks of 
 1833, won by Sir M. Wood's Yespa ; in which 
 Catherina failed to obtain a place. Her last race was 
 at Hednesford, in 1841, and she was beaten, ^ut 
 between 1833 and 1841 she started no less than one 
 hundred and seventy-one times. Without being a 
 first-class animal, she was good enough to win seventy- 
 five times, almost all her races being over a distance 
 of ground, and many of them in heats. We come 
 next to more celebrated, but not to stouter or sounder 
 mares, — Beeswing and Alice Hawthorn. Beeswing 
 came out as a two-year-old at ^Newcastle, in June, 
 1835, and was not placed in the Tyro Stakes. Her 
 second appearance in the same year was at Doncaster 
 where she won the Champagne Stakes ; and her third 
 and last appearance as a two-year-old was at Rich- 
 mond, where she won. From 1835 until 1842 inclu- 
 sive, she started seventy-three times ; her last appear- 
 
HORSE-RACING. 35 
 
 ance being at Doncaster, where, aged nine years, s"he 
 won the cup by five lengths, beating Charles the 
 Twelfth, aged six years, winner of the St. Leger and 
 of two Goodwood Cups ; and Attila, three years, 
 winner of the Derby. It is not necessary to record 
 her many other triumphs. Alice Hawthorn never ran 
 at two years old. As a three-year-old, she ran three 
 times, at insignificant meetings, winning twice. In 
 1842, as a four- year- old, she won the Chester Cup ; 
 and ran nine times. In 1843, aged five, she ran 
 twenty-six times ; and in 1844, aged six, she ran 
 twenty-four times, winning, in both j'ears, many great 
 races, and among them the Ascot Yase and Goodwood 
 Cup. In 1815, aged seven years, she ran nine times. 
 Altogether she ran seventy- one times. 
 
 We have not space to dwell in detail upon other 
 horses, famous for stoutness and soundness. Suffice it 
 to say, that Sir H. Bulkeley's Isaac came out as a five- 
 year-old in 1836, and ran till 1842, starting eighty-eight 
 times ; that Sir W. M. Stanley's Zohrab came out at 
 three years old in 1833, and ran till 1841, starting 
 eighty-six times ; that Barney Bodkin ran once as a 
 two-year-old in 1832, and continued running till 1839, 
 starting sixty- six times ; that Lord Exeter's Bodice 
 came out at three years old in 1834, and ran till Octo- 
 ber, 1839, starting sixty-three times ; that Mr. Fergu- 
 son's Ilarkaway came out as a three-year old in 1837, 
 and ran till the end of 1841, starting thirty-nine times ; 
 that Major Yarburgh's Charles the Twelfth first ap- 
 
86 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 peared as a three-year-old in 1839, and ran till 1842, 
 starting thirty times ; than Lanercost first appeared as 
 a three-year-old in 1838, and ran till 1842, starting 
 forty times. The list might be indefinitely extended. 
 We have selected at hazard a few horses famous for 
 stoutness, between the years 1830 and 1840. But 
 although the number of stout four, five, and six- year- 
 olds decreases rapidly in the racing calendars between 
 1850 and 1866, there is one uniform feature noticeable 
 throughout the series. It applies to Rataplan, Fisher- 
 man, and Moulsey, — the three horses which have started 
 most frequently within the last dozen years, — and is, 
 indeed, of universal applicability. Not one horse in a 
 thousand that runs eight or more races as a two-year-old 
 will he in training at four years old, or, if in training, 
 will he able to stay as a four-year-old over a cup course. 
 
 Few are the students of racing-calendar literature 
 who are aware how many of our historical race- 
 horses, such as Bay Middleton, Amato, Glencoe, 
 Plenipotentiary, Mundig, Mameluke, Bloomsbury, The 
 Baron, Pyrrhus the First, Sir Tatton Sykes, Blair Athol, 
 and countless others, made their debut in public after 
 they had attained three years of age. To these names 
 might be added a long list of famous horses, such as 
 Touchstone, the Queen of Trumps, Yoltigeur, Cossack, 
 "Wild Dayrell, and others, that ran but once as two- 
 year-olds. The career of Crucifix, whose first appear- 
 ance was for the July Stakes in 1839, and her last for 
 the Oaks, at Epsom, in 1840, and who started twelve 
 
HORSE-RACING. 37 
 
 times in eleven montlis without ever being beaten, is 
 always sorrowfully pointed at by opponents of two-year- 
 old racing. " Surely," says Mr. George Tattersall, 
 " tliat system of Turf management and training eannot 
 be good wliicb forces a superior animal so much beyond 
 ber strength and sends ber a cripple to the stud at 
 three years old, sacrificed before she has reached the 
 zenith of her age, by premature abuse of her great 
 powers." What are we to say about the modern Cru- 
 cifix, Achievement, who ran eleven times at two years 
 old, and has to thank the exhaustion consequent upon 
 powers overstrained at this early age for her defeat in 
 the rich Middle Park Stakes, at Newmarket, in 1866, 
 in the Oaks, at Epsom, in 1867, and for her compara- 
 tive worthlessness as a four-year-old in 1868 ? 
 
 It may well be doubted whether our English race- 
 course will ever again see such mares as Beeswing and 
 Alice Hawthorn, such horses as Lanercost or Hark- 
 away. There is not a six-year-old now in training in 
 England to whom any of these four could not at the 
 same age have given a stone and a beating over the 
 Beacon Course. But we have said enough to satisfy 
 even the most thoughtless that the English racehorse 
 of to-day cannot stay and stand training like the horses 
 of the past. The last Derby winner that was in train- 
 ing at five years old was Teddington, and he won the 
 Derby in 1851. Is it not high time for the Jockey Club to 
 take these patent facts into consideration, and to debate 
 whether the mischief is irremediable ? We have not 
 
38 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 space liere to offer suggestions or discuss remedies. 
 Enougli if we can get these facts generally recognised ; 
 for, in that case, profitable as it may be for gamblers to 
 ruin colts and fillies by setting them to compete for a 
 dozen or more two-year-old races, we are not without 
 hopes that, when some of the " heavy plungers " of the 
 hour shall have passed away, a remedy will be found. 
 
 II. It is not our intention to touch otherwise than 
 lightly and briefly upon the other and more formidable 
 danger which bodes little good to the longevity of the 
 Turf, — that is to say, the serious deterioration in morale 
 of the owners of racehorses. 'No one will suspect us of 
 including in this sweeping censure all owners of racing 
 studs. Happily for England, there are still upon the 
 Turf men, — not alone noblemen, baronets, and squires, 
 but also some professional betting-men, — in regard to 
 whom, as in regard to the late Lord Exeter, it is felt by 
 the public that any horse that carries their colours upon 
 a racecourse will run no less truly upon its merits than the 
 needle points to the pole. Of them, as of the greatest 
 jockey that England ever produced, it might be said that 
 " it would be as easy to turn the sun from his course as 
 Frank Buckle from the path of honour and duty.'' Far 
 be it from us to mention their honourable names, or to 
 reveal how short is the list. We have already offered to 
 sporting writers our advice to confine their comments 
 upon any Turf malpractices which they may notice to 
 the columns of the daily or weekly press. Essays 
 upon Turf morality, whether imbedded in the pages of 
 a magazine or published independently, have never yet 
 
HORSE-RACING. 39 
 
 done any good. He wlio undertakes to write them 
 should himself be '* as holy as severe ; " and cannot 
 but be aware that incedit per ignes suppositos cineri 
 doloso. The ground upon which a Turf censor treads is 
 too delicate to be lightly trodden. Nevertheless we are 
 not without hope that some of the younger patrons of 
 the Turf will look around them, and ask themselves 
 whether the atmosphere which they now breathe upon a 
 racecourse is the same that Lord Glasgow, Lord Zetland, 
 and General Peel, the late Dukes of Richmond and 
 Bedford, the late Lord Eglinton, and Admiral Har- 
 court, exhaled and respired five-and-twenty years ago. 
 Is an atmosphere of elevation and purity compatible 
 with a system of betting which lowers the dignity of 
 those who pursue it into the dirt, and makes their 
 transactions, their gains and losses, their pecuniary 
 engagements, and all that honourable men love to re- 
 gard as sacred, the theme of every idle and malicious 
 tongue, the subject of comment for every sporting- 
 article monger ? " There are men of education and 
 high birth who are as much in the power of the betting 
 fraternity and of the money-lender, as the unfortunate 
 debtor was in the power of his aristocratic creditor at 
 Eome." These are grave words. Would that we 
 could indignantly deny their truth ! The same con- 
 temporary writer proceeds to say, ^' A robbery on the 
 Turf is a very bad thing when it is designed by one 
 man ; but to find that it may be whispered in the ear 
 of an English nobleman or gentleman, without repul- 
 sion and disgust, not unfrequently with partisanship 
 
40 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and co-operation, is mucli worse." It has often been 
 remarked that no nation, or no section of a nation, 
 is ever cognisant of a decline in its own morality. 
 The Eomans under Julius Didianus thought themselves, 
 says Gibbon, the equals of the Romans under Augustus. 
 We are sometimes told that if horses are " pulled " 
 now with the cognisance of men of birth and high posi- 
 tion, there were Lord Darlingtons and others half a 
 century ago who stuck at nothing, — that if racing ac- 
 counts are badly settled now, it took a noble lord in the 
 palmy days of 1826 many months to pay the huge sum 
 of money which he lost on the Doncaster St. Leger. 
 It is hardly necessary for us to answer that the men of 
 rank and fortune who stooped to malpractices of yore, 
 were as much an exception to the mass of their order as 
 are the honest owners of horses the exception upon a 
 racecourse of to-day, — that the delayed settlement in 
 1826, to which we have alluded, was the solitary default 
 in a prolonged Turf career. But there are other evi- 
 dences of the diminished self-respect of many noble and 
 gentle patrons of the Turf, which cannot be noticed 
 without regret and humiliation by thoughtful and re- 
 flective moralists. The racehorse, it would seem, is a 
 more democratic leveller than Mr. Beales or Mr. Odgers ; 
 a greater disintegrator of aristocratic society than the 
 railroad, or the penny press, or the electric cable, or the 
 Reform Bill itself, big with mysterious and inscrutable 
 possibilities. That a young, raw, uneducated York- 
 shire or Newmarket lad, who can ride seven stone. 
 
HORSE-RACING. 41 
 
 but who cannot pen a letter of which a milkmaid would 
 not be ashamed, should be welcomed to the homes of 
 dukes and marquises, — that he should be encouraged to 
 smoke cigars, play billiards, and volunteer opinions with- 
 out restraint in the presence of his betters of either sex, — 
 is one of the saddest anomalies of our modern civilisation. 
 The days are at hand when the people of England will 
 pay little respect to men and women with handles to their 
 names who do not respect themselves. Fashion, said 
 Henry Fielding more than a century ago, can alone make 
 and keep gambling sweet and wholesome. When it shall 
 cease to be fashionable for men born in the purple to chat 
 and smoke with jockeys and trainers, and to bet thou- 
 sands and tens of thousands upon the speed and bottom 
 of a racehorse, without any other means of paying, if 
 the race goes against them, than the indulgence a 
 money-lender shall afford, — then, and not till then, 
 shall we expect to see the rehabilitation of the Turf. 
 Meantime, in the hope of awakening in some of the 
 younger and more reckless members of the racing com- 
 munity, a recognition of the fact that the fascinating 
 pastime to which they give their lives and powers can- 
 not be allowed to fall lower without imperilling its very 
 existence, we shall devote a few pages to showing how 
 old and far descended is the practice of horse-racing in 
 these happy islands which it is our good fortune to in- 
 habit, and shall conclude by earnestly admonishing our 
 racing readers to stay while it is yet day, to set their 
 house in order. 
 
 D 
 
42 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 Few men of reflection or observation can fail to 
 perceive that the seventh decade of the nineteenth 
 century is likely to exercise no less potential an 
 influence upon the destinies of the Turf than the 
 Gulf Stream produces upon our national climate. The 
 ten vears intervening between 1860 and 1870 have 
 already been illustrated by their production of many 
 two-vear-olds and three-year-olds, which, in all that 
 constitutes a racehorse, have never been surpassed in 
 the long and splendid annals of the Eacing Calendar. 
 It has been given to few lovers of horseflesh, though 
 their connection with the Turf may have extended 
 over four, five, or even six decades of years, to gaze 
 upon two such magnificent sires as Gladiateur and 
 Blair Athol, both of them winners of the Derhj, both 
 of them winners of the St. Leger. To institute a 
 comparison between two such horses, with a view to 
 arriving at a verdict pronouncing one to be superior 
 to the other, was obviously an absurdity ; but the 
 emulation awakened between Count Lagrange and 
 Mr. Jackson procured for all persons assembled at 
 Doncaster, in September, 1867, the opportunity of 
 scanning two such animals as had not appeared in 
 juxtaposition upon the same ground since the memor- 
 
HORSE-RACINTr. 43 
 
 al)le Tuesday* when Touclistone defeated the poisoned 
 Plenipotentiary in the St. Leger of 1S34. In spite, 
 however, of the performances, breeding, size, power, 
 and comeliness of these two monaiThs of the Turf, 
 there would be little difficulty in finding racing men 
 to maintain that each of them has been equalled, if 
 not surpassed, by other racehorses which the last 
 decade has produced. St. Albans and Tim TThiffler, 
 Lord Lyon and Achieyement, Friponnier and Ladv- 
 Elizabeth, The Earl and Blue Grown, would not be left 
 without eager assertors of their claims to be considered 
 at least the equals of Gladiateur and Blair Athol. Be 
 this as it may, it cannot be pretended at the first blush 
 that the decadence of the Turf, of which we hear so 
 much, is very far advanced, when the last eight years 
 have, in addition to many other excellent horses, been 
 signalised by the production of ten such animals as 
 St. Albans, Tim Whiffler, Blair Athol, Gladiateur, 
 Lord Lyon, Achievement, Friponnier, Lady Elizabeth, 
 The Earl, and Blue Go^^ii. 
 
 Be it, however, remarked that the fame of these 
 flyers, — at least of such of them as have already com 
 pleted their racing careers, — is based upon their two- 
 year-old and three-year-old performances. Let us f^o 
 through the list seriatim. St. Albans never appeared 
 
 * The Doncaster St. Leger, established in 1778, was always run on 
 a Tuesday until 1807, in which year the day was altered to Monday, 
 and so it remained until 1826, when it was again altered to Tuesday. 
 Another alteration was made in 1845, when the day was changed to 
 AVednesday, and it haa continued to he run on that day ever since. 
 
44 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 in public after the year 1860, which conferred 
 upon him immortality at three years old as the 
 winner of the Chester Cup and St. Leger. Tim 
 "Whiflfler having, as a three-year-old, won the Chester, 
 Goodwood, and Doncaster Cups in 1862, not to men- 
 tion many other lesser races, was unable, when as a 
 four-year-old he opposed Buekstone for the Ascot Cup 
 in 1863, to make a better fight of it than is implied 
 by running a dead heat. In the deciding heat he was 
 beaten easily by his three-year-old opponent. Blair 
 Athol ran only in his third year. Gladiateur ran but 
 twice at four years old. Lord Lyon's renown was 
 gained by his victories as a three-year-old, was not 
 improved by his performances as a four-year-old, and 
 was gravely compromised by his inferiority as a five- 
 year-old. Achievement, Friponnier, and the Hermit, 
 the three best three-year-olds of 1867, were very far 
 from being the three best four-year-olds of 1868. 
 Poor Lady Elizabeth, in spite of the brilliancy of her 
 two-year-old performances, has, as a three- j^ear- old, 
 become a reproach and a by-word. It is an undeni- 
 able fact that the seventh decade of this century has 
 hitherto produced no such cup horses as have been 
 famous in story during the six decades which preceded 
 it. In the sixth decade, for instance. Fisherman, 
 Rataplan, and Teddington achieved victories which 
 cannot be matched during the last eight years. Fisher- 
 man started 119 times, and won 69 times. Rataplan 
 appeared as a starter 71 times, and as a winner 
 
HORSE-RACTNG. 45 
 
 42 times ; and Teddington secured for himself the 
 same reputation that Yan Tromp had previously 
 gained, — the reputation of being, in his day, the best 
 two-year-old, the best three-year-old, the best four- 
 year-old, and the best five-year-old, in England. In 
 the fifth decade of the century, the names of mature 
 horses whose achievements eclipse those of Fisherman, 
 Rataplan, or Teddington, are abundantly found. It is 
 but necessary to mention Charles XII., Beeswing, 
 Alice Hawthorn, the Hero, Chanticleer, Yan Tromp, 
 the Flying Dutchman, Canezou, Hyllus, inter alios, to 
 prove that the fifth decade has little reason to dread 
 comparison with the sixth or seventh. The fourth 
 decade, — that is to say the years from 1830 to 1840, 
 — is fertile in great names. Among them we find 
 Fleur-de-lis, Priam, Glencoe, Rockingham, Lanercost, 
 Hornsea, Harkaway, Touchstone, Tomboy, Don John, 
 Plenipotentiary, and many more. Going backwards 
 from 1830 to 1800, the Turf antiquarian will have no 
 difiiculty in proving that stoutness in horses and the 
 growth of the century are in the inverse ratio to each 
 other. Whereas the number of speedy and short- 
 running horses and mares has been constantly growing 
 from 1830 downwards, the number of stayers and 
 stout-runners rapidly increases as we recede from 1830 
 upwards. In fact, — to sum up the whole truth in a 
 few words, — in proportion as two-year-old races and 
 T.Y.C. handicaps have increased, the animals that can 
 raise a gallop over the Beacon Course at four, five, 
 
46 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and six years old have sensibly diminished, until the 
 breed threatens to become extinct altogether. As for 
 aged racehorses that can win cups at seven, eight, or 
 nine years old,* they seem to have passed away from 
 these islands, and to belong to a species as irrecover- 
 able at the great bustard or the hollow-sounding 
 bittern, — as incompatible with our climate as the 
 tropical birds and fishes, of which the fossil remains 
 found in Great Britain and Ireland are still the great 
 perplexity of the Koyal Society. 
 
 But, painful as it may be to a true lover of the Turf 
 to note the signs of the times, it is impossible to deny 
 that, be the decline in the stamina and endurance of 
 the modern thoroughbred what it may, the deteriora- 
 tion in the owners of the racehorse is still more 
 marked and deplorahle. During the whole of the 
 eighteenth, and during the first four decades of the 
 nineteenth centurj^, nothing was more common than 
 for prime ministers, ministers of state, and royal dukes 
 to be the owners of racehorses. But since the death 
 of Lord Palmerston, and the secession of Lord Derby 
 and General Peel from active participation in Turf 
 pursuits, we seem to have fallen upon times which 
 forbid any politician who writes Eight Honourable 
 before his name to own a Derby favourite. The 
 
 * Beeswing won the Doncaster Cup four times : as a four-year-old 
 in 1837, as a seven-year-old in 1840, as an eight-year-old in 1841, and 
 as a nine-year-old in 1842. Between 1837 and 1842 she also won the 
 Newcastle Cup six times. 
 
HORSE-RACING. 47 
 
 impure atmosphere which has long pervaded the Turf, 
 and which led the Queen, influenced by her husband, 
 to withdraw her countenance and interest from her 
 people's favourite national pastime, warns all aspiring 
 men in public life that the ownership of racehorses 
 is now-a-days a diminutio capitis. The late Lords 
 Eglinton and Herbert, the late Duke of E/ichmond 
 and Lord George Bentinck, forswore the Turf, and 
 suspended active connection with it, when they took 
 to politics. Mr. Disraeli, describing Lord George 
 Bentinck, in the Library of the House of Commons, 
 receiving the intelligence that Surplice had won the 
 Derby, records that the success of a colt which he had 
 himself bred, and which was the son of his favourite 
 and invmcible Crucifix, wrung from the proud and 
 unyielding patrician "a superb groan." Alone among 
 our great statesmen. Lord Palmerston, who, whatever 
 else he may have been, was all over an Englishman, 
 maintained the same connection with the Turf in his 
 eightieth which he had commenced before his fortieth 
 year. But the withdrawal of Lord Derby's black 
 jacket and of General Peel's purple and orange from 
 many a racecourse upon which, twelve or fifteen years 
 ago, few colours more frequently caught the judge's 
 eye, is interpreted by the unthinking public as an 
 admission on the part of these two veteran statesmen 
 that to be the proprietor of an Orlando or a Canezou 
 is incompatible with the dignity expected from a grave 
 councillor of state. Even the secession of the Duke of 
 
48 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Beaufort, who, althougli never a cabinet minister, kept 
 up, as being simultaneously Master of tbe Horse and 
 owner of Yauban and Gomera, some connection 
 between tbe Turf and official life, is regarded, in these 
 days of depression among racing men, as a serious 
 blow and sore discouragement. In fact, for the first 
 time during the nineteenth century, we seem to be on 
 the brink of an epoch when the death or retirement 
 of some half-dozen owners will leave Epsom, New- 
 market, and Goodwood to be frequented solely by 
 nameless professional racing men. The last few years 
 have deprived us of the Duke of Bedford, the Marquis 
 of Exeter, the Earl of Eglinton, the Earl of Ches- 
 terfield, Mr. Greville, Sir Charles Monck, Viscount 
 Clifden, Lord Palmerston, Mr. Gully, and many more. 
 When to this list shall be added the names of the 
 Earl of Glasgow, the Earl of Zetland, Admiral Rous, 
 Mr. Payne, Sir Joseph Hawley, the Earl of Wilton, 
 and the Duke of Newcastle, who will there be left to 
 maintain the lustre of the British Turf, and to be the 
 owner of the Flying Dutchmen, Yoltigeurs, and Blue 
 Gowns of the future? 
 
 Without indulgence in unseemly or extravagant 
 croaking, these and other similar thoughts may well 
 fill the genuine lover of this noble pastime with fore- 
 boding and dismay. There is little enough to be said 
 or written which will avail to arrest the decay, both in 
 men and horses, to which no sensible man can pretend 
 to be blind. Like all other doctors, we have our 
 
HORSE-RACING. 49 
 
 own nostrum for abating ttie decline in the racehorse's 
 stamina and endurance, — a nostrum which we shall 
 presently do our best to enforce. As for alluring young 
 noblemen and gentlemen of character, wealth, and 
 position back to a pursuit \vhich, if deprived of their 
 continued countenance, will inevitably languish until 
 it takes rank by the side of steeple-chasing, — this is 
 too grave a task to be undertaken in such a fugitive 
 essay as this. But before advancing remedies and dis- 
 cussing nostrums, let us first consider whether the Turf 
 is really worthy of the pre-eminence which it has so 
 long enjoyed above all other pastimes, and which seems 
 justly to entitle it to be called the national sport of 
 England. 
 
 There is no difficulty in proving that horse-racing 
 is the oldest of our popular pastimes. The only other 
 British sports which can claim to be regarded as in 
 some degree its co-equal seem to us to be fox-hunting, 
 shooting, and cricket. The history of none of these 
 three can be traced so far back as that of horse-racing. 
 The fox only began to be the quarry pursued by 
 country squires, and by their square solid hounds and 
 heavy Flemish horses, towards the commencement of 
 the last century. Queen Elizabeth, a great patroness 
 of the chase, confined herself to haw^king, and hunting 
 the stag. No reader of the '' Fortunes of Nigel " can 
 have forgotten the incomparable passage in which King 
 James I. is described urging forward his favourite 
 hounds, Bash and Battle, in pursuit of "a hart of 
 
50 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 aught tines, the first of the season," and finding him- 
 self alone, and suddenly confronted with young Lord 
 Glenvarlock, whom his fears converted into a threaten- 
 ing assassin. In the middle of the seventeenth century 
 the fox was regarded as vermin. Oliver St. John, 
 when speaking to the Long Parliament, compared 
 Strafibrd to a fox, which, unlike the stag or hare, 
 deserved no law or pity. '^ This illustration," observes 
 Lord Macaulay, " would be by no means a happy one 
 if addressed to country gentlemen of our time ; but in 
 St. John's days there were not seldom great massacres 
 of foxes, to which the peasantry thronged with all the 
 dogs that could be mustered ; traps were set, nets were 
 spread, no quarter was given, and to shoot a female 
 with cub was considered as a feat which merited the 
 gratitude of the neighbourhood." Fox-hunting came 
 into fashion with the first years of the eighteenth 
 century, and increased rapidly in favour until the 
 Squire Westerns and country gentlemen of George II.'s 
 reign came to regard it as their natural diversion. 
 
 Very learned treatises have been written by anti- 
 quarians on the origin of fire-arms. The hand-gun, 
 which seems somewhat to have resembled a modern 
 walking-stick, was improved, in the reign of Henry YL, 
 by the adoption of a priming-pan. Next in order fol- 
 lowed the stocked gun, which was succeeded in time 
 by the match-lock and wheel-lock. The first was fired 
 with a lighted match brought into contact with the 
 priming by a spring- trigger. The wheel-lock was fired 
 
HORSE-RACING. 
 
 51 
 
 by a wheel wliicli passed rapidly over tlie edge of a bit 
 of flint, and was considered in the reign of Queen 
 Elizabeth to be an invention of no slight value. It 
 proved to be worthless as a sporting weapon. The 
 first fowling-piece which seems at all to have been 
 worthy of the name, was the flint-lock, introduced 
 about the year 1692, in the reign of William III. In 
 one of Addison's most delightful papers in the " Spec- 
 tator," Will Wimble is spoken of as a marvel, because 
 he could shoot a bird on the wing. For about a 
 century and a quarter, the flint-lock fowling-gun and 
 musket held their own against all rivals. All the great 
 battles of the last century, as well as all those which 
 gained immortality for the Duke of Wellington and 
 Napoleon I., were fought with the flint-lock musket. 
 Shooting game, as a science, had no existence before 
 the introduction of the flint-lock, and cannot be said 
 to have been perfected until the third decade of the 
 present century, when the percussion- gun came into 
 general use. It cannot, therefore, be pretended^ that 
 the antiquity of shooting is very great. Chroniclers 
 of cricket and its doings have not been wanting who 
 have endeavoured to establish its identity with club- 
 ball, a game played in the fourteenth century. But 
 they would have difficulty, we imagine, in satisfying 
 readers like the late Sir George Cornewall Lewis that 
 cricket, as now played, can be shown to have existed 
 before the middle of the last century. 
 
 The antiquity of horse-racing, in substantially the 
 
52 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 same shape whieli it now wears, is far greater ttan even 
 racing men of reading and education have been in the 
 habit of supposing. Without following the authors of 
 some treatises upon the Turf into their elaborate dis- 
 quisitions as to the evidences that the Romans, after 
 their subjugation of Britain, brought over their own 
 breed of running horses to these islands, we are justified 
 in believing that horse-racing was in vogue among the 
 Saxons, from the fact that Hugh the Great, father of 
 Hugh Capet of France, sent a present to King Athel- 
 stan of several German racehorses. There is also 
 further evidence that horses famous for their speed 
 were transmitted to this monarch from many parts of 
 the Continent ; and we read that in the year 930 a law 
 was promulgated by him, enacting that no horses 
 should be exported from Great Britain except as royal 
 presents. But the earliest authentic evidence of 
 horse-races having been celebrated in this country is 
 furnished by the old chronicler, Fitz-Stephen, who 
 wrote in the reign of Henry II.,— 1154 to 1189,— and 
 who describes what would in these days be designated 
 as the Smithfield meeting in 1168. As we read the 
 translation of the old annalist's words describing a 
 trial of speed between horses which took place seven 
 centuries ago, it is with difficulty that we can persuade I 
 ourselves that we have not '^Bell's Life'' or the 
 " Sporting Magazine " before us, and that we are not 
 perusing the performances of animals got by Stockwell 
 or Trumpeter. "The horses," he tells us, "are not 
 
HORSE-RACING. 53 
 
 without emulation ; they tremble and are impatient, 
 and are continually in motion. At last, the signal 
 once given, they start, devour the course, and hurry 
 along with unremitting swiftness. The jockeys, in- 
 spired with the thought of applause and the hope of 
 victory, clap spurs to their willing horses, brandish 
 their whips, and cheer them with their cries." Simi- 
 larly we learn, upon the authority of Thomson's 
 "Illustrated History of Great Britain," that the sports 
 of the common people at this time were bull-baiting, 
 cock-fighting, and horse-racing, *' which w^ere particu- 
 larly practised in London in the twelfth century." 
 With more or less distinctness the thread of Turf 
 history is traced down to the reign of Henry YIII., 
 who is reported to have been a great admirer of horses, 
 and to have imported sires from Turkey, Naples, Spain, 
 and Flanders, with a view to increasing the speed of 
 our English breed. Many laws were enacted in this 
 reio-n for improving the size and strength of the horse. 
 In emulation of her father. Queen Elizabeth was much 
 given to equestrian display, and her reign introduces 
 us to the first English veterinary treatise upon the 
 manao-ement of horses which the shelves of the British 
 Museum can boast * But it was not until James YI. 
 of Scotland and I. of England succeeded Elizabeth upon 
 
 * " How to Chuse, Ride, Trayne, &c., Horses, by Jervaise ]\Iark- 
 ham ; with a Chapter added on the Secrets of Training and Dieting 
 the Horse for a Course, which we commonly call Eimning Horses." 
 PuLlished in 1599. 
 
54 BRITISH SPORTS AXD PASTIIMES. 
 
 the throne that the Turf was recognised as a national 
 institution. In his reign laws were for the first time 
 passed with a view to the regulation of horse-races ; 
 and such was the partiality for the sport displayed by 
 King James's Scotch subjects, — the " forbears " of the 
 late Earl of Eglinton, the present Earl of Glasgow, and 
 Mr. Merry, — that a statute was enacted, at the King's 
 instance, ordaining that if any Scotchman won more 
 than one hundred marks within twenty-four hours, the 
 excess should be declared the property of the poor. 
 
 We have thus traced in outline the narrative of Turf 
 history from the days of King Athelstan, the Saxon, 
 who might presumably be called the author or father 
 of English racing, down to the times of King James I., 
 who, by his legislation, first placed horse-racing upon 
 a permanent basis. This latter sovereign is commonly 
 but erroneously spoken of in popular histories of the Turf 
 as the first English monarch who openly patronised 
 and encouraged a sport which, from his day down- 
 wards, has continually grown in public favour. The 
 support accorded to horse-racing by James I. was con- 
 tinued by his grandson, Charles 11. , who repaired and 
 • enlarged his grandfather's residence, commonly called 
 the Palace at !N'ewmarket, and added to the Stud Book 
 many mares imported from the Levant, which figure 
 in old pedigrees as " royal mares " down to the present 
 day. Little as it might be expected during an age 
 steeped in vice and profligacy, a grave attempt was 
 made in this reign to impose legislative restraint upon 
 
 i 
 
HORSE-RACING. 55 
 
 " deceitful, disorderly, and excessive gaming." Once 
 already during the present century has this Act of 
 Charles II. been invoked in the celebrated Qui Tarn 
 actions of 1843-44, which afforded Lord George Ben- 
 tinck so rare an opportunity for displaying his tenacity 
 of purpose and ingenuity in unravelling a tangled 
 skein of mystery and intrigue. Nor, when the 
 language of this Act of 1664 is studied by Turf 
 reformers in 1868, will there be many sober persons 
 found to deny that the salutary warnings of the seven- 
 teenth might well be repeated and proclaimed aloud in 
 the nineteenth century. Its preamble sets forth that 
 all games and exercises should only be used as innocent 
 and moderate recreations ; — that, if used in any other 
 fashion, they promote idleness and encourage dissolute 
 living, " to the circumventing, deceiving, cousening, 
 and debauching of many of the younger sort, to the 
 loss of their precious time, and to the utter ruin of 
 their estates and fortunes, and withdrawing them from 
 noble and laudable emploj^ment and exercises." It 
 concludes, after other provisions, with the following 
 notable words : — " And for the better avoiding and 
 preventing of all excessive and immoderate playing 
 and gaming for the time to come, be it further enacted 
 that if any person shall, after the date aforesaid, play 
 at any of the said games or pastimes whatsoever, other 
 than with or for ready money, or shall bet on the side 
 or hands of such as do play thereat, and shall lose any 
 sum or sums, or thing or things, so played for, exceed- 
 
5Q BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 ing tlie sum of one hundred pounds, at any one time or 
 meeting, upon tick or credit or otherwise, and shall not 
 pay down the same at the time when he or they shall 
 lose the same, the party or parties who lose the said 
 monies or things ahove the sum of one hundred pounds 
 shall not in that case be bound to pay the same, but the 
 contracts, judgments, statutes, recognizances, mort- 
 gages, bonds, bills, promises, covenants, and other acts, 
 deeds, and securities whatsoever, given for satisfaction 
 of the same, shall be utterly void and of none eflPect ; 
 and that the person or persons so winning the said 
 monies shall forfeit and lose treble the value of all 
 such sums of money so won, the one moiety of said 
 forfeit to go to our said sovereign, and the other moiety 
 to such persons as shall prosecute or sue for the same 
 within one year next after the time of such offence 
 being committed." 
 
 One other conspicuous " Act to restrain and prevent 
 the excessive increase -of Horse Races " was passed in 
 the thirteenth year of George II., and seems not un- 
 worthy of notice here. Its preamble states that 
 " horse-racing for small prizes or sums of money hath 
 contributed very much to the encouragement of idle- 
 ness, to the impoverishment of many of the meaner sort 
 of the subjects of this kingdom ; and the breed of 
 strong and useful horses hath been much prejudiced 
 thereby." The Act provides that from and after the 
 24th of June, 1740, no person should enter or start any 
 horse for any prize money, except such horse was bona 
 
HORSE-RACING. 57 
 
 fide his own property, and that no person should enter 
 or run more than one horse for a race. Also, that no 
 prize or sum of money shall be run for of less value 
 than £50, except at Newmarket, and Black Hambledoii 
 in Yorkshire. It was also enacted that no horses 
 should run for any prize unless they carried the follow- 
 ing weights : — Five- year-olds, 10 stone ; six- year-olds, 
 11 stone ; and seven-year- olds, 12 stone. Now, it will 
 doubtless be remembered by some who may chance to 
 read these words, that upon the 16th of February, 1860, 
 Lord Eedesdale introduced to the House of Lords a 
 measure entitled the " Light Weight Eacing Bill.'' He 
 proposed that after January 1, 1861, no horse should 
 run for any racing prize carrying less than 7 stone 
 weight, under a penalty of forfeiture of the horse so 
 running, and of £200. The measure came on to be 
 read a second time on June the 12th, and Lord Redes- 
 dale found himself confronted by a petition from the 
 Jockey Club, presented and supported by the Earl of 
 Derby. The petitioners submitted that "all regula- 
 tions respecting horse- racing are better intrusted to 
 the authority which has hitherto made rules for the 
 encouragement of this great national amusement, 
 and that the proposed Bill, should it become law, 
 would have a prejudicial effect." 
 
 It is far from our desire to maintain that either of 
 the Houses of Parliament is better qualified to frame 
 laws for the regulation of horse-racing than that myste- 
 rious and inscrutable Yehmgericht, the Jockey Club. 
 
 E 
 
58 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Ever since the birth of this corporate racing senate, 
 during the reign of George II., the whole responsibility 
 of the legislation with respect to horse-racing, and 
 to the governroent of the sporting community, has 
 devolved upon this elected and conventional body. For 
 a century and a quarter the enactments of our Turf 
 legislators have been cheerfully obeyed by their pro- 
 miscuous subjects. But it has been well observed by a 
 recent thoughtful writer, that " it may be taken for 
 o-ranted that if ever a future historian shall write the 
 decline and fall of the English Turf, one of the reasons 
 assigned for its decay will be, that it was behind the 
 rest of the age in liberal progress, and was badly 
 governed by its chief representatives." Nothing is 
 more unreservedly admitted by every member of the 
 Jockey Club who is capable of one moment's serious 
 thought than that active and coercive enactments are 
 now needed to rehabilitate the Turf, and to revive the 
 declining powers of endurance in the English race- 
 horse. Lord Derby, with his wonted fluency of ex- 
 pression and felicity of language, gave utterance in 
 1860 to the sentiments which animated his Jockey 
 Club colleagues. But although the deterioration, both 
 in racing men and horses, is far more marked and in- 
 controvertible a fact in 1868 than it was in 1860, no 
 attempt has yet been made by the Jockey Club to devise 
 any of those remedies which they cannot but feel to be 
 necessary, and of which, as we have shown, they 
 declined acceptance eight years ago at the hands of 
 
HORSE-RACING. 59 
 
 Lord Eedesdale, or of any other extra -Jockey Club 
 authority. 
 
 We have quoted, at greater length than the space at 
 our command justifies, two Acts of Parliament, passed 
 with a view to improving the breed of horses and the 
 morals of racing men at a period anterior to the exist- 
 ence of the Jockey Club. No member of that club, 
 however arrogant and exclusive, will pretend to deny 
 that in both these legislative Acts the sound sense and 
 judgment of their framers are abundantly apparent. 
 It is the fashion of Jockey Club authorities to allege 
 that they take no cognizance of betting transactions, 
 and that any attempt to purify the atmosphere of the 
 Turf, so far as regards the enforcement of punctuality 
 in settling, and other cognate subjects, would for them 
 be ultra vires, and beyond their jurisdiction. If 
 this be so, we cannot but remark that in Charles II. 's 
 and George II. 's reigns the House of Commons showed 
 itself superior to the mock delicacy which now sways 
 the Jockey Club, and was then capable of passing laws 
 which, if enforced to-day, would be of no slight advan- 
 tage to the Turf and its best interests. Eut even if the 
 Jockey Club shall continue to ignore betting, and refuse 
 to take cognizance of its many disputes, sophistries, and 
 abuses, or if they prefer to delegate such considerations 
 to a committee selected from their own ranks, — as is 
 said to be now the desire of Admiral Eous, — we sub- 
 mit that the abated endurance of the thoroughbred and 
 the entire disappearance of aged horses from the race- 
 
60 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 courses of Great Britain are facts that they cannot 
 ignore. In our concluding remarks we propose to 
 return to this subject. In the meantime, having traced 
 the thread of Turf history from Athelstan the Saxon 
 down to the establishment of the Jockey Club in 
 George II. 's reign, we have a few words to say as to 
 the traditions of some few of our historical race meetings, 
 and as to the courses which have in some instances been 
 trodden for more than three hundred years by an almost 
 unbroken succession of high-mettled racers. 
 
 Foremost in point of antiquity among the races 
 of Great Britain stands the Tradesman's Cup at 
 Chester. It is a well-established fact that a horse-race 
 for the prize of a silver bell was instituted at Chester 
 in 1511, and was decided upon that same " Eood-eye,'' 
 or Island of the Cross, which was once the Campus 
 Martins of the Chester youth, who here displayed 
 their activity and strength in mock fights and other 
 military spectacles, and which is the present race- 
 course. The amusements soon assumed another form, 
 and the mimic war was succeeded by horse-racing, 
 which has continued to be the occasional diversion of 
 the citizens to the present period.* In 1609 the bell 
 was converted into three silver cups, and in 1623 the 
 three cups were combined in " One faire Silver Cupp, 
 of about the value of eight pounds." We are not in 
 a position to assert that every year between 1511 and 
 
 * From " TopograpMcal Beauties of England and Wales," vol. ii. 
 p. 233. 
 
HORSE-EACING. 61 
 
 1868 has witnessed a race over the Eoodee for the said 
 Tradesman's Cup ; but that the Chester Cu23 of to-day 
 is identical with the race established in Henry YIII/s 
 time admits of no dispute. It may not unreasonably 
 be doubted whether many of the owners of Chester 
 Cup winners within the last twenty-five years were 
 aware that St. Lawrence, or Nancy, or Malton, or 
 Mounseer had been successful in a race four times as 
 old as the Epsom Derby or the Doncaster St. Leger. 
 But the declining interest in the Chester Cup which 
 the last twelve years have witnessed may be rekindled, 
 if the antiquity of the race shall awaken some pride 
 in sporting men, and shall arouse Mr. Topham, the 
 well-known clerk of the course at Chester, to renewed 
 exertions. 
 
 It must be confessed that with the exception of the 
 Tradesman's Cup and the Dee Stakes, the Chester 
 race-meetings of to-day possess few attractions. The 
 proximity of the Dee Stakes to the Derby, which it 
 usually precedes by less than a month, lends an 
 artificial interest to the race ; but upon more than one 
 occasion the horse that subsequently won the Derby 
 has sufiered defeat round the punch-bowl course of 
 Chester. For two-year-old races, Chester, as becomes 
 its hoary antiquity, has never been famous. And we 
 much fear that, in spite of the historical interest of the 
 scene, with its circular little racecourse overlooked on 
 the one side by the grave old walls of the Eoman town, 
 ■ and on the other by the staring railway viaduct, the 
 
62 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 representative of modern civilisation, Chester races 
 are doomed to experience a progressive decline, and to 
 pale their ineffectual fires before the attractions of 
 other meetings blessed with finer natural courses. 
 
 Next in antiquity to Chester comes the capital of 
 that sporting county, in regard to which it is said that 
 " every Yorkshireman takes as naturally to the pig- 
 skin as the Kentish lad to the cricket-ball, or the 
 duckling to water." In his " Post and Paddock,'' the 
 Druid tells us of a Devonshire man who used not long 
 ago to make a St. Leger pilgrimage every year, tra- 
 velling both ways on foot, and " who accounted for 
 this strange whim on the grounds that * his grand- 
 mother was Yorkshire-born.' " Horse-racing, as it 
 appears from Camden's " Britannia," published in 
 1590, was practised about that date in the forest of 
 Galtres, to the east of the city of York. In the great 
 frost of 1607 a horse-race was run upon the frozen 
 river Ouse. In more recent times the races were held 
 upon Clifton and Eawclifie Ings ; but the river having 
 been much swollen, and the course overflowed in 1730, 
 it was agreed thenceforth that the races should be run 
 upon the new course laid out upon Knavesmire by 
 Alderman Telford ; — nor is it necessary to announce 
 to racing men that here they have been celebrated 
 ever since. As a mark of the interest which ministers 
 of the Crown once took in horse-racing, it may not be 
 uninteresting to repeat that when the great patronage 
 accorded to races on Knavesmire necessitated the 
 
HORSE-RACING. 63 
 
 erection of a grand- stand, the Marquis of Rocking- 
 ham, better known in political history as "Burke's 
 Prime Minister," headed the subscription list. It is 
 singular that, great as is the antiquity of the York 
 meeting, no record can be found of races haying been 
 run over Doncaster Town Moor at an earlier date than 
 1703. York and Doncaster, and especially the latter, 
 have, as it seems to us, been more famous for their 
 long than for their short races, and for the extraor- 
 dinary interest in the noble animals displayed by every 
 Yorkshire artisan and peasant, whom the prowess of 
 a Beeswing, a Surplice, a Flying Dutchman, or a "West 
 Australian has attracted to the side of the white rails 
 which have witnessed so many momentous finishes. 
 
 In the value of the prizes contended for, and the 
 assemblage of great masses of spectators, Newmarket 
 compares ill with most of our other principal race- 
 courses. At the same time, no true Lover of this 
 magnificent sport would for a moment hesitate to 
 declare that I^ewmarket is the head-quarters of the 
 racing community. With its traditions reaching back 
 to the reign of James I., but not earlier, — consecrated 
 by the memories of a thousand historical matches, such 
 as those between Hambletonian and Diamond, Filho 
 da puta and Sir Joshua, Beehunter and Clincher, Ted- 
 dington and Mountain Deer, Cineas and Barbatus, 
 Julius and Lady Elizabeth, Friponnier and Xi, and 
 many more, — identified with the achievements in 
 the saddle against time of such once famous, but 
 
64 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 now almost forgotten, equestrians as Miss Pond, 
 Mr. Jennison Shafto, Mr. Woodcock, and Mr. Osbal- 
 destone, — Newmarket, witli its multitudinous racing 
 associations, is tlie shrine at which every true lover of 
 the Turf pays his vows with no less devotion than the 
 Mahommedan displays as he turns his waking eyes in 
 the direction of the minarets of Mecca. It would be 
 presumptuous to assign to !N^ewmarket Heath greater 
 praise in respect of its modern two-year-old struggles, 
 or of its ancient four-mile heats over the Beacon. 
 Each of these two styles or phases of racing has its 
 own peculiar merits, and if we are constrained to 
 pronounce that the excess of two-year-old racing now- 
 a-days has rung the knell of the stout and lusty runner 
 of the last century, it must be confessed that, as year 
 succeeds year, fresh two-year- olds are continually 
 coming out which seem to eclipse the fleetness of their 
 historical predecessors. Old frequenters of the Heath 
 are not wanting who will tell you that there is not in 
 our days the same electric thrill of interest about a 
 really great horse when he makes his first appear- 
 ance in public, as that which exercised its magnetic 
 influence over the spectators a generation ago. Let us 
 turn for a moment to the record of two of the 
 most magnificent specimens of the British racehorse 
 that ever looked through a bridle, — Plenipotentiary, 
 winner of the Derby in 1834 ; and Bay Middleton, 
 winner of the same race in 1836. Each of them made 
 his first appearance in the Craven Meeting at New- 
 
HORSE-RACING. 65 
 
 market, and each of them at the age of three years. 
 
 It was the fate of Plenipo in his first race to have for 
 
 his only antagonist Lord Jersey's Glencoe, supposed, 
 
 before he met his conqueror, to be one of the speediest 
 
 milers ever stripped on N^ewmarket Heath. When 
 
 Lord Jersey reconnoitred Plenipo before the race, he 
 
 pronounced him to be a great bullock, more fit for 
 
 Smithfield Market than for competition with Glencoe. 
 
 Under this impression, his orders to Jem Robinson 
 
 were to go off at score, and cut his opponent down by 
 
 pace. What happened in the race cannot be better 
 
 narrated than in Jem Robinson's words : — " I came 
 
 the first half-mile, according to orders, as hard as I 
 
 could lick, but when I looked round there was the 
 
 great bullock cantering close by my side." Bay Mid- 
 
 dleton, in his first race for the Eiddlesworth Stakes, in 
 
 the Newmarket Craven of 1836, was opposed by five 
 
 antagonists, to whom he had no difiiculty in showing 
 
 his heels. His next appearance was for the 2,000 
 
 Guineas, which he won, and in the Derby at Epsom he 
 
 cantered in first, followed by three horses. Gladiator, 
 
 Yenison, and Slane, who, though outstripped by him 
 
 in fleetness, have proved themselves, as the sires of 
 
 Sweetmeat, Alarm, and Sting, no unworthy rivals at 
 
 the stud to the progenitor of the Flying Dutchman. 
 
 Our diminishing space warns us to linger no longer 
 among the memories of Newmarket, or to narrate how 
 the July and Chesterfield Stakes, — which have intro- 
 duced to the public so many flyers destined, like 
 
66 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Crucifix, the Flying Dutcliman, and Teddington, sub- 
 sequently to achieve immortality, — were the first two- 
 year-old races in England established by the authority 
 of the Jockey Club. It remains for us to notice that 
 long before the great celebrity now attaching to 
 Epsom Eaces was conferred upon them by the institu- 
 tion of '' the Derby," this healthy little village in 
 Surrey had achieved fame by reason of its fine bracing 
 air and excellent medicinal waters. Epsom Haces, like 
 those at Newmarket, owe their origin to James J., who 
 was not unfrequently a visitor to the place, occupying 
 upon these occasions the palace, as it is called, of 
 Nonsuch. It is not unworthy of record that the lan- 
 guage used by Lord Palmerston, when moving the 
 usual Derby adjournment of the House of Commons 
 in 1860, would not have been as acceptable to the 
 contemporaries of Pepys as to our modern represen- 
 tatives of the people. In his "Diary" of July 25, 
 1663, Pepys remarks that, " having intended to go this 
 day to Banstead Downs to see a famous race, I sent 
 "Will to get himself ready to go with me ; but I hear 
 it is put ofi", because the Lords do sit in Parliament 
 to-day." Contrasting Pepys' entry with Lord Palmer- 
 ston's words, " To adjourn over the Derby Day is part 
 of the unwritten law of Parliament, and I am sure 
 that Her Majesty's Government do not wish to ask 
 the House to depart from so wholesome a custom," — 
 it would appear that in rigid attention to their parlia- 
 mentary duties the Lords of 1663 compare favourably 
 
HORSE- RACING. %7 
 
 witli the Commons of 1860. But it must be confessed 
 that the legislative bodies of two centuries ago were 
 exposed to no such temptation as the Derby race offers 
 in the seventh decade of the nineteenth century. It 
 will be sufficient to substantiate the interest of each 
 recurrence of London's great festival hj saying that, 
 in every part of the world, the Derby Day at Epsom 
 is spoken of by Englishmen as the one great and 
 characteristic sight which every foreigner who visits 
 England should not fail to see. Other meetings there 
 are, such as those at Ascot and Goodwood, which may 
 surpass Epsom and Newmarket in fashionable estima- 
 tion. But it would be as impossible to estrange from 
 Newmarket the affections of genuine lovers of horse- 
 racing as it is to persuade the London citizen out for 
 a holiday that any other racecourse in England can 
 possess such attractions for him as his own beloved 
 downs at Epsom upon a fine Derby Day. 
 
 Such then, and thus far descended, is that noble 
 national sport which, however liable to abuse, has 
 grown with England's growth during its acknowledged 
 term of existence, extending back over more than nine 
 hundred years. To urge that, because vices and 
 impurities have attached to it, the whole institution 
 of horse-racing ought to be swept away, is equivalent 
 to arguing that a ship ought to be scuttled in mid- 
 ocean because barnacles have clung to her bottom. 
 Many of the Turf's worst deformities, — such, for 
 instance, as "heavy plunging," — have a perpetual 
 
68 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tendency to correct themselves. We are emphatically 
 of opinion that there are no evils connected with horse - 
 racing which the Jockey Club are not strong enough 
 to grapple with, if they gird them honestly to the 
 task, and are no respecters of persons. The first 
 improvement which it seems desirable that they should 
 endeavour to inaugurate is a reduction in the multi- 
 tude of race- gatherings. From the beginning of 
 February until the end of JN'ovember, scarcely a week 
 passes without its one or more race-meetings. At 
 many of them, — as, for instance, at Derby in 1868, — 
 the horses stripped are so few and so bad as to provoke 
 the contempt of all genuine lovers of a race. Every 
 one must have remarked how large a proportion of the 
 multitudinous races thus contended for consists of 
 handicap races for distances ranging between a quarter 
 of a mile and a mile. Scarcely less numerous are the 
 two -year- old spins. It seems to us undeniable that we 
 owe the disappearance from our racecourses of the 
 Beeswings, Alice Hawthorns, and Fishermen of the 
 past solely to that system of Turf management which 
 prematurely taxes the strength of our thoroughbreds, 
 by forcing them all to stand severe training at two 
 years old. Here is a vicious practice with which the 
 Jockey Club is fully competent to deal. What is 
 there to prevent their enacting that no two-year-old 
 shall appear in public earlier in the year than the July 
 meeting at Newmarket ? " The July " was the first 
 two-year-old race ever established in Grreat Britain by 
 
HORSE-RACING. 69 
 
 tlie Jockey Club. Why should they not decree that 
 it shall be the first race in each successive year in 
 which two-year-olds shall be stripped for public com- 
 petition ? We are well aware of the jealousies which 
 such a decision will awaken in the breasts of the 
 managers of all race-meetings anterior in the year to 
 July. But we submit that the vitality, if not the very 
 existence, of the Turf depends upon some coercive 
 or restrictive legislation of this nature. Nothing is so 
 easy as for the Jockey Club to present petitions to 
 Parliament deprecating interference with the laws of 
 horse-racing on the part of members of either of our 
 legislative Houses. But such petitions necessarily 
 imply that the Jockey Club is both able and willing 
 itself to legislate with a view to securing and pro- 
 moting the true interests of the Turf. Let them, in 
 conclusion, take home to their hearts the following 
 weighty words of a modern writer : — " There is no 
 fear of the interests of the Turf ever being seriously 
 affected as long as those who hold the position of its 
 chief guardians make judicious use of their own 
 powers, keep themselves beyond reproach by their own 
 line of conduct, and act in a strict spirit of equity in 
 regard to others." 
 
ON HUNTING. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Our friend in tlie preceding papers has declared, in 
 speaking of the Turf, that horse-racing might be re- 
 garded as the great national pastime of England, — 
 more especially even than fox-hunting or cricket. 
 Now that we are going to say a few words about hunt- 
 ing, we are almost disposed to protest that, on this 
 point, our friend is wrong. We doubt whether, of all 
 our national amusements, hunting is not the most tho- 
 roughly English, and the least susceptible of being 
 taken out of England. Of course we here include 
 Scotland and the sister isle. As regards Ireland, we 
 may go further, and almost express a doubt whether 
 hunting is not more Irish than English, so thoroughly 
 has life in that country, both rural life and town life, 
 become imbued with a love of the sport. Horse- racing- 
 has indeed become so large a business, that it must be 
 acknowledged to inyolve greater interests in a pecu- 
 niary point of view, and to be on that account the more 
 important occupation of the two. It is, moreover, open 
 
HUNTING. 71 
 
 to all the public. Our great racecourses are as com- 
 mon to rich and poor as are the Queen's highways. 
 But nevertheless we think that hunting has more 
 national efficacy than any other of our pastimes ; — that 
 it does more to make Englishmen what they are, and 
 to keep them as they are, extending its influences to 
 very many of both sexes who do not hunt themselves ; 
 and we are quite sure that there is no other national 
 amusement among ourselves, no national amusement 
 belonging to any other people, so incapable of exporta- 
 tion, so alien to foreign habits, so completely the 
 growth of the peculiarities of the people with whom 
 it has originated, as is the sport of hunting. 
 
 Even among the nations who are nearest to us and 
 dearest to us, — those people who have sprung from 
 ourselves, — the amusement is not only unpractised, but 
 is regarded with mixed horror and wonder by those 
 who hear of it. Of course it will be understood that 
 we are speaking now of hunting such as it is in Eng- 
 land ; of such hunting as that we are about to de- 
 scribe, — and not of the pursuit of game. The pursuit 
 of game has been the necessary occupation of all young 
 nations, and has been continued as a recreation among 
 most nations that have come to maturity. But that 
 hunting of which we speak has never been able to find 
 a settled home in the United States, in British Ame- 
 rica, or in Australia. Attempts have been made in 
 various of our colonies, — in Jamaica for instance, and 
 in Canada. A pack of fox-hounds was for a time esta- 
 
72 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 blished in Maryland, whicli, of all tlie United States, 
 is perhaps more than any other like to England in its 
 mode of life. But it has been found impracticable to 
 establish the sport successfully in other lands, even 
 among men who are thoroughly English in their ways 
 and thoughts, — even among Englishmen themselves. 
 Here, among ourselves, it is understood that a man is 
 to enjoy the liberty of trespassing, as opposed to the 
 law of the land, when he is following a recognised 
 pack of hounds. That is a conviction which has been 
 able to get itself acknowledged by no other people in 
 the world. Perhaps the nearest ajDproach to English 
 hunting out of England, is that to be found in 'the 
 Campagna round Rome, where a pack of English fox- 
 hounds is hunted after the English fashion by an 
 English huntsman ; or it may be that the hunting at 
 Pau, in the south of France, will rival that in the 
 Campagna. The attempt in such a locality is hardly 
 more than a proof of the intense love which English- 
 men have for the sport. There are foxes in the Cam- 
 pagna, and there is an open space in which liberty 
 to ride is granted; and there are English residents. 
 Such being the case, fox-hunting has been established 
 there ; and having once been put down by the Pope, 
 is now again alive. And there is hunting of course in 
 France, — besides that English hunting at Pau. We 
 have all heard how the Emperor hunts the deer at 
 Fontainebleau, and some of us have witnessed the 
 stately ceremony. But there is in it not the slightest 
 
 I 
 
HUNTING. 73 
 
 resemblance to English hunting. There is no com- 
 petition ; no liberty ; no danger ; — and no equality. 
 
 The reason why this should be so, — why hunting 
 should not exist elsewhere as it does here in England, — 
 is easy to find ; much easier than any reason why any 
 custom so strange, so opposed to all common rules as 
 to property, should have domesticated itself among 
 ourselves. We are to the manner born ; and till we 
 think of it and dwell upon it, the thing does not seem 
 strange to us ; but foreigners cannot be made to under- 
 stand tha,t all the world, any one who chooses to put 
 himself on horseback, let him be a lord or a tinker, 
 should have permission to ride where he will, over en- 
 closed fields, across growing crops, crushing down che- 
 rished fences, and treating the land as though it were 
 his own, — as long as hounds are running ; that this 
 should be done without any payment made to the land- 
 owner, without any payment of any kind exacted from 
 the enjoyer of the sport, that the poorest man may join 
 in it without question asked, and that it should be 
 carried on indifferently over land owned by men who 
 are friends to the practice, and over that owned by its 
 bitterest enemies ; — that, in fact, the habit is so strong 
 that the owner of the land, with all the law to back 
 him, with his right to the soil as perfect and as exclu- 
 sive as that of a lady to her drawing-room, cannot in 
 effect save himself from an invasion of a hundred or a 
 hundred and fifty horsemen, let him struggle to save 
 himself as he may. Before he can be secure he must 
 
74 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 surround his territory by fences that shall be impreg' 
 nable ; — and should he attempt this, he will find that 
 he has made himself so odious in the county, that life 
 will be a burden to him. It may be said that in a real 
 hunting county active antagonism to hunting is out of 
 the question. A man who cannot endure to see a crowd 
 of horsemen on his land, must give up his land and go 
 elsewhere to live. It is this national peculiarity which 
 confines the practice of hunting to England, and makes 
 it almost impossible for an Englishman to give to a 
 foreigner an adequate idea of the practice. Americans 
 when they are told of it do not altogether believe what 
 they hear. We have known them to declare that if it 
 be as is described, law in England is inoperative, and 
 property not secure. When they are assured that in 
 spite of such anarchy, in the teeth of that insecurity, 
 land in a hunting county in England is not deteriorated 
 in value, — that it will bring perhaps a higher price per 
 acre than any other soil in the world that is to be used 
 only for rural purposes, — they express themselves unable 
 to understand how this should be the case among a people 
 alive to the ordinary commercial relations of meum and 
 tuum. For this reason hunting, which in England 
 has grown up to be an English habit, remains English, 
 and cannot travel abroad ; while horse-racing, which 
 was practised in other countries before it came to Eng- 
 land, is now thoroughly domesticated in France, and, 
 in an altered shape, has become a passion in America. 
 
 The chief national efiect produced by hunting on the 
 manners and habits of our rural people is a certain 
 
 \ 
 
HUNTING. 75 
 
 open-air freedom of speech, which we think has sprung 
 from the sport, though it has spread itself into districts 
 in which hounds are not kept. Men, — especially young 
 men, — who feel themselves altogether cowed by the 
 chairs and tables of those above them in worldly posi- 
 tion, who acknowledge by their very gait and demea- 
 nour the superiority of rank and wealth when they meet 
 rank and wealth in the streets of a town, keep up their 
 heads and hold their own among the lanes and fields, 
 because they have unconsciously learned that a certain 
 country pursuit, open to all classes, has the effect of 
 making all classes for a time equal in the country. We 
 do not mean to imply that this operates on rustic 
 labourers, or on any body of men who are paid by wages ; 
 — but it does operate very widely on all above that 
 standing. The non-hunting world is apt to think that 
 hunting is confined to country gentlemen, farmers, and 
 ricb strangers ; but any one who will make himself 
 acquainted with the business and position in life of the 
 men whom he sees around him in an average hunting- 
 field, will find that there are in the crowd attorneys, 
 country bankers, doctors, apothecaries, — the profession 
 of medicine has a special aptitude for fox-hunting, — 
 maltsters, millers, butchers, bakers, innkeepers, auc- 
 tioneers, graziers, builders, retired officers, judges home 
 from India, barristers who take weekly holidays, stock- 
 brokers, newspaper editors, artists, and sailors. In the 
 neighbourhood of certain large towns in which hunting 
 has come to be the fashion, the majority of the large 
 fields whicb are found there will be made up of men 
 
76 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES, 
 
 who come out of the town and who belong to it. A 
 yery few days passed in watching the work of a hunt- 
 ing-day, in observing and feeling the ways of the men 
 around, in hearing what is said, in seeing what is done, 
 and in breathing the atmosphere of the field, will pro- 
 duce that freemasonry of which we are speaking, and 
 teach the tyro, — not that he is to speak to whom he 
 likes, and as he likes ; in the hunting-field as elsewhere 
 the young and the unknown must wait to be addressed 
 by their elders, and by those who are at home on the 
 spot, or they will hardly avoid shipwreck, — ^but will 
 teach him the tone of equality which prevails, and will 
 imbue him unconsciously with a conviction that out 
 among the fields aristocracy is not exclusive and over- 
 bearing as he will probably have been taught to believe 
 that it is, when met in the streets. The Master of the 
 hunt is indeed an aristocrat, — or rather an emperor on 
 whose shoulders you can always see that the burden of 
 government is weighing heavily ; but beneath him there 
 is freedom and equality for all, with special honour 
 only for the man who is known to be specially good at 
 some portion of the day's work which is then in hand. 
 And this feeling of out-of-door equality has, we think, 
 spread from the huntingrfield through all the relations 
 of country life, creating a freedom of manner and an 
 openness of countenance, if we may so call it, which 
 do not exist in the intercourse between man and man 
 in cities. We are aware that we are here claiming for 
 hunting a wider influence than our readers generally 
 
HUNTING. 77 
 
 will allow to it. The very men who have been made 
 what they are in England by the extension of this in- 
 fluence do not know why it is that they are what they 
 are. Nay ; — they do not even know that they are what 
 they are. But they who have lived long enough to 
 observe effects, who have lived in town and in country, 
 and who have lived with their ears and their eyes open, 
 will, we think, agree with us, that that riding together 
 on terms of equality of the lord and his tenant and his 
 tradesmen has produced in English counties a commu- 
 nity of interests and a freedom of feeling which exist 
 nowhere else. The butcher may still touch his hat to 
 the lord if he be addressed, or the farmer may feel that 
 his landlord is almost a god whom he is bound to wor- 
 ship ; but each will know that he is sitting on his own 
 horse, that for the moment he is absolutely indepen- 
 dent, that he and that other, lord though that other be, 
 have come there on the same occupation, and that when 
 hounds are running, he need stop for no man, — unless 
 it be for the Master or his huntsman. Let the lord 
 take the lead of him if the lord can ! There is no pri- 
 vilege here for rank to pass out first. Something may 
 be allowed to a woman. Something may be allowed to 
 age. But rank has no privilege ; and wealth can afford 
 no protection. Therefore we think that of all our na- 
 tional pastimes, hunting is the most essentially English. 
 When railroads were first becoming general in the 
 country there was much fear among many sporting 
 men that they would destroy hunting. It was clear 
 
78 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 that they would cut up and subdivide the country ; 
 that they would carry noise and turmoil into remote 
 spots, thereby banishing foxes ; that they would bring 
 town near to town, thereby tending to make all the 
 island one city ; and that they would be so fenced as to 
 form insurmountable obstacles to straight riding. All 
 these arguments have been found to be more or less 
 true ; and yet railroads have done so much towards 
 hunting, that they may almost be said to have created 
 the sport anew on a wider and much more thoroughly 
 organised footing than it ever held before. They have 
 brought men, and with the men their money, from the 
 towns into the country ; and the men and the money 
 together have overcome all those difficulties which the 
 railroads themselves have produced. Homes are now 
 made for foxes, specially constructed for their conve- 
 nience and welfare, in spots in which a minimum of 
 disturbance may be expected ; special rides across and 
 under railroads are provided ; hunting trains are 
 arranged to take hunting men in and out of the large 
 cities ; horses by the dozens may be seen walking in 
 and out of their boxes with as much accustomed com- 
 posure as the holder of a season ticket. Before rail- 
 ways were made hunting was confined to the dwellers 
 in the country, or to the few rich and idle men who 
 could give up their whole time to the pursuit. Now a 
 man who cares for his health, and can be happy on 
 horseback, may work at his desk four days in the week, 
 and hunt the other two, sixty or a hundred miles from 
 
HUNTING. 79 
 
 his home, and get back to dinner with his family. 
 Successful men of business have availed themselves so 
 largely of this facility for getting air and exercise that 
 hunting has been more than doubled, instead of being 
 crippled by the railroads. Hunting as it is now prac- 
 tised could not exist without railroads, the use of which 
 has been introduced into all hunting programmes, as it 
 has into the programme of every other amusement and 
 business of life. 
 
 We have not space here to give a history of hunting, 
 nor would such a history have much charm for the 
 general reader. It may be interesting to point out 
 that hunting as now conducted is by no means an old 
 established pastime. Fielding wrote his " Tom Jones " 
 in the middle of the last century, about a hundred and 
 twenty years ago, and we learn what hunting in Eng- 
 land was then from the life of Squire Western. It was 
 in its early infancy, and had hardly advanced beyond 
 the practice of the country gentleman to ride about his 
 own land with a few beagles in pursuit of a hare. 
 Squire Western did not like to be alone, and he would 
 take his young friend Tom with him ; but we hear 
 nothing of any field being congregated, or of any 
 others participating in the sport except a gamekeeper. 
 Fielding, who himself had been a Somersetshire squire 
 before he wrote " Tom Jones," knew well the kind of 
 life which he was describing. A squire in those days 
 went out hunting as squires some thirty years ago went 
 out shooting, — as some squires, we hope, still continue 
 
80 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 to do, — without mucli special preparation, and simply 
 in search of an ordinary day's amusement. Then, as 
 many squires were often doing the same thing, it was 
 found convenient that three or four should put their 
 small packs together, and that one man should be the 
 Master and the director of the hounds. Thus a wider 
 scope was given ; for we may imagine that even a 
 Squire Western would become tired of riding about 
 always on his own land. And soon the biggest hunt- 
 ing squire in those parts would become the Master, as 
 being the richest man, — for the practice of hunting by 
 subscription packs seems to have been of later date. 
 And so the thing grew, and the Master of hounds in a 
 hunting county became a man of importance and of 
 much weight among his fellow squires. 
 
 It may be doubted whether men who now think that 
 the cream of hunting is to be found only in a fast run 
 of forty -five minutes, almost without a check, and with 
 a kill in the open, would enjoy the sport as it existed 
 even at the end of the last century. Hounds had not 
 been trained to run with the speed which is now at- 
 tained, nor had the profession of hunting produced men 
 skilled in casting when the hounds themselves were at 
 fault, as is done now. There was no great crowd, and 
 the fox had a better chance when there were few or 
 none to halloo to him. The hounds were obliged then 
 to puzzle out their own quarry, or to give it up. Men 
 were more patient than they now are, and the hounds 
 Avere allowed to puzzle out their game. We hear more 
 
HUNTING. 81 
 
 of the length of the days spent than we do of the rapi- 
 dity of the pace, and we know that neither hounds nor 
 horses can have gone very fast during those runs of 
 many hours of which the accounts have reached us. 
 Tillage was less abundant than at present, and the 
 ground less perfectly drained. The enclosures, also, 
 were smaller, and the fences, though perhaps easier of 
 management, were more frequent. A continued scent 
 to which hounds could work, was therefore probably 
 more common, — for the draining of our lands has un- 
 doubtedly injured scent, and, as a matter of course, 
 scent will lie on grass when there can be none on 
 ploughed lands ; — but all those adjuncts to the dogs' 
 instincts which we possess, were wanting ; and we may 
 be assured that but little was known of that sort of 
 pace which hunting men now consider to be indispen- 
 sable to their enjoyment. Few men, probably, who 
 are in the habit of hunting, — perhaps but few even of 
 those who ride well to hounds, — are aware how much 
 of science and how much of other outward circum- 
 stances is added to the instinct of the dog in the ordi- 
 nary hunting of the present day. No doubt the best 
 of it, those moments of ecstatic delight in which the 
 man on his horse is able to forget all the cares of the 
 world, and to believe that no paradise can add anything 
 to the joy of that half hour, those well- remembered 
 gems in life, so few and far between, have all been 
 owing to a hot scent carried breast-high by fleet 
 hounds. In those moments no fictitious aid is re- 
 
82 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 quired, and the huntsman himself may be absent and 
 for a while not missed ; — but before we have reached 
 that acme of bliss much has been done to help the 
 track ; the fox has been stopped out of his home by 
 human intellect ; his whereabouts has been discovered 
 probably by human knowledge ; he has been watched 
 out of the covert by human eyes ; his track, in default 
 of the hounds, has been detected by human ingenuity ; 
 and a hundred voices have been raised to assist the 
 pack when at fault. And on ordinary days, — on days 
 in which those creamy moments of ecstasies are only 
 hoped for, are hardlj^ anticipated, and do not come, — 
 it will often be the case that the huntsman will have 
 much more to do with hunting the fox than have the 
 hounds. Were it not so, the fox, understanding by 
 his instinct the imperfection of the scent, would refuse 
 to be driven away, would hang about his wood all day, 
 probably dying there at last, — or would else turn, and 
 traverse, and twist about, running like a hare, and re- 
 fusing to go far from his home. But the manner of 
 his turning is within the compass of the professional 
 skill of the instructed huntsman, and the fox owes a 
 bitterer grudge to the guile of his human enemy than 
 he does to the instinct of his canine foe. Before men 
 had learned this skill, before money was forthcoming 
 to make such skill profitable, when hunting was not a 
 science as it is now, in those days of Squire Western 
 of which we are speaking, the hounds had the hunting 
 much more to themselves. We often hear sportsmen. 
 
HUNTING. 83 
 
 loud in tKeir reprobation of tlie interference with wliicli 
 hounds are treated, reviling the men who holloa, and 
 complaining of huntsmen for over-diligence in casting. 
 '' You should leave hounds alone and let them hunt,'' 
 men will say. If hounds were left alone and let to 
 hunt, such men, trained as they now have been trained 
 to hard riding, would not often find that which they 
 have come out to seek. We are sometimes disposed to 
 think that the time will arrive when hunting will be 
 practised altogether without a fox, — without any game 
 to run, — and that the sport will be managed with a bit 
 of rag dipped every five minutes in asafoetida. The 
 growing impatience of the age will hardly endure 
 much longer the deficient scent or the slack running 
 of the imperfect fox. 
 
 The big squire among the little squires, who became 
 so naturally the Master of hounds in his neighbour- 
 hood, has gradually been converted to, — or is gradually 
 giving way to, — the manager of a subscription pack. 
 Between the one and the other there was a very grand 
 and a very English phase of hunting, of which, indeed, 
 some instances, though now but few, still remain. This 
 is the phase in which the great lord undertook the 
 enormous expense of hunting the county in a lordly 
 style, for the amusement and recreation of all those 
 who lived within reach of his magnificence, and de- 
 fraying the whole expense of the establishment out of 
 his own pocket. The Duke of Beaufort's hunt, and 
 the Berkeley hunt, are still, we believe, maintained 
 
84 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 after this princely fashion. And there is something 
 alluring in the idea of the great seigneur of the county 
 thus providing for the amusement, not only of his 
 tenants and dependants, but also for that of the whole 
 country-side. It is a remnant of that powerful splen- 
 dour which enabled the old feudal lords to carry into 
 battle their own followers, and to keep a troop of 
 armed cayaliers, always ready for work, under their 
 own roofs. But life is now so changed in all its ways, 
 that this lordly magnificence is not in accordance with 
 the tastes of the day. Men now prefer to hunt with 
 subscription packs, in doing which they can j)ay their 
 own proportion of the expenditure, and feel that they 
 follow their amusement without other debt to the 
 Master of their hunt than that which is always due to 
 zeal and success in high position. It is very well that the 
 Queen's hounds should be maintained without payment 
 from those who follow them. They are paid for by the 
 country, and the non-hunting population has not as 
 5^et deputed any Joseph Hume of the day to demur to 
 the expenditure. But in regard to hunting generally, 
 it is found that packs maintained by subscription are 
 those which best meet the wishes of hunting men. We 
 remember to have ridden with a noble earl, whose 
 hounds always went into covert punctually at eleven 
 if he were not coming, but never stirred from the meet 
 till twelve if he were expected. We always felt while 
 waiting through that hour that we were too dependent 
 on the noble earl, and that he could hardly have 
 
HUNTING. 85 
 
 enforced such a rule had he taken a subscription for 
 maintaining the pack of hounds of which he was the 
 Master. 
 
 Sportsmen like to feel that they are paying for their 
 own amusement ; but yet, — and we feel ourselves con- 
 strained to make this charge as a serious accusation 
 against a large number of hunting men, — there is very 
 much of niggardliness in this matter. Gentlemen are 
 invited to undertake the management of fox-hounds 
 with a subscription, — the understanding being that the 
 man so invited shall give his time and experience, and 
 that the necessary expenditure shf^U be defrayed by the 
 hunt in general ; — and yet it is too often the case that 
 the amount subscribed is altogether inadequate for 
 the purpose. There is a feeling that as the position of 
 a Master of hounds is a place of honour, and much 
 coveted,' therefore the holder of it should be content to 
 pay out of his own pocket a portion of the public ex- 
 penditure. We have always felt that the argument 
 was one which should never be allowed to have any 
 weight. If gentlemen are content to hunt as depend- 
 ants of a seignorial Master of hounds, in the manner 
 which we have just described, let them find their grand 
 seigneur, and accept the gift of his magnificence. There 
 are men of wealth who will be willing to spend it in 
 that fashion. But if there is to be the feeling in the 
 hunting-field that the expense is borne by the gentle- 
 men of the hunt generally, there should, we think, be 
 no compromise in the matter. Let us, who hunt, be 
 
^^ BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 dependent or independent ; — but let us not indulge our 
 feeling of independence with a false boast, or comfort 
 ourselves with an assurance that though we are con- 
 tented to take our coats and waistcoats from the gene- 
 rous hand of a rich neighbour, we pay for our boots 
 and breeches ourselves. 
 
 It is somewhat difficult to state with accuracy the 
 cost of maintaining a pack of fox-hounds, because cir- 
 cumstances differ greatly in different counties. The 
 distances to be travelled with one pack are much 
 greater than those which are to be encountered in 
 another ; the nature, of the ground and of the fences 
 require faster and stronger horses here than they do 
 there ; and circumstances varied in other respects enable 
 horses, hounds, and men, to be in the field more fre- 
 quently in one part of England, than they can in 
 another. The following list, however, may be taken 
 as giving, we believe, a by no means extravagant state- 
 ment of the ordinary annual expenditure of a Master 
 of hounds, in reference to his stable and kennel. We 
 presume that the pack is hunted four days a week, 
 and that second horses are supplied for the huntsman 
 always, and as occasion may require for the first whip. 
 It will, of course, be understood that the expense of 
 the Master's own stud and private servants are not 
 here included, and that the items named are simply 
 such as would be necessary if the pack were hunted 
 by a committee of gentlemen managing a fund raised 
 by subscription. 
 
HUNTING. 87 
 
 Wagoe of one huntsman and of two whips . . . £250 
 
 Ditto of feeder 55 
 
 Ditto of grooms, second horsemen, stable assistants, &c. . 300 
 
 Servants' clothing 180 
 
 Cost of horses : —eighteen horses purchased at £60 each, 
 kept at work for three years, and sold for £15 each. £15 
 
 each horse per annum ........ 270 
 
 Feeding for eighteen horses 455 
 
 Saddler's bill 150 
 
 Blacksmith 60 
 
 Veterinary expenses (including medicine) .... 45 
 
 Horseflesh and meal for hounds (fifty-five couple) . . 510 
 Rent of stables and kennels, including rates and interest 
 
 of money spent in building and fitting .... 80 
 
 Assessed taxes on servants, horses, and hounds ... 65 
 
 Coals and ^ndles 50 
 
 Travelling expenses ........ 80 
 
 Incidental expenses ' 150 
 
 £2,700 
 
 We are aware that if this statement should meet the 
 eyes of any Master of hounds, or of gentlemen cog- 
 nizant with the management of stables and kennels, 
 exception may be taken to many of the details. Many 
 Masters give higher prices for their horses ; some will 
 say that they do not realise such sum as that named 
 for those that are cast ; others will feel sure that their 
 horses last them more than the three years specified ; 
 but we think that, taking one county with another, the 
 average would be found to be nearly correct. Wages 
 again, and all incidental expenses, will vary very much. 
 Travelling expenses will, in some hunting counties, be 
 much higher than we have put them. In others, the 
 feeding of hounds will be less, because it will be 
 
88 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 generally unnecessary to buy horse flesh. But we feel 
 assured that we have not given an extravagant state- 
 ment ; — that a Master of hounds who goes out four days 
 a week, and does so with that attendance of servants 
 which the nature of the sport now demands, will not be 
 able to place the sum-total of his expenses at a lower 
 figure than that we have named. And yet it must be 
 acknowledged that in many counties in which four 
 days are expected from the Master, it is found quite 
 impossible to raise such a sum by subscription as that 
 above stated. 
 
 There are, of course, very many items in the ex- 
 penditure of hunting a county which it is impossible to 
 insert in such a list, because those in one county will 
 bear no proportion at all to those in another ; — and 
 also because in some counties they fall almost exclusively 
 on the Master, in others they do so to a great degree, 
 in others to a less degree, and again in others perhaps 
 not at all. Nothing has been set down for game- 
 keepers, nothing for earth- stopping, nothing for rent 
 and planting and protection of coverts, and nothing for 
 that terrible matter of poultry. Fees for gamekeepers 
 are almost always paid by the Master. The stopping of 
 earths, which is a matter much more important in 
 some counties than in others, may, to a great degree, be 
 left to the gentry and farmers when the gentry and 
 farmers are zealous, and know what they are about. 
 It is not generally expected that a Master should pay 
 rent for coverts, but for his own credit's sake he will 
 
HUNTING. 89 
 
 often do so. He will hire shooting here and there, 
 — not wanting the shooting, but knowing that with 
 a minimum of shooting there will be a maximum 
 of foxes. He ought to have nothing to do with com- 
 pensation for poultry; — but old women with the sad 
 remains of ducks' heads and turkeys' throats will 
 naturally go to him, and he will often find himself 
 compelled to satisfy them. We have presumed that 
 his hounds came to him from heaven, and we have 
 charged nothing for their cost. It is the Master's 
 practice, no doubt, to breed them ; — but some must have 
 bee,n bought originally, and there will be the expense 
 of travelling for sires and bitches. In addition to all 
 this, he will want a private secretary, and in the matter 
 of postage he is a staunch supporter of the Queen's 
 revenue. It has been truly said of a Master of hounds 
 that he must always have his hand in his pocket, and 
 always have a guinea in it. 
 
 It may be as well that we should here state also what 
 is the ordinary personal cost of hunting to the sports- 
 man, and we shall then see at a glance how small a 
 proportion of that expenditure is the subscription 
 required from him for maintaining the pack, even if he 
 be willing to pay his fair share of the cost. And here 
 again we must observe that the cost of a hunting 
 establishment must vary greatly according to the 
 circumstances in life of its owner. The country gentle- 
 man, who lives in the middle of a hunt, has few or no 
 travelKng expenses, has his own paddocks for his 
 
 G 
 
90 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 horses, pays no appreciable rent for his stables, has 
 servants in his yard at low wages, and can, from his 
 position in the county, generally carry on the work 
 with a lesser stud than will suit the sportsman from a 
 distance. In the following statement we have endea- 
 voured to give the ordinary expenditure of a man who 
 has to supply himself with all that he requires for 
 hunting after having taken up his residence in some 
 hunting country. It will often be the case, perhaps 
 more often than not, that such a man will not burden 
 himself with a stable, but will pay so much per horse 
 to some keeper of stables. He will find much comfort 
 in doing so, but we do not think that in point of 
 expense there will be much difference. Hunting is a 
 pursuit in which the close-fisted man will carry on 
 the war at a very much cheaper rate than he who is 
 thoughtless in such matters. There is money to be 
 lavished and money to be saved on every item, — from 
 the cost of your horse to the charge for removing a 
 shoe. But this spirit of economy, or of extravagance, 
 will prevail with the same effect whether you keep 
 stables of your own, or have your dealings with a 
 stable-keeper. If you will consent to ride hired horses 
 on all occasions, you may no doubt go over the ground 
 at a cheaper rate than you can with your own cattle. 
 But you must be indifferent to the feeling of ownership, 
 which is one of the great delights of hunting ; you 
 must be prepared to ride a roarer, which is the 
 purgatory of hunting; the horses given to you will 
 
HUNTING. 91 
 
 generally gallop and jump, but they will always be 
 stale ; — and you must be superbly indijQPerent to the 
 safety of your own neck. Submitting to these draw- 
 backs, you can, we believe, ride hired horses at least 25 
 per cent, cheaper than you can keep them for yourself. 
 And the man who does this will have the advantage 
 of hunting, and of quitting the expense of hunting, 
 just when it suits him to do either the one or the 
 other. 
 
 "We have presumed, in preparing the following 
 details, that the owner of the stud desires to hunt four 
 days a week, and that he requires two horses out on 
 each day. Not a large proportion of men who hunt 
 wants by any means so extensive an establishment. 
 Stables of four and three horses are, we believe, much 
 more common than stables of seven. Comparatively 
 few men do hunt four days a week, and of those who 
 do, many are young enough and light enough to go 
 through the day upon one horse. But we have found 
 it easier to take the account of a full stable, and will 
 simply say that the items may be divided so as to show 
 the ordinary expenditure necessary for one, three, four, 
 or any other number of horses. The result will be 
 about this ; — that he who rides with one horse will pay 
 £5 a day for his sport, and that he who rides with two 
 horses will pay £10. I have presumed that seven 
 horses are necessary, — in order that eight may leave 
 the stable every week. A lesser number will not 
 suffice. Out of seven there will generally be at least 
 
92 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 one tliat requires temporary retirement, and six ready 
 for the field are needed for such work. 
 
 Servants' wages (three) ....... ^130 
 
 Servants' clothing 50 
 
 Hunting clothes for self 15 
 
 Cost of horses : — seven in use purchased at £120 each, sold 
 at £45, and kept at work for three years each — annual 
 
 cost of £25 175 
 
 ' Feeding seven horses, £30 per horse* .... 210 
 
 Saddler's hill 30 
 
 Blacksmith's ditto 20 
 
 Veterinary expenses (including medicine) .... 25 
 
 Eent of stahles 25 
 
 Taxes 10 
 
 Travelling expenses 100 
 
 Incidental expenses, — coals, gas, candles, hrooms, hrushes, 
 
 buckets, &c., &c 50 
 
 £840 
 
 This expenditure will thus give a man four days' 
 hunting a week for twenty-one weeks in the year, at 
 £10 a day. When any sportsman shall find that he 
 has achieved this, and has ridden his eighty-four days 
 between the beginning of IsTovember and the middle 
 of April, we will congratulate him on the state of his 
 own health, on that of his stud, on the ease with which 
 he manages the ordinary business of his life, — and 
 especially in regard to the weather. 
 
 It will be observed by those who themselves defray 
 
 * It will he ohserved that the feed of horses is placed at a lower 
 figure in regard to the Master's stables than it is here fixed. The 
 Master will have advantages, — especially as to summering horses, — 
 which a private sportsman cannot generally obtain ; and will in most 
 cases have his own hay, vetches, &c. 
 
HUNTING. 93 
 
 the expense of a hunting establishment that nothing 
 has been here put down as the cost of subscribing to 
 the pack ; — and yet it is admitted by nearly all that 
 some such subscription must be paid. The amount, 
 however, is not unfrequently so small as to add but a 
 ver}^ slight percentage to the other expenses of the 
 amusement. Men almost think that in hunting they 
 should have for nothing the servants, the horses, the 
 hounds, and the game, — as they do have for nothing 
 the woods which they see drawn and the land over 
 which they ride. If we may be allowed to make a 
 suggestion in a matter so extremely delicate, we would 
 say that hunting men should ordinarily fix their 
 subscriptions at about 10s. for each horse they have 
 out during the season. The man who hunts once a 
 week with one horse would thus pay his £10 or £15, 
 — which should be held to be sufficient ; — whereas the 
 sportsman who is enabled by his leisure and his pocket 
 to hunt four days a week, with two horses for each 
 day, should not subscribe less than £70 or £80 per 
 annum. 
 
 It will be thought by some who have seen the large 
 crowds of horsemen at many of our meets, but who 
 have not analysed those crowds, that if the above 
 advice of ours were taken, much more money would 
 be subscribed than is needed to make up the sum 
 named as the proper amount of a Master's expenses ; 
 but when the crowd has been analysed, such wiU not 
 be found to be the case. Farmers should never be 
 
94 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 allowed to pay. They give their land, and preserve 
 the foxes, and have to sustain loss to their crops and 
 poultry without a complaint, — as best they may. 
 Clergymen rarely pay. It would not be fitting that 
 bishops should know that their names are on the lists, — 
 and then they act as chaplains to the hunt. Doctors 
 do not pay, setting our bones for us when they are 
 broken, — sometimes gratuitously. The small trades- 
 men never pay anything. The ruck of horsekeepers, 
 innkeepers, and of horsey men generally, who ride in 
 black coats, hunting caps, and old brown breeches, and 
 which is to be seen with every hunt, which comes from 
 heaven knows where, and lives heaven knows how, 
 never pays anything. When you are buried beneath 
 your horse in a ditch, two or three of such will 
 generally be there to take you out, — and will under- 
 stand well how to do it. Ladies pay nothing for 
 amusing themselves, — either when hunting or else- 
 where, — and we hope it may be long before any one 
 will wish that they should do so. Boys who come 
 home at Christmas to their ponies and mince-pies pay 
 nothing. Old gentlemen who toddle out on their cobs 
 if the weather be fine to see what is going on, do not 
 often add to the fund ; and then strangers to the hunt 
 of course do not pay. It must be a small field that 
 will give a larger percentage of paying men than one 
 in four. 
 
 The upshot of all that we have said tends to show 
 that hunting is a costly amusement. There can be 
 
HUKTING. 95 
 
 but a few men, we may suppose, wlio can afford, and 
 will be willing to pay £800 or £900 a year for a 
 single diversion. But it must be remembered tbat 
 men niay bunt, — as we bave said before, — witbout 
 bunting four days a week, and may bunt also witbout 
 tbe luxury of a second borse. We bave beard men 
 say tbat tbey would ratber not bunt at all tban go out 
 no oftener tban twice a week, — and tbat to bunt as 
 tbe owner of a single borse is simple misery, and tbe 
 name of bunting only. We altogetber disagree witb 
 tbese statements, and tbink tbem to be bombastic and 
 pretentious. If we could venture to offer advice on 
 sucb a matter to young beginners, we sbould counsel 
 tbem ratber to confine tbemselves to two days a week, 
 believing tbat bunting, like any otber amusement, will 
 pall by great frequency. We will not bere take advan- 
 tage of our situation and preacb a sermon to sbow 
 tbat no man witb a purport in bis life sbould devote 
 more tban two days in a week to any amusement ; but 
 we will confine ourselves simply to tbe fact tbat tbe 
 man wbo bunts twice a week, — or more tborougbly 
 still, be wbo bunts but once a week, — is tbe sportsman 
 wbo is ever tbe keenest. It is be wbo feels tbat tbe 
 day is never long enougb, and tbat tbe Master is a 
 recreant to tbink of returning to tbe kennel before 
 black nigbt bas tborougbly establisbed berself. It is 
 be wbo is satisfied witb tbe run wben be gets it, 
 tbinking it to be all deligbtful, not criticising tbe pace 
 too minutely, not quarrelling witb tbe nature of tbe 
 
96 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 ground, not caring mucli whether the fox has gone 
 straight or has turned, putting up mth little when but 
 little is to be had, and being a glutton for much when 
 much comes in his way. Nothing strikes us more in the 
 hunting-field than the fastidious indolence of men who 
 are every day in the saddle. They will hardly take 
 the trouble to be on the look-out for sport unless they 
 be at some pet covert, or riding a favourite horse. If 
 the wind blow, or the sun shine, if the land clog a 
 little or be too dry, if it be the dog pack instead of 
 the bitches, or the bitch pack instead of the dogs, 
 if the wood be large, or foxes reported to be scarce, or 
 if, by any not uncommon chance, these gentlemen 
 shall have got out of bed on the wrong side in the 
 morning, all hope of hunting is over for that day. A 
 man who has only one day in the week to give to his 
 amusement is more chary with his hopes before he 
 relinquishes them. 
 
 And as for the man with the one horse ! But 
 
 here, gentle reader, if you will permit the solecism, we 
 will leave for a few minutes the authoritative grandi- 
 osity of the plural number, and approach you with a 
 closer personification. He who now writes these 
 words, possibly for your advantage, ostensibly for your 
 delectation, was a man with one horse for some eight 
 years of his hunting life, and he flatters himself that 
 he saw what hunting was. He knows, at any rate, 
 that he enjoyed hunting then as he has not enjoyed 
 it since, and may never hope to do again. And he 
 
HUNTING. 97 
 
 feels, also, that when lie sees a young man with only 
 one day at his command, and only one horse belonging 
 to him, — and with the proper sort of spirit within that 
 young man's hunting gear, — he envies that young 
 man as he never has envied any other human being on 
 the earth. 
 
 We will now return to the plural number, and to 
 propriety of expression. We have stated above what 
 will be the average expenditure of a large stable. The 
 man who wishes to begin with one horse, may divide 
 the sum we have named by seven, and will find that he 
 will have the amount for which he ought to carry on 
 his amusement. He will, of course, keep his horse at 
 a livery stable, and it will cost him about £120 per 
 annum, including the fees to the groom, some little 
 expenses for travelling, and the price of his boots and 
 breeches. There will also come out of that sum, if he 
 is careful, the necessary percentage on the original 
 cost of his horse. For that expenditure he may have 
 from twenty to twenty- four days' hunting in the year. 
 If I say that he may, without additional cost, ensure 
 good health and good societj^, learn good manners, and 
 see Englishmen at their best, we who are interested in 
 this book of British Sports and Pastimes may perhaps 
 be thought to entertain exaggerated ideas of the 
 benefit of hunting. 
 
98 BKTTISn SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 In our previous observations about hunting, we did not 
 get beyond a simple explanation of the nationality of 
 the sport and a statement of the cost of following it. 
 We now propose to describe, if it may be within our 
 power to do so, what it is that the hunting man enjoys, 
 and how that enjoyment may be best secured. And 
 we will endeavour to give to the tyro in hunting a few 
 ideas as to what he should do, how he should conduct 
 himself, and in what way he should endeavour to make 
 himself happy in the hunting-field. We will add to 
 this some few observations as to the difficulties which 
 are ordinarily encountered in the management of a 
 country, as we are taught by experience to think that 
 those difficulties are very much underrated by many 
 gentlemen who, when they are at a meet, think it to 
 be all in the course of nature that a country well pro- 
 vided with foxes and fit to be ridden over should be 
 open to them and to their horses. 
 
 That there is much to be enjoyed in hunting can 
 hardly be doubted by any of our readers. Who knows 
 the man or woman who has hunted and who does not 
 wish to continue it ? — or any young man who does not 
 hunt, and does not wish that he did? And yet it 
 would be difficult enough, even for the sportsman who 
 has been at it for half a centuiy, who has thought of 
 
HUNTING. 99 
 
 it, dreamed of it, and talked of it, who has longed for it 
 in summer, and steadily practised it in winter, — it 
 would be difficult enough even for such a one to realise 
 to himself what it is that he enjoys. In most of the 
 amusements to which men are prone, there is a certain 
 standard of success by which superiority in achieve- 
 ment can be measured ; — in so many head of game 
 brought down by him who shoots ; in so many fish, or so 
 many pounds of fish, captured by the man who fishes ; 
 in the score at billiards or at cricket ; in the points 
 won at whist ; and above all, in the events on the Turf. 
 In each of these a man can reckon up his doings, can 
 count his triumphs, and can tell himself, by the result 
 of his calculations, whether to him the game is worth 
 the candle. There can be no such reckoning up in 
 hunting. The old-fashioned taking of the brush, which 
 was once regarded as the winning of the Derby of the 
 day, is altogether exploded. The huntsman takes the 
 brush, and when a gentleman brings it home in his 
 pocket, it is because he has, with the Master's permis- 
 sion, obtained it, not without a consideration, from 
 that popular functionary. It will be known of any 
 man who is seen frequently with the same pack, 
 whether he rides well or ill to hounds, — and no doubt 
 the public voice will give a pre-eminence to this man 
 or to that of which the hero will be fully aware. But 
 there is no scoring of runs in hunting, no counting up 
 of achievements ; — and it is not the foremost rider who 
 is the best sportsman, except on those rare occasions on 
 
100 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 whicli to ride foremost requires endurance of man and 
 beast, as well as skill, patience, courage, and good 
 fortune. It unfortunately happens that he who rides 
 foremost in most runs is generally where he ought not 
 to be. It is hardly too much to say that the Master of 
 hounds is usually anathematising in spirit the fore- 
 most rider, and that he not unfrequently feels himself 
 called upon to translate his spirit into words. In fact, 
 the customary foremost rider, the man who flashes on 
 the moment the hounds re- settle to their scent, is a 
 pest. Though there be triumphs in hunting, those 
 triumphs can hardly be weighed and measured, and 
 should ever be treasured deep in the silent bosom, — 
 without a word, without a sign, on the part of him who 
 has earned them, to show that he knows that they are 
 his. The successful cricketer may boast of his score. 
 The fisherman may say how many pounds he has 
 caught. But the hunting man should never talk of 
 his own prowess. He may ride as jealous as he 
 pleases ; but his speech of himself should be yea, yea, 
 and nay, nay. It is not in recounted triumphs that the 
 pleasure of hunting consists. 
 
 But before we attempt to say what this pleasure is, 
 we will venture to express an opinion as to what it is not. 
 And this we will do, because we think that there is 
 still abroad among some folk, — mothers whose sons 
 may perhaps come to hunt, and fathers who have mar- 
 riageable daughters, — an erroneous idea that hunting 
 is fast, in the slang sense of the word, and that it co- 
 
HUNTING. 101 
 
 exists naturally with drinking, swearing, gambling, 
 bad society, naughty women, and roaring lions. 
 Among this class of persons, it would naturally be 
 supposed that the man who hunted on Saturday and 
 Monday would certainly not be seen in church on the 
 Sunday. This, we venture to assert, is a mistake in 
 the minds of those who, from the circumstances of 
 their life, know nothing of the hunting- field ; and it 
 has been in a great measure produced by the false and 
 flashy descriptions given of hunting by those who have 
 taken upon themselves to portray our country sports. 
 We took up the other day a volume of a modern sport- 
 ing magazine, and found, bound up with it as a frontis- 
 piece, a picture of sundry men in top-boots, sitting or 
 lying round a dinner-table, — and all of them ap- 
 parently drunk. This picture of a drunken revel was 
 intended to be characteristic of a hunting man's de- 
 lights. The books, too, that we have had about hunt- 
 ing have too frequently described to us a set of loud 
 ignorant men, who are always hallooing "Yoicks," 
 and who are generally exercising the keenest of their 
 intellects in cheating each other out of a ten-pound 
 note in some matter of horseflesh. "We remonstrate 
 most loudly against this representation of the hunting- 
 field, and declare that we know no place of common 
 resort for amusement, in which a father may go in 
 company with his son, with a fuller assurance that 
 there will be nothing which he and his son may not 
 see and hear and do together. There is a strong feel- 
 
102 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 ing against a clergyman wlio hunts, whicli we tKink is 
 grounded on tlie same mistaken idea. That neither a 
 clergyman should hunt, nor any other man who cannot 
 do so without appropriating time or money which 
 should be given to other things, is clear enough. 
 But, putting that aside, we cannot see how any amuse- 
 ment can be more congenial to, or better adapted for, 
 a gentleman, the nature of whose occupation requires 
 that he shall live in a rural district. There are those 
 who think that a clergyman should never amuse himself 
 in any way, and they are of course only consistent in 
 debarring a vicar from hunting. They would debar 
 him also from reading a novel, or from playing cro- 
 quet. Our experience, having taught us to believe 
 that clergymen require distraction as much as other 
 men, has induced us also to think that no recrea- 
 tion can be better suited to them than that of the 
 hunting-field. The difficulty consists in this, — that 
 till the prejudice has been conquered, the prejudice 
 itself does the injury which the hunting will not do. 
 The same remarks, mutatis mutandis, apply to the 
 hunting of ladies. The company both of the clergy- 
 man and of the lady improves the hunting field, and 
 we cannot perceive that either ladies or clergymen are 
 injured by what they find there. Our present object, 
 however, is to protest that the roaring-lion element of 
 the hunting-field does not ordinarily belong to it. It 
 did so once, no doubt. But the roaring- lion elements of 
 society were more common then than they are now in 
 
HUNTING. 103 
 
 many phases of life. They who commence hunting in 
 anticipation of the joys to be found in the roaring-lion 
 elements will find that they are mistaken. 
 
 The young man who proposes to himself to take to 
 hunting as one of the amusements of his life, should be 
 on his guard not to expect too much from it. He will 
 get air and exercise, and a daily modicum of excite- 
 ment. He will find society, and will generally be able 
 to choose for himself good society, if he prefer it. He 
 will see the country in many of its most charming 
 aspects, and will gradually, but unconsciously, discover 
 the secrets and the manners of rural life in England. 
 He will learn how farmers look, and what they do, and 
 will become acquainted with the speech, and gait, and 
 customs of the men. For, as it should always be 
 remembered, the best half of hunting is in the social 
 intercourse which it gives. Though the young sports- 
 man be a liver in cities, he will find that he is a liver 
 also in the country, — that that great page of life is open 
 to him, and that he wiU come to a knowledge of rural 
 things and men, which he could learn in no other 
 fashion. But he will not ordinarily be riding at the 
 rate of twenty miles an hour, — nor yet at the rate of 
 ten. He will not be doing those wonderful things 
 which men are made to do in hunting plates. He 
 will find himself neither encountering certain death by 
 being chucked over his horse's head down a precipice 
 half as high as the Monument; nor will he make 
 himself immortal by jumping rivers nearly as broad 
 
104 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 as Oxford Street. Let tlie tyro at once understand 
 tliat the modicum of excitement is considerably less 
 tlian that which the sporting pictures may have led 
 him to expect. 
 
 And here perhaps it may be as well to say a word or 
 two about the dangers of hunting. That men do get 
 falls is certain. Occasionally, — though very rarely, as 
 will be apparent to any one making a calculation as to 
 the percentage of such accidents on the number of men 
 who hunt, — but occasionally a man breaks a collar- 
 bone, or a rib or two, or even an arm or a leg. ISTow 
 and again we hear of some fatal accident from which a 
 man has died. We doubt whether there is any active 
 amusement to which English men and women are 
 attached, of which the same thing may not be said ; — 
 unless, perhaps, it be croquet, — as to which we have 
 never yet seen a statement of the percentage of broken 
 ankles ; but the accidents of the hunting-field, as they 
 occur among a multitude, and with results which are 
 manifest and immediate, become at once known, 
 whereas others of a different nature pass without our 
 notice. If a comparative statement could be furnished, 
 showing the number of girls who perish in a year from 
 the ill effects of over-exercise in a ball-room, and also 
 of the men who are killed in the hunting-field, we do 
 not doubt on which side would be the greater mortality. 
 Every summer men and boys are drowned when 
 bathing. Every winter that brings us ice brings us 
 also similar accidents from skating. Men suffer fatally 
 
HUNTING. 105 
 
 from rowing, — as Mr. Skey has been at such, pains to 
 tell us. They blow themselves to pieces when shooting. 
 They perish among the Alps. They are wrecked when 
 yachting. They shoot one another at rifle practice. 
 They become apoplectic over a whist table. And why 
 not ? It seems to us that at present there is a spirits 
 abroad which is desirous of maintaining the manly 
 excitement of enterprise in which some peril is to be 
 encountered, but which demands at the same time that 
 this should be done without smj risk of injurious 
 consequences. Let us have the excitement and plea- 
 sure of danger, but, for Grod's sake, no danger itself ! 
 This, at any rate, is unreasonable. A man's life is 
 dear to himself, and dearer to his friends ; but it is not 
 so dear but that it may be advantageously risked for 
 the sake of certain results. The amount of the risk 
 must of course be made matter of inquiry by those 
 who are too thoughtful to follow this or that pursuit 
 because others follow it. We believe that in England, 
 Ireland, and Scotland we possess above two hundred 
 established packs of hounds ; — that each pack hunts on 
 an average three days a week, and continues to do so 
 through twenty-five weeks of the year; and that an 
 average of eighty horsemen are out with each pack on 
 each occasion. We think that this will show that one 
 million two hundred thousand is the number of times 
 that a man and horse in the course of the year go out 
 together on this perilous adventure. If we say that a 
 bone is broken annually in each hunt, and a man killed 
 
 H 
 
106 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 once in two years in all the hunts together, we think 
 that we exceed the average. Our friends from this 
 may find the amount of the risk they will run. For 
 ourselves, we must confess that the incidents of a 
 sedentary life strike us as being more dangerous. 
 % We have ventured to tell our young friend not to 
 expect too much. The runs of which he has read, 
 and which took the gallant men who rode them 
 twenty miles from point to point in something under 
 two hours, will not come in his way. Eight miles an 
 hour is a good average hunting pace. In a prolonged 
 run, four miles in twenty minutes, without a check, 
 is a fast burst, and will require a good man and a good 
 horse to keep with hounds in a country that is fenced. 
 A run continued through two hours with no more of a 
 check than may come from casting right and left and 
 then on, will tire any horse that is fairly weighted, if 
 as much as sixteen miles of ground, or if, as is much 
 more likely, fourteen or a dozen miles, have been 
 covered from point to point. But no hunting man 
 should count his pleasure by distance. Time and pace 
 should be his standards. The time he can measure for 
 himself. Pace he cannot measure accurately without 
 measuring distance also ; — but he will soon learn to 
 know whether his horse is or is not required to move 
 quickly. The cream of fox-hunting certainly consists 
 in a quick run from a small covert. It shoidd be 
 straight, over a grass country strongly fenced, with a 
 scent that shall enable the hounds to work on without 
 
HUNTING. 107 
 
 assistance from the huntsman, in which the fox shall 
 seek protection in no large wood, and which shall be 
 brought to a finish by ** a kill " in the open before the 
 horses are tired, and with no necessity for cold-hunting 
 at the close. From forty-five minutes to an hour is 
 quite as much as is needed in time for the best run 
 that can be ridden ; and the forty- five minutes is 
 generally much better than the hour. 
 
 "We will now endeavour to explain the points of 
 merit which we have named. The small covert is best, 
 — as regards the individual run, — because the fox must 
 break from it without being half- beaten by the hounds 
 before he consents to leave its protection. And it is best 
 again because the man who really means to ride will 
 rarely fail of being able to get away from it with the 
 hounds. From a large wood no horseman can be sure of 
 a good start unless he rides through and through with 
 the hounds as they hunt their fox within it. When he 
 has done this it will not only be the fox that is half- 
 beaten before the game begins. And the run should be 
 straight. We fear we must acknowledge that this love 
 for a straight line, which is the passion implanted 
 more strongly than any other in the bosom of the 
 hard-riding fox-hunter, does not find its spring in 
 neighbourly love or in general philanthropy. Looking 
 on the sport as an outsider, one might be inclined to 
 say that a fox running in a circle would be of all foxes 
 the most convenient. The riders would then generally 
 be brought nearer to their homes, the difficulties would 
 
108 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 be lessened by the curves, and they wbo did not begin 
 with a good prospect would find things mending with 
 them at every turn. But then, my friend, things 
 Avould mend not only with you, but with others also. 
 And it may be that with you things will require no 
 mending. You are away, at the side of the pack, with 
 all done for you that Fortune and a quick look-out 
 could do. Let the hounds go as straight as they will, 
 they cannot rob you of your place. But a check, a 
 curve to the right or to the left, any recreant touch of 
 fear in the quarry's bosom tempting him to seek his 
 old haunts, will in two brace of minutes bring down 
 upon you the ruck of your dear friends which you have 
 already had the extreme pleasure of leaving behind 
 your back. To shake your friends oflP and get away 
 from them, will soon come to be your keenest delight 
 in hunting. To be there, in the proper place alongside 
 of the hounds, is very sweet ; but to know that others 
 are not there is sweeter. To find that the beloved one 
 of your heart has gradually fallen away from you and 
 dropped behind, impeded probably by the depth of the 
 ploughed land, or in difficulties with a distorted ditch, 
 or still measuring with his eyes some brook which you 
 have cleared, perhaps because you could not hold your 
 own horse ; — this is delightful. To feel this is to feel 
 the true joy of riding to hounds. But all this is lost 
 if that recreant vermin should lose his heart and 
 resolve to return to his own country. If any haid 
 riding man were to tell us that he disregarded the 
 
HUNTING. 109 
 
 straight running of a fox, we should think him the 
 most philanthropical of men, — if we believed him. 
 
 And the run should be over a grass country, strongly 
 fenced. As to the advantages of grass it will be 
 unnecessary to say much. For all hunting purposes 
 it is naturally better than ploughed land. Scent will 
 lie on grass easily, when the upturned soil cannot hold 
 it for a moment. And horses can live on grass and 
 go gaily, who would die away from fatigue if called 
 on to gallop over a ploughed field. Why the strong 
 fences should also be desirable, it may be more difficult 
 to explain. Every hunting man who knows what he 
 is about, will avoid a jump whenever he can. A man 
 who goes over a gate which can be opened does not 
 know what he is about. But yet hunting without 
 leaping w^ould be very dull work ; — and although each 
 fence as it comes in the way is recognised as an enemy, 
 as a thing which for the moment is detestable, yet, 
 when it has been passed successfully, it becomes " a 
 thing of beauty and a joy for ever." And then again, 
 that leaving behind of your friends, which soon be- 
 comes the strong passion of the hunting man's heart, 
 is much assisted by strong impediments, — provided 
 always that the impediments be not too strong for 
 yourself also. 
 
 We have asked, too, for a strong scent, — a scent so 
 strong that the huntsman should not be called upon to 
 help his hounds. Our reader will understand that we 
 are now speaking of the delights of riding to hounds 
 
110 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 rather tlian of those of seeing hounds hunt. It Is our 
 opinion that in a fast run, such as that of which we 
 are speaking, few men observe the hunting of the 
 hounds, let the hounds be ever so near to them. The 
 rider is conscious of the contiguity which is so de- 
 sirable in his eyes, and finds that he has enough to do 
 to keep his place. And the hounds stream on, as 
 though they were running to a view. There is no 
 effort at hunting on their part, and the real work of 
 maintaining the exact track of the fox is probably done 
 by two or three of the leading dogs. A colder scent and 
 slower work will no doubt display more of the hunting 
 capacity of the pack ; — and to an experienced sports- 
 man the ingenuity of a huntsman's casting as he helps 
 his pack will be an additional pleasure. In Squire 
 Western's time this probably was the great delight of 
 hunting. But now the sporting world has reached 
 something, if not better in hunting, at any rate very 
 different ; and we have ventured to write these remarks 
 with the understanding that of all virtues on the 
 hunting-field the virtue of pace is to be first con- 
 sidered, and to be regarded as the most desirable. 
 
 We have asked that there shall come no large wood 
 in the way of our beloved victim. A fox that has 
 already shown us his mettle by running straight and 
 freely, will often pass through even a large covert 
 without hanging in it. Even if he tries an earth and 
 finds it stopped, he goes on again for some still distant 
 bourne with which he is acquainted. But neverthe- 
 
HUNTING. Ill 
 
 less, the wood is a great impediment to tlie rider, and 
 creates doubts in his mind which for the moment turn 
 all his pleasure to a pain. He has many things to 
 resolve in his mind. Which way does the wind 
 blow ? — for the fox will probably turn from the covert 
 down the wind. And shall he ride the wood? — or 
 shall he leave it to his right ? — or shall he leave it to 
 his left ? He should know its size, its shape, and all 
 its bearings, before he can answer these questions with 
 any certainty of judgment. Once more, he must call 
 on Fortune to assist him ; and if the jade be false to 
 him he may find even now, when he has done so much, 
 that he has done nothing. 
 
 And then we have demanded " a kill " in the open, 
 before the horses are tired, and with no necessity for 
 cold-hunting at the close. The reader must under- 
 stand that to kill his fox is the grand object of the 
 Master ; it is the grand object also of the huntsman, 
 of his assistants, and of the hounds. Unless this be 
 done with fair average frequency, the hounds will 
 become useless, the farmers discontented, the old 
 women furious, and hunting would, in fact, be imprac- 
 ticable. The hunted fox should, if possible, be killed. 
 No scarcity of game should stand in the way of this 
 law ; and there should be no protection other than 
 that conferred on all females who, when condemned to 
 death, can show that their position is one of peculiar 
 interest. The vixen heavy with cub should be spared, 
 — and none others. But the ^'kill in the open/' for 
 
112 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 those who have lived and kept their place through the 
 heat and turmoil of the chase, is a worthy reward of 
 all their efforts. They see it, and none others do 
 see it. They are saved from that poignant sense 
 of deep injustice which fills the mind of the riding 
 man with indignation when the tail of the hunt comes 
 up to some covert in which the poor animal is being 
 slowly pressed to his death, and every man there is 
 equal with his fellow ! He who has been in the lanes 
 for the last half-hour is to be seen bustling round the 
 covert, full of animation, as if he knew all about it ! 
 And he will come and discourse with you on the run, 
 treating you perhaps as an equal, or, by the mass, 
 perhaps as his inferior ! He will tell you of what he 
 has seen, give you his remarks on the " goodness of the 
 thing," and nearly choke you with your own suppressed 
 wrath ; — for you will not choose to remind him that 
 the run was really over six minutes before he came 
 upon the scene. A "kill in the open" generally saves 
 the successful men of the day from this misery. We 
 have known a man, — nay, we do know a man, — great 
 enough to be able to swear that he was there, — one 
 out of five or six of whom each one knows all the 
 others well, — while at the moment he was two miles 
 off, trotting along with the old gentlemen and the 
 young ladies ; who will do so from day to day, till he 
 really produces a semblance of belief in the minds 
 of the uninitiated ! But such a hero as that is not to 
 be found in every hunt. 
 
HUNTIXG. 113 
 
 Such is the cream of hunting ; but he who desires 
 to know what pleasure hunting will really give him, 
 should not expect delights such as these very fre- 
 quently. There may be three or four such runs in a 
 season ; the man who hunts twice a week -maj have 
 the chance of seeing two of them ; and he will be a 
 lucky man if, out of those two, he can live through 
 one to the end. It is a joy that he will remember 
 through all his days, — to which his memory will cling 
 with a constancy which it will evince for but few 
 other events of his life. But it is not to be thought, 
 because such runs as these are few and far between, 
 that therefore hunting in general is vapid and unsatis- 
 factory. Men will grumble and growl ; and they who 
 come out oftenest will grumble and growl the most. 
 We ventured in our former remarks to say of such 
 men that they have an aptitude for getting out of bed 
 on the wrong side. But there they are in spite of 
 their grumbling, — and it is to be presumed that they 
 would not come unless they were pleased. It is very 
 joyous to gallop about a wood ; — more joyous when 
 the gallop is out of the wood. As we have said 
 before, the society is much. And though that jealousy 
 of riding of which we have spoken, and which, 
 whether it be bad or good, is ineradicable from the 
 hunting-field, — though that feeling does exist and 
 have strong sway, one does not always wish to be 
 cutting down one's neighbour, and leaving one's friend 
 in a ditch. There is, moreover, the real working of 
 
114 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 the hounds to he observed, which, as we have 
 attempted to explain above, the sportsman can hardly 
 watch, can hardly indeed see, when a whole pack is 
 streaming along, in one continuous line, racing with 
 each other as he is racing with that man on the other 
 side of him. 
 
 That there are some miseries in hunting, is true 
 enough. A blank day, — that is, a day without any 
 fox at all, — is an unpleasant incident. It does not 
 often happen in a well-managed country, but such 
 things are known. One is apt to think, when so great 
 a catastrophe has occurred, with something of regret 
 of the five pound which is being expended so igno- 
 miniously, and of all that might have been done with 
 it. There is a shame attached to the utter failure as 
 one drags oneself miserably from covert to covert in 
 the gloom of the coming evening, which is distressing 
 enough. And men become sombre, silent, and cross. 
 They snarl and snap, and don't offer each other cigars. 
 And the Master himself becomes a picture of misery 
 that would melt a heart of stone. We know no more 
 degrading position than that of a Master of hounds 
 when he is driven to own that the day is blank. We 
 believe that there have been Masters who, in thinly 
 populated countries, have gone about provided with an 
 animal in a bag, so that at last this absolute ignominy 
 may seem to be avoided. And we have known of 
 certain drains and holes, not many miles from the 
 kennel, from which foxes would be bolted at three 
 
HUNTING. 115 
 
 o'clock with a precision wliicli certainly looked like 
 foreknowledge. But, in truth, a blank is so terrible a 
 misfortune that almost anything done to avoid it may 
 be pardoned. We ourselves have often thought that 
 a good drag home in the evening would on such 
 occasions be very exhilarating to the spirits. And 
 the weather is a frequent source of trouble. A hard 
 lasting frost may be endured with equanimity. It is 
 one of those misfortunes to which humanity is subject, 
 but which, though very onerous, are of such certain 
 occurrence, that humanity learns to endure them with 
 patience. And then there is no tormenting doubt with 
 a hard frost. The hunting man runs up to town, or 
 puts his things in order about his house and farm, and 
 consoles himself with thinking that his horses wanted 
 rest. But those mornings which we may best describe 
 as being on the balance, touch-and-go mornings, in 
 Avhich the sportsman does not know whether he will 
 be wiser to go to the meet, or wiser to stay at home, 
 are very bad. If he be energetic he goes, and meets 
 five other energetic men, equally wretched with 
 himself, and a servant from the Master, who tells him 
 that the ground about the kennel is so hard that three 
 men with a pickaxe can't touch it. If he be slack in 
 his tendencies he lays in bed, and hears, the next time 
 he is out, that at one o'clock the hounds went beauti- 
 fully, and that they had on that day " the run of the 
 season." And there are other sorrows of a heavy 
 kind coming from the weather. A high wind is very 
 
116 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 injurious to hunting, and makes riding to hounds 
 almost impossible, A storm at niglit will cause tlie 
 foxes to be stopped in their holes, — for a fox is much 
 opposed to going abroad in bad weather. And bright 
 sunshine is bad for scent. And hard rain is very 
 uncomfortable. And muggy warm weather is not 
 serviceable. The old song which proclaims the glories 
 of a southerly wind and a cloudy sky was composed 
 by some one who knew but little of hunting. It must 
 be confessed that in hunting the weather is apt to be 
 troublesome. 
 
 And there is the misery, fast increasing in these 
 days, which comes from the too great number of men 
 who hunt. With a field exceedingly numerous it is 
 difficult to get a fox to break. It is the nature of the 
 animal to be more afraid of men than he is even of 
 hounds, and he will prefer to return to the covert, 
 which is full of his canine enemies, to threading his 
 way among horsemen. It becomes, therefore, incum- 
 bent on the field to leave as much space as possible 
 clear round the covert, so that the fox may have room 
 to start. The men should cluster together in one 
 spot, and with a small number such clustering is to 
 be managed. But when there are out from 200 to 
 300 horsemen, it is almost impossible to save a covert 
 from being surrounded. Then there is apt to be an 
 unhappy spirit abroad, and ill-natured things are 
 spoken. The Master threatens to take the hounds 
 home, energetic young men ride about beseeching and 
 
HUNTING. 117 
 
 praying ; — and at last the fox is ignominiously hunted 
 to death within his own domain. 
 
 There are miseries in hunting, we admit, — attri- 
 butable no doubt originally to Adam's fall and the 
 imperfect nature of men. 
 
 We have undertaken to give some hints to the tyro 
 in hunting, and in the e£Ports which we are about to 
 make towards doing so we trust that our experienced 
 readers will understand that we are not venturing to 
 offer counsel to them. There is no matter in which 
 men are more prone to think that their experience is 
 better than that of others than they are in the matter 
 of hunting. But the young man who only intends to 
 hunt, will forgive us if we offer to him a few hints as 
 the results of a long apprenticeship. Perhaps the first 
 question to be touched is that of the distance to be 
 overcome in getting to the meet. And here of course 
 considerations of expense will present themselves. We 
 do not ourselves love the rail either for our horses or 
 for our own persons ; but when the distance is very 
 long it must be used. The objection in our mind is 
 not in the morning, — but in the evening. It is a 
 great nuisance to have to catch a train ; — and almost 
 a greater nuisance to wait for one. We do not think 
 that horses in general suffer from such travelling, if 
 they be properly clothed. Horse- sheets should always 
 be brought as a matter of strictest necessity. It will 
 occasionally become expedient to send horses back by 
 train when the need to do so has not been expected, 
 
118 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and no provision has been made. In such an 
 emergency clothing should be bought, begged, or 
 borrowed. There is another mode of obtaining it, 
 open to some objection ; but there are those who think 
 even that preferable to sending a horse naked into a 
 horse-box after a day's work. For shorter distances 
 young men ride to meet, and older men go on wheels. 
 We are now among the older men ; but we used to 
 delight in a fast hack, — thinking the sharp morning 
 trot to be one of the delights of the day. Our rule 
 in life has been to send horses on over night when the 
 distance to the meet exceeds fifteen miles, and to let 
 them go on the same morning for any lesser amount 
 of travelling. Horses should travel to meet at about 
 five miles an hour ; and a hunting man can generally 
 take his own horse as well as a groom can do so, if he 
 have patience for the slow pace. He must also have 
 the greater patience necessary for bringing him home ; 
 — but, in truth, the bringing of your horse home must 
 usually be your o^vtl work. You may keep your hack 
 out every day you hunt, and yet miss to use him two 
 times out of three. If your distance home be usually 
 very great it will be comparatively easy for you to find 
 your supplementary conveyance; — as experience and 
 a map will prove. In returning home it should be 
 remembered that the horse loses as well as gains by a 
 very slow pace. It is a great object to you that he 
 should be in his stable and get his food as early as 
 possible. You have probably brought your sandwiches 
 
HUNTING. 119 
 
 and sherry with. you. He has not. And yet, from 
 his nature, he requires more frequent feeding than you 
 do. Always get gruel for your horse on the first 
 opportunity after the hunting is done. And if your 
 horse have to stand in a stable waiting for a train, 
 throw him a handful of corn, — a handful, and then 
 another. He will eat that when he will not touch a 
 fuU feed. 
 
 Always go to the meet ; — to the meet and not to the 
 covert, to be first drawn. It may be known to you 
 that you may save a mile or two, and perhaps half an 
 hour in the morning, by sloping away to some wood- 
 side. But the meet is announced for the convenience 
 of the hunt in general, and you cannot go to the covert 
 without doing an injury. Such tricks cause men to be 
 hated, — justly; and you should remember that a 
 Master has it always in his power to set your know- 
 ledge at defiance. He may change his mind as to the 
 priority of that covert, — and will be very apt to do so 
 if he finds that men act selfishly towards him. 
 
 There is great doubt in the minds of hunting men as 
 to what is best to be done when an ordinary covert is 
 being drawn. When the hounds are put into a small 
 gorse of seven or eight acres, or into twenty acres of 
 wood, there need be no doubt ; — you should stand 
 where others stand, and if you keep your eyes open 
 and your ears, there is little doubt but that you will 
 get away quite as near to the hounds as is desirable. 
 The difiiculty applies to large coverts, — to woods, as 
 
120 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 to wliicli it is open to you either to ride to the hounds 
 as they are looking for their game and hunting it 
 when found, or otherwise to remain stationary, saving 
 your horse till you have learned that the fox is away. 
 If you be a heavy man, with one horse, the waiting 
 will certainly be your wisest decision. The question, 
 however, will probably be decided by your tempera- 
 ment. It is not every man who can wait. And there 
 is infinite difficulty as to the spot at which you should 
 station yourself There is a theory that foxes break 
 down wind, — so as to run the way the wind is blowing. 
 They thus decrease the power of the hound to catch 
 the rising scent ; and their instinct probably tells them 
 that this is so. But the theory, we think, is not to be 
 trusted. We have found that foxes break with equal 
 good- will either up or down wind. After awhile, the 
 instinct of which we have spoken is brought to bear, 
 and the fox running uj) wind will turn and run 
 down wind. He will find that his pursuers have an 
 advantage from the wind, and will change his point. 
 At one 23eriod of the year, — in the first weeks of 
 February, — a dog-fox, found away from his own 
 ground, will run home, let the wind blow which way it 
 will. If, at last, you elect to be stationary, you can 
 only stand where others stand who know what they 
 are about better than you do. Move as they move, 
 and learn to hunt with your ears. It is a great thing 
 to know which way the hounds are moving in covert 
 from the notes of the huntsman's horn and the tones of 
 
HUNTING. 121 
 
 his voice, — a great thing to know which way hounds 
 are running from the tones of their voices. But this 
 has to come of experience. For awhile the novice 
 must go as others lead him, and must put his trust in 
 others who have that knowledge which he lacks. Let 
 him be careful not to trust in those who lack it them- 
 selves. There are men who have been hunting all 
 their lives, and yet cannot get out of a field without 
 some one to show them the way. 
 
 It is quite true that very much depends on getting 
 away well with hounds, — that, indeed, as regards the 
 best runs which are seen, all depends upon it. It 
 occurs not unfrequently, — more often perhaps than 
 not, — that hounds will check and throw up their noses 
 and be at fault within the first half-mile out of covert, 
 and that time will thus be given to those who have 
 been unfortunate at first. But this arises from in^ 
 different scent, and it will follow as a natural though 
 not inevitable consequence, that the pace will be 
 moderate throughout, and that no violence of perform- 
 ance will be needed on the part of the horsemen. The 
 sport may be very good, but you, my tyro, whom I am 
 specially addressing, will have no opportunity of dis- 
 tinguishing yourself. But we will suppose a morning 
 on which the scent lies, the fox breaks gallantly and 
 strongly, and the hounds come out after him with a 
 burst, giving him almost no start of them at all. A 
 fox hardly wants a start, for he can always beat the 
 hounds for awhile. A fresh fox will get away from a 
 
122 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 pack of hounds tliougli lie be in tlie very midst of 
 them. On such an occasion as this it is everything to 
 get well away ; and that can only be secured by great 
 watchfulness of eye and ear, and by constant attention 
 to the thing that you are doing. It will seem to you 
 to be the merest chance in the world ; and yet, if you 
 will observe a set of men hunting together for a season, 
 you will find some six or seven who almost invariably 
 are successful in getting away. These are the men 
 who really think of the business in hand, and who in 
 truth like to ride to hounds. 
 
 On this occasion you shall be among those who are 
 fortunate. You shall have seen the fox break. Re- 
 member always that in this interesting moment it is 
 your first duty to restrain yourself. Hold your tongue 
 — and your horse. Some hallooing will be necessary, 
 but there will be those there who know when and how 
 to halloo. A cheer uttered too soon will bring the 
 quarry back again. You will esteem us vain and futile 
 if we tell you, now, in cold blood, not to ride on hard 
 before the hounds ; but when the time comes you will 
 find yourself so tempted to do so that there are ten 
 chances to one that you will be a sinner. You will 
 torget the hounds in your excitement ; and there will 
 be veteran sinners, — cunning men, anxious to steal a 
 march, who will lead you astray. You will sin 
 certainly ; but, when you have sinned, repent, and try 
 to sin no more. But in the second field, having re- 
 ceived some slightly sarcastic word of rebuke from the 
 
HUNTING. 123 
 
 Imntsman wliicli you will take in good part, you will 
 find yourself in your proper place behind the hounds, 
 — and it will be well that you should be half a field on 
 one side of them. Strive that they shall never be out 
 of one field before you are into it. Do that, and you 
 will be near enough. Fail to do so, and you cannot 
 see them hunt. JSTo man can do this always. The 
 irregularity of the land, the difficulty of fences, and 
 the uncertain running of the fox prevent it; but it 
 should be your object in your riding to go as near to 
 this as may be possible. In the doing it or the not 
 doing it lies all the difference between riding to 
 hounds and riding to men. Kiding to men is a very 
 pretty amusement, and many who hunt all their lives 
 never get beyond it. You will soon perceive that not 
 one man in ten of those who are out ever see the work 
 of the hounds when they are running fast. But you 
 will perceive also from the conversation of men that it 
 is considered desirable to see the hounds hunt. My 
 heroic friend of whom I have spoken will know every 
 corner of a field in which the hounds " threw up," — 
 or, at least, he will know that there are but few able 
 to contradict his assertion. 
 
 But you will soon find, — you, a neophyte, — that in 
 the bustle and the hurry of the run, you have no time 
 or mind left for anything but to sit on your horse, 
 look after your fences, and take what care you can that 
 that special man with a red coat and black boots and 
 little bay horse does not get more ahead of you than 
 
124 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 you can help. You will soon find arising in your 
 heart a most unchristian hatred for that man; — and 
 yet he will be of the greatest service to you. You will 
 follow him over one fence after another ; and should 
 he fall, or the little hay horse be beaten in a heavy 
 plough, or should he cease to be before your eyes from 
 any cause that you will not understand, you will per- 
 ceive that you have lost your guide. But you will 
 still go on. You will have forgotten in your excite- 
 ment all the lessons taught to you, as to seeing your 
 way over the second fence from each field in whitsh you 
 are riding, as to watching the foremost hounds, as to 
 going slow at timber and fast at water, as to a judicious 
 trot on the plough, and the rest of it. For pace you 
 will trust to your spurs ; for management of the fences 
 you will trust to your horse; for the course to be 
 taken you will still follow some other guide whom you 
 will unconsciously have chosen. And you will find 
 yourself wishing that the gallant fox was not quite so 
 gallant, and that he would succumb to the ardour of 
 the hounds. It is not till the run is done and over 
 that you will know how sweet and how glorious it 
 was. 
 
 We are told that the great happiness of life is to 
 have lived well and to have done with it. There is in 
 the idea of this theory the necessity of a standing 
 ground outside the world which looms to us cold and 
 uncertain. But there is no doubt about the joy of 
 having ridden well to hounds. To have done the 
 
HUNTING. 125 
 
 thing well and tlien to say never a word about it, 
 requires a certain conjunction of physical and mental 
 attributes which almost ennobles a man. In speaking 
 of the run which you have ridden well, the first 
 personal pronoun should never be brought into use. 
 No temptation should elicit from you an assertion 
 that you have been nearer to hounds than others. 
 Jealous}^ in riding is unavoidable. We will not eve 
 say that it is not commendable. But a triumj^hant 
 rider is an odious man. And there is this also to be 
 paid of such a one ; — that he who sins in boasting, 
 will be presumed also to sin in lying. 
 
 Many other hints as to riding might be given to the 
 beginner, were it not that we should become tedious by 
 the overlength of our lesson. He will hear much of 
 going straight ; and we ourselves have said something of 
 the charm of a straight- running fox. But that term of 
 riding straight must be taken with many grains of 
 salt. 'No man can ride really straight, or should 
 attempt it. Open gates are preferable to high fences, 
 even though some slight loss of ground should occur. 
 Gaps are better than posts and rails. In some 
 countries it is essential to know something of the 
 nature of the landing on to which you are to jump. 
 Heads should be used where the hunting of the hounds 
 can be seen from them ; — and are used very frequently 
 when the hunting of the hounds cannot be seen at all. 
 Crushing and rushing, bustling and hustling, cannot 
 be avoided by energetic men whose bosoms are filled 
 
126 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 by an uncontrollable anxiety to be among the first ; 
 but they should be avoided as much as possible as 
 acknowledged sins. Such a mode of riding is in bad 
 taste ; and the sinner who sins and knows that he will 
 sin again, should at least be aware that he is a sinner, 
 and not glory in his defects. To abuse no one, and to 
 take abuse easily, — if it be not of a nature beyond 
 bearing, — should be the resolve of every young hunt- 
 ing man ; and we may almost say of every elder also. 
 What though a man should cross you at a fence ? — 
 what though he knock you over into a ditch ? — what 
 though he ride over you, which certainly is disagree- 
 able ? It is of the nature of the sport that it should be 
 rough ; and in all collisions each man thinks that the 
 other is in fault. And faults of this nature in the 
 hunting-field are so unavoidable, so unintentional, so 
 certainly the result either of accident or of ignorance, 
 that there is rarely room for anger. But there are 
 many who cannot restrain themselves from sharp words. 
 Such sharp words mean nothing, and are not worthy 
 of a retort. This, however, may be a place proper for 
 warning all young riders not to take their fences too 
 near to those whom they are following. Of all 
 dangers in the hunting-field the worst is that which 
 comes from this offence. 'No man should allow his 
 horse to follow another at a fence, till his leader is 
 altogether clear from the impediment. 
 
 And now in our last lines we will say a word or two 
 about the difficulties of the hunting-field, in order that 
 
HUNTING. 127 
 
 they who liave gone along with us so far may know 
 that difficulties do exist, and that some allowance 
 should be made for them. We shall not here speak of 
 questions of expense, having attended to that subject 
 in our former chapter. Although hunting is as free to 
 men nearly as the air that they breathe, they will find 
 in most countries a class of farmers and landowners 
 who object to have horses on their land. They will 
 soon hear it asserted that these objectors are detestable 
 fellows, — and that their objections are frivolous, if not 
 wicked. A friend told us the other day that a man 
 who was determined not to have foxes about his place 
 must be a low Kadical. There are men even in 
 England, who do not care for hunting; and it will 
 seem as reasonable to them to declare that a man 
 who wishes to keep his drawing-room to himself 
 must be a stupid Tory. Foxes about hen-roosts are 
 not advantageous ; nor do they assist in the preserva- 
 tion of pheasants. A couple of hundred of horsemen 
 about a park, or even about a farm, do not make things 
 look prettier than they were. Certain crops, such as 
 beans and clover, are certainly injured by hunting ; 
 and no one can suppose that fences or gates are pre- 
 served by the manner in which the sport is conducted. 
 A hunting man has no more legal right to trespass 
 than another, though practice enables him to do so 
 without risk of penalty to himself. All this should 
 be remembered by those who are anxious for the pre- 
 servation of foxes, and especially by those who do not 
 
128 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 themselves furnisli land to be ridden over, or coverts to 
 be drawn. Some indulgence should be shown to the 
 feelings of non-hunting men. If this be not done, it 
 may be possible that the objections of the non- 
 hunting men may become stronger than the custom 
 in favour of hunting which still prevails. 
 
 And we think that many sportsmen are strongly 
 disposed to expect that more shall be done for them by 
 the Master, and his servants, and by the hunting 
 capacities of the country, than is in truth practicable. 
 We believe that good runs, and certainly that fast 
 runs, are more frequent now than ever they have been 
 since hunting became a sport in England. There is no 
 means of testing accurately the truth of this opinion, 
 and it is one very opposite to the complaints which 
 generally meet our ears in the hunting-field. Men 
 will be frequently heard to declare that hunting now is 
 not what it used to be, — that foxes are scarce, — that 
 they won't run, — that they never go straight, — and 
 that the sport has become so bad, that it is hardly 
 worth a man's while to go out to seek it. This, per- 
 haps, is simply human nature, and is no worse than is 
 said of all amusements and all occupations. Farmers 
 are always being ruined. Trade is always dull. No- 
 body is ever thriving according to his own account. 
 Nothing is so bad as the theatres. Dinner parties are 
 so dull that it is a folly to go to them. Young men 
 are detestable ; and young ladies are so fast, furious, 
 and forward, that they have to be avoided like fire- 
 
HUNTING. 129 
 
 brands. As everything at tlae present clay is bad, 
 why should not hunting be bad also ? But not the 
 less do men come out hunting. Arguing in this way, 
 we might pass over the comjDlaints made, were it not 
 that they are effective in driving Masters and hunts- 
 men to attempting more than can actually be done. 
 A huntsman will often find himself driven to lift his 
 hounds almost for miles, to guess the run of a fox, 
 and even to make runs when he has no fox before him, 
 — because so much is demanded from him. If runs 
 manufactured after that fashion will suffice, so be 
 it. We can manufacture them with a drag, so 
 long as the farmers will allow us to ride over their 
 lands on those terms. But if we do this, we shall lose 
 the sport of fox-hunting. Our advice, therefore, to all 
 sportsmen is this; — that they should not expect too 
 much for their day, — and that they should not get 
 out of bed on the wrong side. 
 
ON SHOOTING. 
 
 The clay wliicli introduces these pages to the reader's 
 eye will also drop the curtain upon the English shooting 
 season of 1867 — 68. From the second day of February 
 until the twelfth day of the following August, the 
 feathered game of these islands will regain and enjoy 
 unconscious immunity from those deadly missiles, 
 which the breech-loaders of Purday and his multi- 
 tudinous professional brethren drive with such accuracy 
 and force through the spangled plumage of grouse, 
 pheasant, and partridge. It seems, therefore, no 
 inappropriate moment to canvass the effects produced 
 by the almost universal abandonment among British 
 sportsmen of guns loaded at the muzzle, and the 
 adoption in their stead of guns loaded at the breech. 
 This substitution of weapons has been, as our sporting 
 readers are well aware, a slow and gradual jDrocess. 
 Great and now acknowledged a» is the superiority of the 
 breech-loader over the muzzle-loader, it was found to 
 be no easy matter to induce middle-aged and elderly 
 sportsmen among us to abandon in a moment the 
 
SHOOTING. 131 
 
 detonating or percussion system with whicli the fame 
 of Osbaldeston, Captain Ross, George Anson, Lord 
 Hunting-field, and many other celebrated marksmen, 
 both dead and living, is inseparably identified. No 
 sudden disclosure of the inferiority of their weapon 
 flashed conviction upon the minds of British sportsmen, 
 and taught them, as the battle of Sadowa taught 
 soldiers all over the world, that percussion-caps and 
 muzzle-loaders were no less a thing of the past than 
 flint and steel, or bows and arrows. But even if the 
 merits of the breech-loader had been far more con- 
 spicuously manifest and incontrovertible than they are, 
 nothing is more illustrative of the characteristic 
 conservatism of our own upper classes than the tenacity 
 with which they cling to the ancestral fashion of field- 
 sports and country amusements which has been 
 handed down to them from their grandsires. iN^othing 
 can now seem more improbable to us than that the 
 percussion gun should have had any difficulty in up- 
 rooting and displacing the flint gun. And yet it 
 would be easy to prove, from publications which 
 appeared from forty -five to fifty years ago, that many 
 of the best gunmakers and crack shots of that day 
 continued for years to maintain the superiority of the 
 flint gun over the detonator, and that Colonel Hawker, 
 the most successful and authoritative writer upon guns 
 and shooting that Great Britain has hitherto produced, 
 seems to have retained a sneaking preference for flint 
 and steel up to his dying day. 
 
132 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 In connection with our investigation of the efiects 
 upon the diversified interests of shooting which are 
 likely to result from the introduction of the breech- 
 loader, we propose briefly to review the general condi- 
 tion and prospects of this popular English pastime. 
 The pursuit and destruction of wild animals, whether 
 feathered and biped, or furry and quadruped, has been 
 in fashion among mankind from the earliest recorded 
 times. But it has been reserved for Englishmen, since 
 the introduction of fire-arms, to apply to a pursuit, 
 which by every other nation, ancient and modern, has 
 always been described under the generic name of 
 '' hunting," the narrower and more specific title of 
 *' Shooting.'' When Nimrod is described in the Book 
 of Genesis as " a mighty hunter before the Lord," it is 
 not to be presumed that he was in the habit of mount- 
 ing his horse and careering across the hills and valleys 
 of the land of Canaan in pursuit of deer, or wild boar, 
 or any other quadruped. What may have been the 
 game, and what the snares, or traps, or pitfalls, or 
 projectiles by which its destruction was compassed in 
 Asia some 2,200 years before the birth of our Lord, we 
 must leave to Dr. William Smith, or to some scriptural 
 *' Old Shekarry," to investigate and determine. Again, 
 when Xenophon enters into an elaborate description of 
 hunting as it existed in his day, we must dismiss from 
 our minds, as we read him, all recollection of the 
 restricted signification which the word bears in these 
 islands and among ourselves. The elevation of fox- 
 
SHOOTING. 133 
 
 hunting among us into a favourite and, as some 
 maintain, into our most characteristic national pastime, 
 has deprived English shooters of the right to call 
 themselves hunters. For, when an Englishman an- 
 nounces that he is going out hunting, the words convey 
 no other notion than that he is about to mount his 
 horse and to repair to a meet of some fox -hounds which 
 is to be held in his vicinity. But let an American, in 
 Iowa, or Wisconsin, or Minnesota, announce that he 
 is going out hunting, and the first question addressed 
 to him will be whether he intends to pursue bear or 
 deer, prairie-chicken or wild-fowl. 
 
 It has always appeared to us that this divorce 
 between hunting and shooting has been very pre- 
 judicial to the true interests of the latter pursuit. 
 jNTo one can deny that the pride which manly and 
 genuine sportsmen feel in their shooting achievements 
 is enhanced in proportion as the game pursued is 
 assimilated in its nature to the class of animals de- 
 scribed by lawyers as feroe naturao. The unlaborious 
 pheasants are dependent for their existence upon artifi- 
 cial supplies of daily food, and the more they are made 
 to approximate to the habits and nature of barn- yard 
 fowls, the more rapidly will all pride and satisfaction 
 in the numbers slaughtered be felt to diminish. The 
 pheasant is, after all, an exotic or foreigner imported 
 from China or Asia Minor to England by a factitious 
 outlay of money, of which stiU more must be expended 
 to keep him alive. Without carrying our prejudices 
 
134 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 against pheasant-sliooting to a fanciful extent, it must, 
 we think, be conceded tliat tliorougli sportsmen take, 
 for the most part, greater pride and pleasure in shoot- 
 ing partridges or grouse than in shooting pheasants. 
 For, although upon a well-preserved manor or moor 
 the partridges and grouse are accustomed to have grain, 
 or damaged raisins, or some other kind of food served 
 out to them periodically by the keeper's hand, there is 
 in both these birds an inherent wildness which is inde- 
 structible, and forbids their domestication or reduction 
 to such a state of tameness as is commonly found to 
 exist among pheasants reared at Holkham, or Bradgate, 
 or in other well-stocked English coverts. No one who 
 has watched an experienced gamekeeper advancing into 
 a covert of which he has long been the custodian, and 
 spreading the shocks of grain along the ground for his 
 pheasants to eat, can hope to jDcrsuade himself much 
 longer that the bright-plumed Chinese or Asiatic fowl 
 upon which he is about to exercise his skill as a marks- 
 man differs materially in nature from the Shanghai roost- 
 ers which he has left behind him in the neighbouring 
 farmyard. But let a stranger stand near to the spot 
 on which partridges or grouse are habitually fed, and 
 he will have occasion to observe that the natural shy- 
 ness of the bird will forbid his feeding or drawing near 
 to the ground upon which the encroacher stands. 
 
 That which has always been regarded as the great 
 charm of shooting in the eyes of Mr. Daniel, the author 
 of " Rural Sports," and of other old-fashioned sports- 
 
SHOOTING. 135 
 
 men of his date and class, has been its approximation 
 to hunting in this latter word's widest sense — that is 
 to say, to the pursuit of wild birds and quadrupeds 
 with a view to their destruction. It is imj)ossible to 
 read Mr. Daniel's pleasant volumes, or Colonel Hawker's 
 *' Instructions to Young Sportsmen," without discern- 
 ino- the attractions which sea-coast wild- fowl shooting- 
 possessed for both above all other kinds of sport. It 
 may be safely asserted that no boy with any taste for 
 field-sports ever saw Colonel Hawker's well-known 
 picture, entitled " Commencement of a Cripple- Chase, 
 after firing Two Pounds of Shot into a Skein of Brent 
 Goose, and Two Wild Swans," without retaining a 
 lively recollection of it until his dying hour. So 
 natural is the taste for wild and adventurous shooting, 
 which is innate in every man who is worthy of the 
 name of man, and which it takes a long course of luxury, 
 and of battue- shooting, and of hot luncheons among 
 the brown fern, to finally eradicate ! But there is no 
 class of sportsmen in whom contempt and distaste for 
 English battue-shooting are more sure to be found 
 than in those who have tasted the delights of the wild 
 shooting which Hindostan, and Asia Minor, and ^orth 
 America, and many other regions of the world, furnish 
 in abundance. It is difiicult for any one who has long 
 been dependent upon his gun or rifle in a wild country 
 for his daily supply of food, to understand what pleasure 
 or satisfaction there can be in entering a covert plenti- 
 fully stocked with birds and animals, all of them more 
 
136 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 or less tame, and in shooting down we know not how 
 many hundred head of hares, pheasants, and rabbits, 
 within three or four hours. " We have always looked 
 upon these exhibitions with pain, and we conceive 
 them to be totally opposed in principle to the real spirit 
 of English sports. We never could comprehend a 
 man's feelings in killing a quantity of game under 
 such circumstances. Sport it certainly is not.'* These 
 are the words of as genuine a sportsman as ever pulled 
 trigger. Unfashionable as it may be to promulgate 
 one word in deprecation of the taste for battue-shooting 
 now growing up among young Englishmen of rank, 
 we must confess that we never read the account of a 
 wonderful day's shooting in Lord Stamford's, or any 
 other nobleman's coverts, without regarding such 
 records with pain and aversion. The creative and 
 sustaining principle of genuine sport is to be found in 
 the laborious uncertainty of rambling for hours over 
 forest and moorland without knowing what wild bird 
 or animal may rise or spring up before us. A wood- 
 cock or snipe, three or four brace of partridges or 
 pheasants, half a dozen hares or rabbits, a couple of 
 teal or wild-duck, picked up in a wild walk of this 
 kind, outweigh, in our estimation, the value of a 
 hundred pheasants or hares massacred in a battue. 
 It is singular to observe how outrageously the French, 
 when plagiarising, as is now their wont, our English 
 pastimes, parody the worst features of their adopted 
 sport. We have never read such a burlesque of an 
 
SHOOTING. 137 
 
 English battue as tlie account of the day's shooting 
 given in JSTovember, 1867, by the Emperor Napoleon to 
 the Emperor of Austria in the woods of Compiegne 
 and Pierrefond. At eleven o'clock nineteen shooters 
 arrived at the scene of action in a series of char-a-banc. 
 The Austrians were dressed in violet velvet, with pre- 
 cious stones for buttons. The nineteen shooters were 
 divided into two parties, — the Emperor's party con- 
 sisting of ten, and the other party of nine individuals. 
 The beaters and loaders amounted in number to two 
 hundred and fifty. The Emperor of Austria was armed 
 with ten muzzle-loaders, which were loaded by six 
 keepers, who came expressly from Yienna for the 
 purpose. The Emperor I^apoleon shot, as usual, with 
 muzzle-loaders. Shooting commenced at easy eleven, 
 and left off at sharp four. Within this time a total of 
 3,829 head were massacred, whereof 600 head fell 
 before the Emperor of Austria's, and 402 head before 
 the Emperor Napoleon's, guns. Out of the sum total 
 killed, 1,978 were pheasants. Allowing time for lunch 
 and other refreshments, it will be seen that in every 
 sixty seconds rather more than fifteen head of game 
 must have fallen. Shades of Daniel and Hawker ! 
 What would ye have said, when in the flesh, to such a 
 day's shooting as this ! 
 
 It is believed, however, by some, that inasmuch as it 
 is absurd to call pheasants " ferae naturae," and inas- 
 much as they have to be watched, fed, and prevented 
 from straying at a heavy cost of money, some justifica- 
 
 K 
 
138 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tion of the maintenance of the severe Game Laws which 
 still exist among us is herein to be found. The current 
 of that which professes to be the most advanced and 
 enlightened public opinion of the day sets strongly at 
 present against the Game .Laws, as being the most 
 objectionable surviving remembrancers of feudal insti- 
 tutions which are still to be found in the midst of us. 
 We shall not here attempt to argue out so vexed and 
 wide-reaching a question as the advisability of retaining 
 or modifying our existing Game Laws. Happily it is 
 now generally conceded by the owners of land that 
 rabbits are vermin, nor would there be much resistance 
 among country gentlemen if a law similar to that 
 which has recently been passed in France, and which 
 declares them to be vermin, were to be promulgated in 
 England. No one can pretend that the most scientific 
 and expensive style of farming, such, for instance, as 
 that which prevails in the Carse of Gowrie, is com- 
 patible with the existence of rabbits viewed as game, and 
 subject only to be destroyed at the option or caprice of 
 the landlord and his keepers. Nor can it be denied 
 that if a landlord insists upon having a very large 
 show of hares, he must consent to allow to the farmers, 
 upon whose crops they feed, some concession or com- 
 pensation in the form of reduction of rent, or of right 
 to shoot or course. But as regards the Game Laws 
 which protect flying game, there is not much to be 
 said against them ; nor do we think that poachers 
 would, in the main, be gainers if Game Laws were 
 
SHOOTING. 139 
 
 abolished, and if it were enacted that to steal a phea- 
 sant or partridge was precisely the same offence as to 
 steal a chicken or turkey. A more serious objection 
 to the strict preservation of game than any that arises 
 from the maintenance and enforcement of the Game 
 Laws in their present form seems to us to crop up in 
 the frequent occurrence of severe combats or affrays 
 between gamekeepers and poachers, attended, as they 
 too frequently are, by fatal results. The recent murder 
 of Lord Wharncliffe's head-keeper, and the recollection 
 of many similar disasters which have occurred within 
 the memory of every middle-aged man, cannot fail to 
 produce a sobering effect upon all thoughtful and con- 
 scientious proprietors of strictly-preserved estates, and 
 to force upon their consideration the inconvenient 
 question whether they are justified in foro conscientiae 
 in purchasing the presence of large numbers of hares 
 and pheasants in their woods and fields at so costly a 
 price. There is, of course, much to be said in favour 
 of the preservation of game on the score of the general 
 immunity and protection from robbers and burglars 
 which night- watchers on an estate secure for its farm- 
 houses and tenements. Nevertheless, the responsibility 
 of jeopardising men's lives, or of damaging their health 
 by privation of sleep, with a view to selfish indulgence 
 in what is, after all, but a pastime, is great enough to 
 induce many a landowner, who is devotedly attached 
 to field-sports and a proficient with his gun, to forego 
 the satisfaction of having his coverts overflowing with 
 
140 ERITTSH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 game, preserved at such an outlay of money, and it may 
 be of blood. 
 
 But without further moralising upon the ethics of 
 game preserving, let us proceed to examine what are 
 likely to be the effects produced upon the general 
 interests of shooting in consequence of the introduction 
 of the breech-loader. We have little hesitation in 
 recording our opinion that its substitution for the 
 muzzle-loader will, in the end, produce no less radical 
 a revolution in the history of this widety- spread pastime 
 than was caused half a century ago by the discovery 
 and introduction of the percussion system. Few more 
 striking and pregnant instances of British adherence to 
 tradition can be found than was manifested, between 
 the years 1815 and 1830, by the reluctance of soldiers 
 to accept any other weapon than the flint-lock musket, 
 which had won Albuera and Salamanca, Toulouse and 
 Waterloo. None of our historical soldiers were more 
 ready in most cases to declare themselves swift and 
 peremptory reformers than the family of the Napiers. 
 And yet we find Sir Charles James JSTapier, the con- 
 queror of Scinde, emphatically protesting, in or about 
 the year 1818, against the introduction of a percussion 
 musket, which, as he insisted, would induce soldiers 
 armed with it to fire too rapidly, and to throw 
 away half their shots. We fancy that we have heard 
 some such language uttered too, with more show of 
 reason, in regard to the recent armament of our infantry 
 with breech-loaders. 
 
SHOOTING. 141 
 
 Less indisposition, however, to accept a weapon 
 which was evidently destined to be the fire-arm of 
 the future, was exhibited between 1815 and 1825 by 
 British sportsmen than by British soldiers. It will 
 be remembered that we owe the discovery of the per- 
 cussion j^i'inciple of igniting gunpowder in muskets 
 by means of detonating powder to the ingenuity of 
 a clergyman. This is not, par parenthese, the only 
 improvement in the science of destruction for which 
 we are indebted to gentlemen of the same coloured 
 cloth. So long ago as 1807 the Rev. Mr. Forsyth 
 took out the first patent for a percussion musket, nor 
 is it possible even for the least imaginative of men to 
 notice this date without indulging in a passing day- 
 dream upon the possible efiects which Mr. Forsyth's 
 discovery might have produced if it had been utilised, 
 during the eight years which followed its publication, 
 by the army of the Duke of Wellington. Nothing, 
 however, was more natural than that this nation, 
 locked, as it was, in a life-and-death grapple with 
 Napoleon, should have had little time or inclination 
 for the investigation of inventions. It was reserved 
 for sportsmen to introduce detonating guns, to the 
 favourable notice of the public, and between 1820 and 
 1830 their use became general. It was in 1822 that 
 Colonel Hawker, while claiming for himself credit as 
 the adapter of the copper cap, instituted a comparison 
 between a duck-gun with detonating lock, and another 
 with flint-lock, and demonstrated to his own satisfaction 
 
142 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTHVIES. 
 
 the superiority of the latter. Nevertheless, at that 
 very moment, all the successful young shots of England 
 were revelling in the rapidity of ignition, and the 
 certainty of explosion, which were the characteristics 
 of the detonator in contradistinction to the flint-lock 
 small- arm. But it is amusing to observe that the 
 slowness of motion, and the disposition to regard all 
 improvement as innovation, which we are accustomed 
 to consider the peculiarities of "the departments" in 
 our own day, were no less markedly discernible in the 
 War Ofiice which had recently conducted England in 
 safety through the greatest struggle she has ever 
 known, and in the mind of the most distinguished 
 soldier whom our country has produced. It is worthy 
 of record that such were the suspicion and distrust 
 with which the authorities viewed the new percussion 
 musket, that it was issued in the first instance only 
 to one company in every regiment. It was not until 
 the efficiency of the weapon was fully established by 
 the decisive victories gained with it on the Sutlej and 
 in the Punjab, that all departmental hostility to it 
 evaporated and passed away. Its introduction into the 
 French ^rmy did not take place until the year 1840. 
 
 The most noticeable feature in connection with the 
 substitution of the detonator for the flint lock appears, 
 at first, to have been that the shooting of many men 
 who had been all their lives very indifierent performers 
 with the ancient weapon became sensibly improved 
 when they used the modern. Colonel Hawker found 
 
SHOOTING. 143 
 
 it necessary to alter his instructions for young sports- 
 men, and to advise them to shoot three, instead of six, 
 inches ahead of a bird flying rapidly across them at 
 30 yards' distance. But it is curious to remark that 
 the "bags," or returns of game killed, do not appear 
 to have been greatly augmented by the superiority of 
 the new weapon. There is no estate in England which, 
 as regards the fecundity, accuracy, and antiquity of 
 its annals and anecdotes of shooting, can compare 
 with Holkham. It would appear that the bags secured 
 by Mr. Coke and his friends at the end of the last 
 century did not differ materially from those reported 
 immediately after the introduction of the percussion 
 gun. Thus we read that in October, 1797, Mr. Coke, 
 shooting, of course, with a flint gun, upon his manor 
 at Warham, and within a mile's circumference, bagged 
 forty brace of birds in eight hours out of ninety-three 
 shots, killing every bird singly. Again, in January, 
 1803, Mr. Coke, Sir John Shelley, and Mr. Thomas 
 Sheridan went over to Houghton, and, traversing the 
 very ground of which the shooting has lately been 
 rented by the Prince of Wales, killed in one day 
 14 brace of hares, 16 couple of rabbits, 24 brace of 
 pheasants, 13 brace of partridges, and 16 couple 
 of woodcocks. No doubt the Prince of Wales and 
 his associates have made larger bags than this on the 
 same ground during the late season ; but it has often 
 been noticed, with surprise, that the percussion gun 
 was not signalised on its introduction by the largely- 
 
144 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 increased size of the bags which might have been 
 expected. It is a matter for speculation whether this 
 is to be accounted for by believing that men who had 
 long been familiar with the flint gun did not at first 
 understand how to make the most of their new weapon, 
 or whether it arose from greater scarcity of game at 
 the beginning of this century. 
 
 Explain it as we may, no more certain evidence of 
 this fact can be adduced than is furnished by the record 
 of the now forgotten, but at one time much- celebrated 
 shooting-match which took place between Colonel 
 Anson and Captain Eoss in November, 1828, at the 
 shooting-quarters which Lord de Eoos then rented at 
 Mildenhall, in Sufiblk. It cannot fail to have been 
 remarked by sporting antiquarians that the shooting- 
 matches which were so much in vogue thirty or forty 
 years ago, and in which the prowess of two rival 
 marksmen was tested at the expense of partridges or 
 pigeons, have in modern times become as obsolete and 
 unfashionable as races over the Beacon Course at 
 Newmarket, or as pugilistic encounters in a 24- foot 
 ring. Be this as it may, there is, perhaps, no similar 
 match that ever excited so much interest, or of which 
 the fame has lived for so many years, as the great 
 " Ross and Anson match " to which we have just 
 alluded. We are indebted for the following account 
 of it to a description which emanated from the pen 
 of Captain Ross himself. He relates that in July, 
 1828, he was returning from the Red House at 
 
SHOOTING. 145 
 
 Battersea, in company with Colonel Anson and Lord 
 de Roos. They had been shooting at pigeons, and 
 Lord de Roos, after remarking that no one had a 
 chance against Captain Eoss at pigeons, inquired 
 whether he had equal confidence in his power of 
 shooting game or partridges. Upon receiving an 
 affirmative reply, Lord de Roos proposed that Captain 
 Ross should present himself at Mildenhall upon the 
 first day of the following November, prepared to shoot 
 partridges against any man Lord de Roos produced. 
 It was agreed that the two rivals were to start at 
 sunrise by the watch, and to shoot until sunset without 
 any halt ; that no dogs were to be used, but that they 
 were to walk about 40 or 50 yards apart, with two or 
 three men between, or on one side of them ; that it 
 was not necessary that any birds should be picked up, 
 but that if a bird was seen by the umpire to drop, it 
 should be considered sufficient. The bet was £200 
 a side, but to this amount both antagonists added 
 considerably before the event came ofi*. The rest shall 
 be told in Captain Ross's own words : — 
 
 "We all breakfasted at Mildenhall by candlelight, 
 and were in line ready to start at the correct moment 
 when by the watch the sun had risen ; for we could 
 see no sun^ the country being enveloped in mist. 
 Colonel Anson was a particularly fast and strong 
 walker, and seemed to fancy he was able to outwalk 
 me. I was not sorry to see him go ofi" ' at score,' as 
 I knew that I was in the highest possible training. 
 
146 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and that I was able to keep the pace up without halting 
 for fifteen or sixteen hours. Everything was conducted 
 with the greatest fairness. We changed order every 
 hour, and as Colonel Anson was able to hold on at the 
 same pace, we were fighting against each other as 
 fairly as two men could. 
 
 " The Colonel had luck on his side, as the birds rose 
 more. favourably for him than for me, and in the course 
 of the match he got eleven more shots than I did ; 
 the consequence being that at one time he was seven 
 birds ahead of me. About two o'clock, however, I 
 saw evident signs that he had pretty nearly pumped 
 himself out. The old Squire rode up to me and said, 
 * E-oss, go along ! he'll lie down directly, and die,' 
 fancying that he was viewing a beaten fox. I was 
 thus able to go right away from the Colonel ; and as 
 the birds were so wild, in consequence of the crowd 
 and noise, that few shots were got nearer than 50 or 
 60 yards, I gradually made up my lee way. 
 
 "A quarter of an hour before the expiration of the 
 time when the watch would indicate sunset, Mr. Charles 
 Greville and Colonel Russell rode up to me, and said 
 that Colonel Anson could walk no more ; but that he 
 was one bird ahead of me, and Lord de Boos had 
 authorised them to propose to me to make it a drawn 
 match. I had a great deal of money, about £1,000, 
 depending on the result, and had not had a shot for 
 the last ten minutes ; so, after a moment's considera- 
 tion, I came to the conclusion that at that late hour, 
 
SHOOTING. 147 
 
 when the birds were all out of the turnips and feeding 
 on the stubble, it was too large a sum to risk on the 
 chance of getting a brace of birds in a quarter of an 
 hour. I therefore agreed to make it a drawn match. 
 I was as fresh as when I started, and offered to start 
 then and there, and go on foot to London against any- 
 one present, for £500. The number of birds killed by 
 each was absurdly small — only, I think, twenty-five 
 or twenty- six brace. We dined at Mildenhall, and 
 were capitally entertained by Lord de Roos, who had 
 the best of French cooks and the best of French wines.'' 
 Some time after these words were written. Captain 
 Ross added to them thus : — " Alas ! alas ! when I look 
 back to that evening ! Every one then assembled in 
 the dining-room at Mildenhall, with the exception of 
 myself, is now in his grave ; and our polished and 
 accomplished host died a disgraced man ! " 
 
 This chronicle of a memorable match, although not 
 without interest even after the lapse of well-nigh forty 
 years, is chiefly serviceable on the present occasion as 
 illustrating the smallness of the bag which two of the 
 best shots in England were able to make in 1828 with 
 the newly-introduced percussion gun. Undoubtedly, 
 the facility of loading was not nearly so great between 
 1820 and 1830 as it became subsequently, between 
 1840 and 1850. Another lesson which this and all 
 similar matches serve to teach is, the impossibility of 
 fairly testing the comparative skill with the gun of any 
 two men by subjecting them to a single trial of 
 
148 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 strengtli. Even the best sliots are subject, as Hawker 
 remarks, to great inequality in their shooting ; and, in 
 addition, the accident of good or bad luck as to the lie 
 of the birds, will never fail to incline the scale one way 
 or the other, if the two antagonists are as to skill 
 nearly on a level with each other. Fashion, however 
 much it may have deteriorated upon other points, has 
 shown itself discriminating and sagacious in discarding 
 such shooting-matches in the middle of the nineteenth 
 century as were in vogue and popular at its commence- 
 ment. 'No one was fonder of these matches in his 
 youth than the late Mr. Osbaldeston ; and, it must be 
 added, that few men ever submitted to defeat, which, 
 indeed, was seldom his portion, with so bad a grace. 
 It cannot be doubted that a disposition to get up 
 matches for money between friends, and to promote 
 competition by stimulating men to ride or to shoot 
 against each other, is conducive to anything rather 
 than to good fellowship. For these reasons, we hail 
 with satisfaction the fact that such matches as, accord- 
 ing to the author of " Sportascrapiana," were con- 
 tinually being made between Colonel Anson, Lord 
 Kennedy, Messrs. Osbaldeston, Farquharson, Cruik- 
 shank, Budd, and many more, are now scarcely ever, 
 if ever, proposed. 
 
 It is, perhaps, as well that, in these days of breech- 
 loaders, shooting-matches should have gone out of 
 fashion ; for few indeed are the partridge manors in 
 England which could stand having many matches shot 
 
SHOOTING. 149 
 
 over them by crack young marksmen of tlie present 
 time, armed with this weapon. We heard it lately 
 remarked that there are not many coverts in England 
 of which Mr. Thomas De Grey, M.P. for West Norfolk, 
 would not make a clean sweep in three hours, if he 
 was turned loose in them, armed with his couple of 
 breech-loaders, and with directions to slay and to spare 
 not. It is too late in the day for us to enter now into 
 an elaborate demonstration of the vast superiority of 
 the breech-loading shot gun over its predecessor, for 
 this superiority is all but universally admitted and 
 confessed. The time has long gone by when it was 
 necessary for a sporting writer to take the course 
 adopted in 1857 by the " Old Shekarrj^," who, in 
 October of that year, advanced thirty reasons in the 
 Field newspaper for preferring breech-loaders to any 
 other weapon. The breech-loader now occupies the 
 field, in more senses than one, and reigns, like 
 Alexander, without a rival. The *' Old Shekarry's " 
 thirty reasons seem to us susceptible of considerable 
 condensation or compression. The chief advantages of 
 the breech-loader may be summed up in a few words : 
 — 1. It may be fired five times while a muzzle-loader 
 is fired once. 2. It is much safer, and the loader's 
 hand is never in jeopardy. 3. There is little or no 
 recoil. 4. It hits harder and shoots quicker than its 
 rival. 5. It can be reloaded noiselessly, and without 
 change of position, and without soiling the butt of the 
 gun. 6. The charge can be drawn in an instant, and 
 
150 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 snipe shot, or duck shot, or ball, can be inserted or 
 removed at will. 
 
 It is impossible to overrate the value of this last- 
 named advantage to men who, like the " Old Shekarry," 
 are accustomed to shoot in India, or Africa, or in 
 regions frequented by dangerous wild beasts. There 
 are few greater disadvantages to a good hunter when 
 on a trail, or when stalking a tickle quarry, than to 
 have two or three persons at his heels, carrying his 
 extra guns or rifles, and trebling or quadrupling the 
 noise which he makes in forcing his way through 
 brushwood. Moreover, the experienced hunter, when 
 in pursuit of " big game," such as lions or tigers, 
 greatly prefers to be dependent upon himself alone. 
 Many a sportsman's life has been endangered by his 
 gun-bearers bolting at a critical moment, and leaving 
 him, with both barrels discharged, in the immediate 
 proximity of a wounded and maddened animal. Lastly, 
 it is no slight advantage to a sportsman, tired out after 
 a hard day's fag, to have but one weapon to clean, 
 instead of having to set to work upon four or five 
 guns or rifles, and to perform a task w^hich no man 
 who has shot in Asia, Africa, or America, and who 
 values his own life, ever intrusts to any hand save his 
 own. Now, the possession of one good breech-loader, 
 which is an armoury in itself, sets the sportsman free 
 from all these disadvantages which we have enume- 
 rated. While shooting snipe in a jungle, he is not 
 disconcerted at finding himself in the neighbourhood of 
 
SHOOTING. 151 
 
 tiger, or bear, or elephant, for he can substitute a ball 
 for snipe-shot without an instant's delay, and without 
 taking his eye off his enemy. In fact, to sum up the 
 whole case in favour of the- breech-loader in the " Old 
 Shekarry's " emphatic words ; — " He who has once 
 used a breech-loading gun or rifle will no more think 
 of going back to a muzzle-loader than the crack 
 marksman at Ilythe would return to Brown Bess." 
 
 But admitting, as we do, the general superiority of 
 the breech-loader as a weapon framed for the destruc- 
 tion of game, it is impossible not to entertain grave 
 doubts as to the maintenance of the same abundance of 
 game in Great Britain which our predecessors luxu- 
 riated in during the second quarter of the present 
 century. The passion of the day is for heavy bags of 
 game shot in comparatively short spaces of time, — 
 say, in from three to four hours, — and with little heed 
 given by the shooters to the question whether the bird 
 which they destroy is a mangled heap of feathers when 
 it falls, or whether it is killed at a proper distance, and 
 in neat and sportsman-like style. By no class of men 
 will a more pregnant sermon be preached, as to the 
 visible effects of the breech-loader upon the birds 
 which it destroys, than by the poulterers of London. 
 Baily, and Fisher, and many of their professional 
 brethren, will tell you that out of the pheasants sent to 
 them, the proportion of birds fit to appear upon the 
 table is continually growing smaller. It was for some 
 time pretended by the champions of the muzzle-loader 
 
152 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 that it delivered its shot more closely and forcibly tlian 
 its rival. 'No one wlio examines the pheasants now 
 killed In a battue "will have any doubt as to the breech- 
 loader being the harder-hitting weapon of the two. 
 So thoroughly is this fact admitted by the London 
 poulterers, that they have invented a method of utilising 
 pheasants which are too hard hit to admit of being 
 roasted, by cutting off the mangled portions of the 
 breast, and making up the remaining portions into 
 minced meat for pheasant or game pies. But there Is 
 another fashion, also greatly on the increase In Eng- 
 land, which seems to us to bode little good to future 
 abundance of game, — the fashion, we mean, of driving 
 moors and manors, and of killing partridges and grouse 
 from behind a hedge or peat- stack, as they are driven 
 over your head. It Is notorious that there are many 
 estates In England, especially In the moorland districts 
 of Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Lancashire, Cumberland, and 
 Westmoreland, where, in former times, a moor, beaten 
 in the ordinary way, yielded at most twelve or fifteen 
 brace of grouse in a day, picked up by the laborious 
 exertions of two or three good shots, — and that not for 
 many days. But the same moor. If driven according 
 to the modern fashion, will now yield without difficulty, 
 to the same number of guns, 130 or 150 brace In a day. 
 As an Illustration of the truth of what we are saying, 
 we have but to Instance the Duke of Devonshire's 
 moors In the neighbourhood of Chatsworth. We have 
 all heard a great deal of the grouse disease in Scotland 
 
SHOOTING. 153 
 
 during the past year. Undoubtedly the inscrutable 
 epidemic which has been fatal to so many birds is, in 
 the main, accountable for their greatly diminished 
 numbers. But may it not fairly be asked whether 
 ten years of driving grouse, and of killing them 
 with breech-loaders, have not also something to 
 do with it, and whether a continuation of the same 
 practices for ten years more will not make itself felt in 
 a manner which will tell very disagreeably upon the 
 rent-roll of many Highland lairds ? 
 
 The breech-loader, like all other labour-saving ma- 
 chines, is unquestionably a valuable boon to humanity, 
 but it presupposes that the time which it saves in killing 
 game is to be made use of in higher and more profitable 
 occupations. It is a frequent remark of Americans, 
 when commenting upon the numerical strength of the 
 leisure classes in England, that in creating the universe, 
 God made no provision for men and women into whose 
 scheme of daily life no thought or necessity for labour 
 enters as an essential ingredient. If young and luxu- 
 rious gentlemen fancy that they can, by using the 
 breech-loader, kill as much in four hours as their fathers 
 and forefathers killed in three or four times that space, 
 and that they can also continue to shoot as many days 
 in the year, and as many hours in the day, as their 
 predecessors, it needs no prophet to announce to them 
 that they are reckoning without their host. The 
 destruction of game, perpetually indulged in as a 
 pastime, and with no reference to the value as articles 
 
 L 
 
154 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 of food possessed by the birds or animals killed, must 
 be pronounced by a severe moralist to be in tbe bigbest 
 degree reprehensible. And it is worthy of remark that 
 the increased facility for making large bags, conferred 
 upon the sportsman by the breech-loader, has subtracted 
 and withdrawn all general interest from the records of 
 such shooting feats as fifteen years ago were upon every 
 tongue. For years and years the present Lord Pan- 
 mure and Mr. Campbell of Monzie were quoted as the 
 only two men in Scotland who had ever killed a 
 hundred brace of grouse in one day. This feat they 
 accomplished with two or three muzzle-loading guns, 
 one of which was put into their hands after every shot, 
 freshly loaded. There were not wanting sportsmen, 
 however, who thought even this feat eclipsed by the 
 present Lord Wenlock, who, upon a moor in Perth- 
 shire, killed ninety-three brace of grouse with one 
 muzzle-loading gun, loaded throughout the day by his 
 own hand. But whatever interest once attached to 
 these achievements with the muzzle-loader, has now all 
 but faded away in connection with the breech-loader. 
 It is felt that the breech-loader is so much more rapid 
 and deadly a weapon, that few people now care to be 
 told whether Mr. De Grey or any one of his contem- 
 poraries have killed 150 or 200 brace of grouse with it 
 in a day. Let the rising generation of sportsmen take 
 good heed, in conclusion, lest in their anxiety to 
 astonish the world with magnificent " bags," they 
 succeed in estranging from a noble sport that degree 
 
SHOOTING. 155 
 
 of popular favour which has hitherto given immunity 
 to the Game Laws, and a forfeiture of which could not 
 prove otherwise than fatal in the end to its prosperity 
 and longevity. 
 
 Happily, in these days of easy locomotion, there are 
 abundant opportunities for wealthy and adventurous 
 young sportsmen to amuse themselves outre mer with 
 more stirring sport than the woods and fields of Eng- 
 land, the moorlands of Scotland, or the bogs of Ireland 
 supply. The wonders of the African continent, as a 
 field for ambitious marksmen, have been revealed to us 
 within the last twenty-five years by a succession of 
 mighty hunters. India continues to ofier to English- 
 men the same fecundity of sport for which her Ghauts 
 and Himalayas, her jungles and sunburnt wastes, her 
 nullahs and forests, have been perpetually celebrated. 
 But, should the sportsman desire to pursue every 
 variety of game upon a noble continent, rejoicing in a 
 summer climate which makes life in the open air one 
 continual feast, let him repair to the broad plains and 
 prairies or the majestic lakes and rivers of North 
 America, and take his fill of sport, with bear, bufialo, 
 panther, deer, and every variety of land and water-fowl 
 for the objects of his pursuit. We have often medi- 
 tated upon the exquisite deKght with which Colonel 
 Hawker would have launched his Hampshire canoe 
 upon the broad bosom of the Potomac river, and what 
 havoc he would have wrought among the wild swans 
 and brent-geese, and canvas-back ducks, and blue- 
 
156 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 wings, and all the hosts of wild-fowl with, whose cries 
 the whole surface of the stream is Yocal after nightfall. 
 What additions would he not here have made to what 
 he calls his " wild-fowl artillery ;" what novel instruc- 
 tions would not his ingenuity and experience have 
 suggested for approaching the wary and well-nigh 
 unapproachable wild swan ! " Those who have walked," 
 says Colonel Montague, " on a summer's evening, by 
 the sedgy sides of unfrequented rivers, must remember 
 a variety of notes from different water-fowl ; the loud 
 scream of the wild goose, the croaking of the mallard, 
 the whining of the lapwing, the tremulous neighings 
 of the jack-snipe, and the booming of the bittern." 
 
 If it had been the gallant colonel's fortune " to run 
 the blockade" by crossing the Potomac frequently on 
 dark nights during the recent American war, he would 
 have had ample opportunities of greatly enlarging 
 his list of river-birds and his description of their cries. 
 But whatever may be our passing apprehensions as to 
 the substitution in England of shooters for sportsmen, 
 and whatever our suspicions as to the incompatibility 
 of unrestrictedly-used breech-loaders with the mainte- 
 nance of an undiminished head of game, we have no 
 fears whatever about any diminution of the pluck, 
 energy, and accuracy of aim which have always dis- 
 tinguished British sportsmen in every part of the 
 globe. Britain will still, we doubt not, continue to 
 produce a never-failing supply of men like Gordon 
 Gumming and Sir Samuel Baker ; and if at any time a 
 
SHOOTING. 157 
 
 long course of hot luncheons under the hedge-side, or 
 of kid-gloved manipulation of the breech-loader, may 
 have sapped for a moment the manliness of one of our 
 young porphyrogeniti, it will take but a brief taste of 
 the delights of wild shooting in any land beyond sea to 
 send his blood once more coursing hotly through his 
 veins, and to vindicate his manhood, enterprise, and 
 endurance against all sneers and aspersions. 
 
ON rissmG. 
 
 A NUMBER of persons, aping Dr. Johnson, are prone to 
 sneer at our sport upon tlie waters, — '' a stick," quoth 
 they, " with a fly at one end and a fool at the other," — 
 and so the angler and his pastime are summarily dis- 
 missed by men who neither understand him nor his 
 vocation. Were enemies of angling less ignorant they 
 would be tolerant of the sport, for there is more in the 
 art of fishing than meets the eye of a superficial 
 observer ; indeed, the mere catching of a basket of fish, 
 — all the looker-on can see in the sport, — is perhaps 
 the smallest part of the gratification derived from a 
 day spent by the river- side, which an enthusiastic 
 fisher has said is a recreation that ought only to be 
 permitted to good men. As it is not given to every 
 man to be an angler, neither is it given to some other 
 men to be truthful interpreters of the pleasure and 
 instruction that may be derived from a sport which has 
 existed since the painted aborigines of early Britain 
 transfixed their fish with a bone spear. 
 
 Nothing that is very new can be said about the 
 method of angling. It is an old-fashioned art, and is 
 
FISHING. 159 
 
 still pursued after the mode tliat prevailed when Isaak 
 Walton wandered, rod in hand, in the flowery meads 
 that border the river Lea. Anglers, like poets, must 
 be born to their vocation. Many excellent books have 
 been written on the pastime, — about it, and in praise 
 of it, — but no book that has been written, from Walton 
 to Francis, will make an angler. Indeed the best 
 anglers are those who have learned to fish from neces- 
 sity. Yain man may encase his body in the regulation 
 suit of Tweeds, and expend much money on the uphol- 
 stery of the art, but he will never by so doing lure the 
 speckled trout from its watery home. All the books 
 he reads will not enable him to do that. The ragged 
 gipsy from his hill- side encampment, with an extem- 
 porised rod, to which may be fastened a bit of common 
 string, with perhaps a bent pin to hook the fish, will 
 do far more execution than a regiment of the guys who 
 pretend to be fishers, yet fail in their endeavours to 
 deceive the fish ; but then, angling to the gipsy is a 
 necessity of life, and at an early age he learns instinc- 
 tively where to find a trout, and how to get it into his 
 possession. As in shooting there are battues, where 
 the birds are frightened into flocks, and grounds where 
 the pheasants are preserved into the veriest tameness, 
 so in many places there are stretches of protected 
 water filled with fish, in order that certain people may 
 have an opportunity to become, for a brief time, mighty 
 fishers. But one fish, however small, ingeniously lured 
 from that water in which it had its natural home, is 
 
160 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 worth a basketful taken from a preserve where the 
 animals are only stored for capture. In France the 
 fishermen of Brittany sow their sea fishery grounds 
 with cod roes to attract the sardine to their nets, but in 
 Scotland the sailors can take sprats in millions without 
 a lure. Men sit in a punt on the Thames delighted if 
 after an hour or two's work they obtain a few dace or 
 gudgeon, the water having been previously strewed 
 with some kind of ground bait. That, of course, is no 
 more angling than a battue is sport. A salmon angler 
 ridicules such fishers in the same way that a highland 
 deer- stalker would ridicule '^ le sport" of an elaborately 
 got up Frenchman shooting the little birds that chirrup 
 in the Bois de Boulogne. 
 
 The true angler is a man of parts ; he hath virtues 
 which are either awanting in, or at any rate are not 
 cultivated by, other men ; he is endowed with the gifts 
 of patience, endurance, and observation ; he is slow to 
 anger, and full of resources ; he is generally a man 
 enjoying rude health, unselfish, careless of the pleasures 
 that delight other men, and anything but the fool 
 depicted by Dr. Johnson and his followers. Fish are 
 not easily caught by fools. We have a few extracts 
 about angling in our commonplace-book, redacted from 
 the utterances of men who have been great at luring 
 the fish from the water. One of these is to the efiect that 
 fishing is one of the most healthy recreations that can 
 be pursued. " The motion of the rod," says this writer, 
 " gives to the whole body, but especially to the muscles 
 
FISHING. 161 
 
 of the breast, much strength and power." We have a 
 suspicion that it is chiefly unsuccessful anglers, men 
 who have failed in the art, that abuse it, much in the 
 same way as men who fail to become great actors abuse 
 Macready. ''To be a successful salmon-fisher," we are 
 told by another disciple of Walton, " involves a large 
 amount of patience, perseverance, and strict attention 
 to minutiae. A deficiency in one point, though you 
 may be proficient in all other details, will cause a 
 nullity of the whole." Good anglers are keen critics of 
 details, and take a pleasure in attending personally to 
 all those little things that dandy fishers get done by 
 deputy. Your real fisher, too, has a soul above hunger ; 
 a crust of bread, a mouthful of cheese, and a dram, are 
 all he wants, and even this small refreshment is unwil- 
 lingly partaken of, if the fish be in a " taking" mood. 
 Never mind ; his fast converts the simplest fare into a 
 feast ; hunger afibrds him a fine salad, the temporary 
 rest given to the stomach is good for the constitution, 
 and the decided change of scene from pent city to open 
 country is a tonic that is worth travelling four or five 
 hundred miles to obtain : — 
 
 " Though sluggards deem it but an idle chase, 
 And marvel men should quit their easy chair 
 The toilsome way and long, long league to trace. 
 Oh ! there is sweetness in the mountain air. 
 And life that bloated ease can never hope to share." 
 
 The mighty angler, — the triton among the minnows, 
 — is undoubtedly he who tackles the salmon of the 
 
162 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 IS'orwegian fiords, or tlie man wlio can run down, now 
 and again, to the salmon rivers of Wales or Scotland ; 
 but as we cannot all be giants in the art, there must, 
 we fancy, be human beings to represent " Patience in 
 a punt, smiling at a perch." It is not the vocation of 
 every man to sweep the Tay or the Severn, and now and 
 again land a thirty-pound salmon. Great, very great 
 indeed, is the difference between the active waters that 
 flow amid the hills and dales of Scotland or Wales, and 
 the sluggish and muddy streams that slowly meander 
 through many of the flat meadows of England. They 
 necessitate difierent kinds of angling, and by parity of 
 reasoning difierent kinds of anglers ; the fish also being 
 difierent, taking to itself the impress of its peculiar food 
 and habitation. But it is not meet for a member of the 
 craft to sneer at his brethren, because they have not 
 the chance of distinguishing themselves amid the 
 mountains of the north or west. 
 
 There are no doubt many good anglers frequenting 
 the Thames, — men who ought not to be sneered at, — 
 and we know that traditions are handed down among 
 these fishers of mighty trout and other giant fishes 
 that have been captured in that famous river ; and 
 some day the sport may be renewed, — some day, when 
 the waters of the mighty stream are no longer polluted 
 by the sewage of the towns by which it fiows, — some 
 day, when the salmon courses up the silent highway, 
 and the artificially-bred trout and ombre chevalier 
 sport in the purified waters. Then we shall see the 
 
FISHING. 163 
 
 old stuffed trout and perch of the ^' Angler's Arms " 
 renewed, and have again, we sincerely hope, a race of 
 Waltons wandering the flowery meadows. We have 
 fished a bit of the Thames water, and have taken an 
 occasional pike, not to speak of abounding roach and 
 barbel. There are fine haunts on the Thames for " the 
 wolf of the waters," as that river pirate and cannibal 
 the pike may be designated, — beautiful spots of deep, 
 clear, and pellucid water, fringed with green verdure, 
 where lies this terrible scourge of the river waiting for 
 prey, — places that an innocent troutling or lazy perch 
 deem all too beautiful to be inhabited by such a devil. 
 But the fiend is waiting there ; and just when the trout 
 is gambolling in fancied security, or the perch is lazily 
 lunging at an opportune worm, the pirate cannibal 
 dashes out of his lair, makes them prisoners, and eats 
 them at his leisure ! Considering that the Thames is 
 so near St. Paul's, and so accessible to the inhabitants 
 of a populous city, it is wonderful that there are fish 
 left in it. Most rivers near a city are quickly emptied 
 of their finny population. It is wonderful indeed to 
 find how populous with fish the Thames still is, espe- 
 cially in members of the carp family. Indeed, the 
 speciality of this great river, so far as anglers are con- 
 cerned, is that it abounds in members of the carp 
 family. Perch, too, are tolerably plentiful, and jack as 
 well, not to speak of the silver eel, and that host of 
 minor fishes which scientific anglers only value as bait 
 for the tritons of the scene. After all, Thames anglers 
 
164 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 are not so greedy for small fry as tlie pecheurs wlio 
 haunt the banks of the Seine about the Quay D'Auteil, 
 to whom minnows or infantine fish of any kind are a 
 godsend, to be quickly transferred to a frying-pan. 
 Eels are angled for industriously in the Seine, or rather 
 are groped for in the mud, and speedily, — haying 
 undergone that traditionary preparation which we have 
 all heard about, — figure on the tables of the neigh- 
 bouring cheap restaurants stewed in red wine, or 
 otherwise prepared to tempt the appetite. We have 
 witnessed the great rapidity with which the business 
 of angling and cooking is carried on in the little 
 villages on the banks of the Seine ; but still, although 
 the twin operations of capture and cooking are quick 
 enough, they do not nearly approach the rapidity of 
 Lord Lovat's plan. This nobleman, it is said, used at 
 certain seasons of the year to light a fire at the brink 
 of the salmon leap at Kilmorack, on the Beauly ; and, 
 placing upon it a kettle, quietly wait till a fish, in its 
 laudable endeavours to reach the shallow upper stream- 
 lets, would precipitate itself into the boiling water, and 
 in the space of twenty minutes or half an hour become 
 done to a nicety. Thus he enjoyed his salmon, as he 
 thought, in perfection. We never tasted a fish so 
 cooked, but have more than once partaken of the 
 veritable Tweed kettle, prepared, as was said, from a 
 recipe handed down from the ancient monks of Mel- 
 rose, who were, if tradition may be believed, extremely 
 fond of good living ; — 
 
FISHING. 165 
 
 "The monks of Melrose made gude kail 
 On Fridays when they fasted ; 
 Nor wanted they gude heef and ale, 
 As land's their neighbours' lasted." 
 
 The pretty kettle of fisli just referred to is prepared 
 by crimping tlie animal the moment it is captured and 
 killed, when, after cleaning and cutting it into slices, it 
 is boiled in a strong pickle or brine till thoroughly 
 done ; and then eaten, sans ceremonie, without any 
 other relish than a portion of the sauce in which it 
 has been boiled. It is a mistake to serve any rich 
 sauce with this fish ; the flesh is rich enough without 
 any foreign condiment whatever. Another modern 
 mistake is serving salmon on a napkin ; it ought to 
 be sent to the table in a deep dish with plenty of the 
 water in which it has been boiled. A third mistake 
 is in eating our salmon boiling hot : let the epicure try 
 the fish after it is cold, and whenever possible boil 
 a whole fish. A small salmon of from six to eight 
 pounds, boiled whole, is very fine ; before it is served, 
 scrape ofi" the scales, — never mind the unsightliness, — 
 and don't fail to eat the skin ; it is excellent. Were 
 it our cue to write here about the cooking of fish, in- 
 stead of the catching of them, we could enlarge on 
 the subject with satisfaction to ourselves and profit to 
 our readers ; but our present business is with their 
 capture rather than their cookery. 
 
 Coming back, then, to our proper work, we may 
 assume that angling, " the contemplative man's recrea- 
 
166 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tion," as it has been called, no longer requires a 
 defence on the score of cruelty. It is not now thought 
 to be more the act of a butcher to kill a trout than to 
 slaughter that pet poetic animal, the lamb. Even the 
 ladies have ceased to talk sentiment on the subject. In 
 fact, they have begun to handle the rod themselves. 
 Every now and then we hear or read of the feats of 
 our lady salmon-killers. A lady kills a thirty-five 
 pound fish, and thinks nothing of the feat. Lately it 
 took a lady, wdth the aid of a stalwart keeper, two 
 hours to get a fish out of the water ; and that particular 
 salmon was thought to be such a beauty that it was 
 sent to the House of Commons as a present to the 
 Speaker, and after being much admired by the right 
 honourable gentleman and his friends, was "ordered 
 to lie on the table.'' That lady would never, of course, 
 think of killing a lamb with her own fair hands, but 
 it is quite certain she did not think it cruel to kill a 
 salmon. It is quite clear that, if lamb and grouse 
 were never eaten, neither the one nor the other would 
 ever be killed for table purposes ; no horrid grizzly 
 butcher would disturb the dreams of little lambkins, 
 nor would the crack of the death-dealing rifle bring 
 doom to pheasants and partridges. To man has been 
 given dominion over the fowls of the air and the 
 denizens of the deep, from the tiny minnow which the 
 boy hooks with a pin, to the leviathan of the frozen 
 seas, which is shot with a harpoon fired from a mortar ; 
 and as the fish claims dominion over the flies that 
 
FISHING. 167 
 
 sport upon the stream and the worms which frequent 
 the water, and as it kills them as often as it can, it is 
 not for us to draw the line or curse at some particular 
 bait because it seems cruel to use it. 
 
 Anglers' fishes, — the salmon and trout excepfed, — 
 cannot be said to possess much, if any, economic value. 
 No man of taste who could obtain herrings or sprats 
 would ever purchase roach or barbeL There was a 
 time, however, when a fish-pond was an universal 
 appanage of every country mansion-house ; and when 
 carp, perch, or trout, or some other well-known fish, 
 obtained from home water-preserves, or from some 
 stream flowing through the estate, figured on the 
 dining-table, made palatable by expensive cookery ; 
 and in the grounds of our old abbeys and monasteries 
 there was invariably, in the olden time when such 
 institutions flourished, a fish stew. The monks, it is 
 proverbial, were fond of good living, and many a fine 
 trout and fat carp, it is easy to believe, graced their 
 fast-day refections. Now country gentlemen do not 
 require a fish-pond, because the express train whirls 
 down a turbot or cod-fish that was living and in the 
 sea a few hours before it was deposited, daintily packed 
 in a wicker fish creel, at the porters' lodges. To some 
 persons the sea-fish named prove a grateful change from 
 the constant salmon, for even that fish, when too often 
 partaken of, is not relished ; toujours perdrix has be- 
 come a proverb ; — toujours saumon has been exclaimed 
 against before now, not only by country gentlemen, but 
 
168 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 by peasant boys and ploughmen, who, once upon a time, 
 were accustomed to turn up tbeir noses at fish food 
 wbicb has of late years become a dainty solely to set 
 on ricb men's tables. Long ago every hind living near 
 a salmon water claimed the right of angling in it, and 
 many of them were smart fishers. It is instructive to 
 note the change of habit among the people that has 
 made salmon fashionable and consequently dear. "We 
 hope it will not be thought dreadfully heretical if we 
 say, like the ploughman of old, that it would be dis- 
 tasteful to us to be compelled to eat salmon three times 
 a week. Strange as fashionable folks may think it, 
 we relish a prime haddock boiled in sea water, or a 
 fine salt herring, far more than the venison of the 
 waters, — just as we prefer a hind leg of a well-fed 
 black-faced sheep to a haunch of venison. All this is 
 no doubt dreadfully unfashionable, but it is our true 
 taste nakedly exposed to the reader. 
 
 Another heresy of ours is, that for genuine sport, — 
 for affording an enjoyable day's angling, — the trout 
 is a better fish than the salmon. Indeed, it is the 
 angler's fish par excellence. We know of no better 
 reward for an industrious fisher than a dozen or two 
 of trout ranging in weight from a few ounces to a 
 pound and a half. A well-proportioned trout of twelve 
 or eighteen ounces is indeed a prize for the best angler. 
 Salmon angling is very expensive, — so expensive that 
 it can only be enjoyed by the wealthy. It is rather 
 annoying to be required to pay perhaps a sovereign a 
 
FISHING. 169 
 
 day for tlie right of angling on a stretch of salmon 
 water, and have in addition to surrender your take of 
 fish to the lessee of the stream who grants you permis- 
 sion to take them. Many gentlemen now go to Norway 
 in order to enjoy the sport of salmon-fishing in perfec- 
 tion which, however, can still be had in Scotland, where 
 there is also excellent trout-fishing for many months in 
 the year. In the large lakes of Scotland there are 
 gigantic trout ; there are especially the great trout of 
 Loch- Awe, — salmo ferox, — which grow to very large 
 dimensions. We have more than once helped to kill 
 a twenty-pounder. The salmo ferox is found in most of 
 the larger Scottish lochs, and is a thoroughly game fish ; 
 it fights to the death, and, as an angling friend of ours 
 says, scarcely knows when it is dead. It has been found 
 more than once to free itself from the line, and then 
 again seize the same bait with which it was taken before 
 with greater voracity than ever. This monster of the 
 lakes, like the bull trout of the Tweed, is a dreadful 
 cannibal, preying extensively on smaller fish living in 
 the same waters. We know well enough that an occa- 
 sional fine trout has been taken out of the Thames and 
 other English rivers, — as, for instance, the splendid 
 fish taken near Kingston in Surrey by a banker, which 
 weighed ten pounds, and was thirty inches long ; but 
 as the trout is, par excellence, the angler's fish, so is 
 Scotland, par excellence, the land of the trout. For 
 trout angling, in all its most enjoyable aspects, men 
 must assuredly journey north of the Tweed. And once 
 
 M 
 
170 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 in the *' land of brown heath and shagg)^ wood,'' — away 
 far from the populous city, — there is a wealth of water 
 rich in fish, which generally speaking is free to anglers, 
 who may, as a rule, fish for trout in any river they 
 like ; and there are hundreds of streams which a 
 London angler would find worthy of a visit. We do not 
 mean on the beaten paths which are now so well known 
 to all fishers, such as the land of Tibby Shiels, or rather 
 the water of lone St. Mary's, and the adjoining rivers 
 and burns. Even in Scotland, distant as some of the 
 streams are from the busy haunts of men, they have 
 been somewhat over-fished ; and although trout are not 
 exactly scarce on some of the rivers, still that fish is not 
 so plentiful as it used to be when in our early youth, — 
 say thirty-five years ago, — we saw two men in the 
 course of a forenoon fill a good-sized washing-tub with 
 trout lured from a Dumfriesshire burn. In Scotland 
 efforts are being made to introduce the grayling as an 
 angler's fish, and we have had in our possession several 
 fine specimens of considerable size taken from the 
 Clyde, where it is now becoming rather plentiful. It 
 may interest English anglers to know that there are in 
 Scotland one or two peculiar fish, which must, we 
 think, have been introduced pisciculturally like the 
 grayling, such as the vendace, which, however, is too 
 shy to be called an angler's fish. Quantities of vendace 
 are taken once or twice a year by means of a net, in 
 order that the people round about may hold a feast, 
 and have a little jollification. It is a fish that is 
 
FISHING. 171 
 
 confined to one place, and that is the water of Loch- 
 maben, in Dumfriesshire. There is also in Scotland 
 the far-famed and " marrowless " Loch Leven trout, 
 — another of those mysteries of the piscine world 
 which no fellow can understand. It is very accessible, 
 and afibrds tolerable sport to the angler, who requires, 
 however, to hire a boat to fish from. In our opinion 
 lake fishing is not nearly so exciting as river angling ; 
 the fish have not the same scope for resistance as they 
 have in a river or brook, where they can dart from 
 bank to brae, and easily obtain a hiding-place ; but th 
 lake fish ^re of course much larger than burn trout, 
 and Loch Leven trout are as a rule as costly, if not 
 more so, than early salmon, and a profitable trade in 
 these trout has existed for more than half a century. 
 The fish of this far-famed loch, in which stands the 
 prison- castle of Mary Stuart, are both rich in colour 
 and fine in fiavour, which is of course the result of a 
 peculiar feeding ground. The run of Loch Leven 
 trout at present average a pound per fish. We have 
 seen one hundred fish weigh ninety-nine pounds. The 
 vendace cannot for a moment be compared gastro- 
 nomically with Loch Leven trout, which are delightful 
 when plain boiled in well- salted water, or when baked 
 in a slight paste. It is thought by some connoisseurs 
 that Loch Leven trout have deteriorated in flavour 
 since the lake was partially drained ; but we know no 
 difierence; — their flavour to us is as delightful as it 
 was thirty years ago. It is surprising that steps have 
 
172 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 not been taken long ago to augment the supplies of 
 these trout. Artificial breeding has, we know, been 
 tried, but not very successfully. The powan of Loch 
 Lomond, like the vendace of Lochmaben, is rarely 
 taken by the angler. It is not an angler's fish, but it 
 is worth capturing as a curiosity. There is no lack of 
 fishes in that Queen of Lochs ; indeed, the angler may 
 consider himself in clover when he reaches this district of 
 Scotland, for he is near all the best kinds of fishing with 
 which the country abounds, — from minnow to salmon. 
 Scotland has been metaphorically called the Land 
 o' Cakes, — it might as well have been «alled the 
 Land of Fish, It is a country abounding in lochs 
 and streams, mountain burns, hill-side rivulets, and 
 gigantic waters like the Tay. Scotland too may be 
 described as the trout fisher's Dorado, — that fish 
 being the stock in trade of its lochs and rivers. It 
 is useless, however, to expect good fishing in the 
 neighbourhood of towns and cities ; but is there not 
 the railway or the steamboat to carry anglers to far- 
 ofi" solitudes, where nature, with all her pristine 
 charms, is ready to fascinate the visitor? The land 
 of the mountain and the flood, the land of Walter 
 Scott, the land of cakes, the home of the salmon 
 and the trout, — what can the traveller or the angler 
 desire more ? 
 
 " Their groves of green myrtle let foreign lands reckon, 
 Where bright beaming summers exalt the perfume ; 
 Far dearer to me yon long glen of green breckan, 
 
 With the burn stealing under the long yellow broom !" 
 
FISHING. 173 
 
 Scotland, as all northern anglers are aware, yields 
 a very large share of the salmon which are brought 
 every year to London. Very few of these commercial 
 fish, however, are procured by angling, most of them 
 being captured in a wholesale way by means of the 
 net and coble ; but a goodly number of salmon are 
 still caught by the rod, especially at the beginning 
 and the end of the season. There are one or two 
 Scottish societies of socially inclined fishers that rent 
 a cottage and a stretch of water on the Tweed, to 
 which they can proceed during the season in order 
 to enjoy a day or two's angling, and there are other 
 fishing clubs besides. We, however, prefer Tay as 
 an angling stream, and consider its salmon superior 
 to those of Tweed; and the former river has the 
 advantage of not being infested by the bull trout, 
 a fish which has already exterminated the salmon of 
 some rivers, and is now playing havoc in Tweed. 
 Anglers coming from England purely for fishing 
 purposes should at once go north, — or south, if they 
 prefer that route. Let the Thames fisher who is 
 desirous of seeing sport in the far north put himself 
 at St. Katherine's Wharf on board the Dundee steam- 
 boat. Arrived at Dundee, let him then go on to 
 Perth, and as he is there at any rate, he should not 
 forget to visit the salmon nursery at Stormontfield, 
 which is interesting both in a scientific and commercial 
 aspect ; firstly, because it has largely aided in the 
 solution of several important problems in the natural 
 
174 BRITISH SPOETS AIS^D PASTIMES. 
 
 and economic history of the salmon, whicli need not 
 be detailed here, and secondly, because the operations 
 carried on at these ponds have demonstrated that the 
 cultivation of salmon on a fixed plan is worthy of 
 commercial support because it pays. But what our 
 angler is recommended to do is to get away at once 
 to what may be called the angling districts of the 
 Tay and its tributaries. True, at Stormontfield, or 
 about Scone Palace, he may see the nurse of the 
 young salmon, "Peter of the pools," Peter Marshall, 
 " coaching " a brace of beginners in a coble, on an 
 active part of the water. See how deftly Peter zigzags 
 to and fro across the rapid stream, telling his pupils 
 how to comport themselves, anon changing a fly, then 
 taking a leetle pull at the youngest gentleman's flask 
 of very still Glenlivet. Many a salmon has Peter 
 helped out of the water. As we look and listen there 
 comes a double flop on the stream, and we obtain 
 just for an instant a brief glimpse of an immense 
 salmon, — that is to say, it looks immense, for we can 
 see no definite boundaries to it, as it dashes into the 
 water. Peter tells the novice, who looks frightened 
 and is shaky, to give it plenty of line, and the fish 
 rushes off with dreadful rapidity, Peter rapidly direct- 
 ing what is to be done next. The line seems more than 
 once in danger of snapping, as the fish darts from 
 side to side of the water, dashing at one time clean 
 out of the river, and getting pulled back by the 
 awkwardness of the angler. Peter manages the boat 
 
FISHING. 175 
 
 with great skill, so as to humour the fish to the top 
 of his bent. After a game fight, lasting over half an 
 hour, a very nice eighteen-pound fish is lifted clean 
 out of the water with a landing-net, and Peter, wiping 
 his brow, takes a pull at the flask with much relish, 
 and exclaims, '' Hech, sirs,, but we've got her at last ! " 
 There is some free salmon angling on the Tay, which 
 at times yields a few fish ; and in the neighbourhood 
 of Perth and Dunkeld there are plenty of accessible 
 trout streams where one may angle all the live-long 
 day, and no one will ask. What doest thou ? 
 
 As has been already hinted, salmon angling is 
 desperate hard work. Men have been known before 
 now to hook a fish, play it for two hours, and then 
 lose it ! A well-known Scottish editor, — a mighty 
 fisher, — got so excited in playing a fish that he 
 jumped into the water nearly up to the neck, and 
 drowned a leading article for his journal, which hap- 
 pened to be in the pocket of his breeches ! But he 
 secured his salmon. We prefer, as we have said, the 
 gentler exercise of trout fishing, and whilst friends 
 have fought a day on the Tay for the venison of the 
 waters, and gone home very tired and unrewarded, we 
 have filled our basket with prime trout from the 
 Shochie or the Tsla. Laying aside our own tastes 
 and prejudices, and looking upon the salmon as being 
 the monarch of anglers' fishes, a brief sketch of the 
 economy of a salmon stream may not prove uninte- 
 resting to fishers, or, at any rate, to persons who 
 
176 BRITISH SPORTS AKD PASTIMES. 
 
 like to read about fish.. It is not long since grave 
 apprehensions were entertained that salmon would 
 be altogether extirpated from our rivers. Most of 
 the large English streams were without fish of any 
 kind. Even the mud-loving eel had been poisoned 
 by the numerous impurities that manufactories have 
 introduced into our rivers. The rental of the Tweed 
 had fallen to a fourth of what it was at one time. The 
 Tay was being ruined by stake nets, and the Solway 
 by overfishing ; and the fish that were left in those 
 rivers that had not been polluted by an overflow of 
 chemicals, were gradually becoming smaller, and of 
 course lighter, — the heavy ones being speedily cap- 
 tured, and the young ones not allowed time to attain 
 a great size. The quick modes of carriage that came 
 into use, the facilities afforded by railroads for reach- 
 ing the larger seats of population, as well as the high 
 price obtained for salmon from the dealers of London 
 and elsewhere, served, and still serves, indeed, to spur 
 the tenants of the fisheries into the greatest activity, 
 inducing them not to allow a single fish to reach the 
 spawning grounds in the upper waters, — where they 
 would be most accessible to some anglers, — if they 
 can possibly prevent it from ascending. Many years 
 ago, when there was only a local demand both for 
 salmon and sea fish, the idea of a failure of the sup- 
 plies was never for a moment entertained either by 
 proprietors or fishers. The fish were then plentiful 
 enough, a penny a pound weight being a common 
 
FISHING. 177 
 
 price in the neighbourhood of nearly every salmon 
 stream. It was at one time attempted to carry salmon 
 from Scotland to London alive in welled vessels, but as 
 the fish killed themselves attemj)ting to escape, that 
 plan had to be given up as impracticable. Tlie moment 
 it was ascertained, however, that salmon could be 
 carried to great distances if packed in ice, and be 
 found in tolerably good condition at the end of the 
 journey, the price rose to such a figure as put an 
 end for ever to the grievance of farm servants and 
 apprentices who were determined not to eat that fish 
 oftener than twice a week. 
 
 The enormous fecundity of fishes, — some of them 
 yield their eggs in millions, and most of them in 
 tens of thousands, — has given anglers and others the 
 idea that it is impossible to afiect the supplies by 
 any amount of fishing. The female salmon yields 
 eggs at the rate of one thousand for every pound of 
 her weight. A fish of twenty pounds, as a general 
 rule, yields twenty thousand eggs. As regards the 
 productiveness of a salmon river, the question to be 
 solved is, not how many eggs the fish produce, but 
 how many eggs arrive at the stage of table fish, or, 
 in other words, grow to be salmon of say twenty pounds 
 weight. We have the authority of Sir Humphry 
 Davy for saying that out of the 17,000 ova which 
 each female salmon on an average annually deposits, 
 only 800 in ordinary circumstances come to perfec- 
 tion. Some fisherv economists do not allow that 
 
178 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 such a large number ever grow to be table fish, and 
 perbaps Sir Humphry did not mean that the number 
 specified by him became table fish, but merely that 
 they were hatched into life. One writer on this part 
 of the salmon question thinks that only one per cent, 
 of the eggs of the mother fish attain the point of 
 perpetuating their kind. The destruction of eggs and 
 young fish must therefore be enormous. Large quan- 
 tities, it is known, never come in contact with the 
 milt, and so they perish. Countless numbers of the 
 ova are carried away by the floods into unsuitable 
 places, and they too perish. Then, again, numerous 
 fish-cannibals are waiting at the spawning-beds to 
 feast on the appetising roe ; the thovisands so eaten 
 cannot be calculated, but so they perish. The young 
 fish, again, are always in danger ; and although a 
 river may be positively swarming with young salmon, 
 comparatively speaking, only very few of them ever 
 live to reach the salt-water; all kinds of fresh- water 
 monsters are constantly extorting tribute from the 
 shoal. The smolt slaughter which occurs when the 
 juvenile army reaches the sea is awful. Hordes of 
 large sea-fish are always waiting in the estuaries at 
 the period of migration, instinctively aware of the 
 feast that is in store for them. That only a very 
 small percentage of the young salmon which go down 
 to the sea as smolts return as grilse is obvious. Yet 
 that large quantities of grilse are still left is also 
 obvious from the fact that tens of thousands of these 
 
FISHING. 179 
 
 fisli are annually killed. Indeed, the fishery-lessee is 
 the greatest enemy of the young salmon. It has been 
 shown very conclusively that grilse are young salmon 
 that have not spawned. Then why kill them ? It 
 is surely the worst possible economy to kill these 
 virgin fish before they have at least one opportunity 
 of perpetuating their kind. If we were to kill all 
 our lambs, for instance, where should we obtain our 
 mutton ? As a well-known angler has said in speak- 
 ing of the salmon-fisheries, " The conduct of salmon- 
 proprietors is as rational as high-farming with the 
 help of tile-drains, liquid-manure, and steam-power 
 would be for the purpose of eating corn in the blade." 
 
 Were it possible for some of our anglers who have 
 a turn for arithmetic to take the census of any large 
 salmon river, it would be found that by far the largest 
 proportion of the fish were very young, not perhaps 
 over four years old. Anglers have read of the enor- 
 mous salmons of former days, the sixty and seventy- 
 pounders that figure in various works of natural history, 
 but we seldom see such fish now, — forty- pounders are 
 even very scarce. The great bulk of the salmon now 
 taken are under twenty pound weight. The demand 
 is so great that time cannot be allowed for growth ; 
 but in this high-pressure age nothing is allowed to 
 grow old. If we want old wine, it has to be manu- 
 factured expressly for us, and as for getting a morsel 
 of old cheese, our grocer says it is hopeless. 
 
 A river, however laro^e, can onlv feed and breed a 
 
180 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 given quantity of salmon. As anglers well know, 
 when fish are very plentiful in a stream, they are 
 often lean and poor in flavour. The fish population 
 of such a river as the Tweed must be very large. 
 Indeed, we know that it is, or at least has been so, for, 
 in the quinquennial period between 1841 and 1845, 
 as many as 18,000 salmon, 81,000 grilse, and 69,000 
 bull trout were taken from it ; and it would not be 
 too much to say, that as many were left behind as 
 were taken, — not counting either parr or smolts. Two 
 of the most essential elements of a first-rate salmon 
 or trout water are breeding-ground for the old fish 
 and feeding - ground for the young ones. Without 
 good spawning places, the destruction of ova will 
 be vastly greater than has been indicated, and with- 
 out good feeding- ground the fish won't thrive. The 
 condition of the proprietors of head-waters has been 
 much improved by recent legislation. They deserved 
 a great deal of sympathy ; they had at one time to 
 give their share of the river almost, as one might say, 
 gratis, to the lower proprietors, as a nursery for their 
 benefit. They were deprived of their sport of angling, 
 because the few fish that were allowed to ascend the 
 waters were not in a state to afibrd the angler any 
 satisfaction. It was a hard case for the upper water 
 and tributary stream men, that they could receive no 
 consideration for the valuable privilege they afibrded 
 to the owners of the commercial fisheries on the lower 
 waters, except a few baggit fish. FuU justice will 
 
FISHING. 181 
 
 never be clone to the upper proprietors till some new 
 plan of working our salmon rivers be bit upon. Were 
 eacb river worked as if it belonged to one man, — like 
 the Spey, — were tbe workings of salmon rivers, in 
 fact, made co-operative instead of competitive, there 
 would be a greater chance of justice being done to all 
 the proprietors. 
 
 It will be good news for all anglers to learn that 
 pisciculture is extending itself. Messrs. Martin and 
 Gillone, of Tongland, the lessees of the Dee salmon- 
 fisheries in Kirkcudbrightshire, — where, by-the-bj^e, 
 there is excellent salmon or trout angling at a moderate 
 foe, — have carried it on successfully and on a consider- 
 able scale for some years ; and in Galway, Mr. Ash- 
 worth, since he began the plan of artificial rearing, has 
 increased the j)roduce of his fisheries tenfold. We are 
 instructed by an eminent salmon-farmer, who is too 
 modest to allow us to give his name, that in considering 
 the efiect of any practical amount of artificial propaga- 
 tion as compared with the natural process adopted by 
 the parent salmon itself, it is requisite to estimate, 
 firstly, the quantity of ova that a given number of fish 
 annually caught in any river may have deposited in 
 the previous year ; and, secondly, the number of years 
 required to produce an average stock of fish varying in 
 weight from six to thirty pounds each. It is rather 
 difficult to fix the average weight of fish caught in 
 various rivers, but the annual number killed may be 
 taken to be, in some salmon rivers, twenty thousand 
 
182 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 iisli. Experience enables us to arrive at the conclusion 
 that it requires three years to produce marketable fish 
 — from the egg — of the average weight of seven 
 pounds each. The twenty thousand fish annually 
 caught may vary in size from six to thirty pounds. 
 Then again, in spite of the general rule referred to, 
 various fish produce difierent numbers of ova. A fish 
 of twenty pounds weight has been found to contain 
 nearly twenty- seven thousand eggs, whilst another 
 weighing fourteen pounds would only yield seven 
 thousand eggs. Taking large and small together, it 
 may be assumed that twenty thousand fish had visited 
 their breeding- ground the previous year, and that one- 
 half were females that produced seven thousand eggs 
 each ; in other words, that seventy millions of eggs had 
 been left in the rivers annually, and had produced 
 one marketable fish to every three thousand five hun- 
 dred eggs. This large quantity of seventy millions 
 of fish eggs annually deposited in a river whose pro- 
 duce of marketable salmon only amounts to twenty 
 thousand fish, appears to be a very extraordinary 
 estimate, and leads one to ask what becomes of the 
 surplus ? 
 
 The Stormontfield breeding boxes and ponds have 
 now been greatly enlarged, so that the proj)rietors will 
 be able to have an annual breeding, and thus pour into 
 the Taj every year four or five hundred thousand fish ! 
 The primary conditions of salmon life, living, space, 
 and spawning ground, are, - as all who have angled on 
 
FISHING. 183 
 
 that river will testify, — to be found in perfection in the 
 Tay. Mr. Eamsbottom, the pisciculturist, says of this 
 river that it is one of the finest breeding streams in the 
 world, and that it would be presumption to limit the 
 number of salmon that might be raised in it were the 
 river cultivated to its capabilities. The main stream 
 has a very large volume of water, and having many 
 tributaries, there is such ample breeding-ground and 
 such an abundance of fish, that if the wonder-working 
 Stormontfield boxes were to throw an annual million 
 of salmon into the river there would still be room 
 enough for all. This is of importance, because a river 
 will only hold a certain population. The sea has 
 ample food for all the salmon kind that visit its deep 
 waters, and as the fish return to the river fat in flesh 
 and rich in flavour, it is not difficult to guess that the 
 food they obtain is fine in quality and abundant in 
 quantity. It is not likely, either, that the food which 
 the ocean afi'ords to the fish will vary much in its 
 quality, but it is well known that the food supplied by 
 some rivers is much less nourishing than that of other 
 waters. The young fish of one river grow fast and 
 have a fine flavour, whilst those of another stream are 
 slow of growth and are lean and comparatively flavour- 
 less. In one river a fish of a particular age will weigh 
 nine pounds, but a fish of the same age in a difierent 
 stream will be a pound or two lighter. Even in the 
 same water, fish of the same age will at difierent stages 
 of their growth be found to weigh very difierently. 
 
184 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Anglers ouo-lit to note sucli facts as these witli more 
 exactitude than they generally do. 
 
 Were the proprietors of the Severn to enter into 
 pisciculture, say to have a suite of boxes and ponds 
 capable of turning into the main water a million of 
 smolts per annum, and were they to co-operate so as to 
 have only one or perhaps two fishing stations instead of 
 fifty, they would undoubtedly solve the grand problem 
 of how best to conduct a salmon fishery on a large scale. 
 They would, of course, have to guard more and more 
 against the j)ollution of the stream and its tributaries. 
 The salmon is a dainty animal, and cannot exist except 
 in the cleanest waters. The filthy Clyde has no salmon, 
 neither has the Thames. Other rivers, as many of our 
 anglers are aware, have become depopulated of salmon, 
 and still more of them are likely to sufier from want of 
 fish, unless they become purged of the filth allowed to 
 flow into them. This is a consequence of the rapid 
 rise of manufactories on the banks of waters which 
 were at one time strictly pastoral streams. The ques- 
 tion of river pollution is intimately associated with the 
 occupation of the angler. The home of the fish should 
 be pure, and living fish in a stream is the best test of 
 its purity. The future of angling is so bound up in the 
 purification of our waters that we claim permission to 
 illustrate this part of our subject without waiting for 
 the report of the Commissioners who have been ap- 
 pointed to take evidence on the state of our rivers. 
 Alas ! our streams are not now what they were a 
 
FISHING. 185 
 
 quarter of a century ago ; some of them are but high- 
 ways for the passage of all kinds of filth, dead dogs 
 and cats, — putrid and foul, — chemical wash, and the 
 abounding liquid refuse of towns, by some uneconomic 
 maladroitness sent to the river that ought to have been 
 kept bright and pellucid, in order to supply the inhabi- 
 tants with water ! In giving evidence before the 
 Commissioners now inquiring into the state of our 
 rivers, the Mayor of Wakefield told how in his young 
 days he had seen the river Calder full of roach and 
 perch, and not a fish can now live in it, nor did his 
 honour think that the water of that river could be 
 made fit to drink by any chemical process whatever. 
 The proprietary of a stream would have also to look 
 after the poachers ; for poaching, which was at one 
 time purely a recreation, when the men in the neigh- 
 bourhood of a salmon river oi;ly killed fish for their 
 personal wants, is now a business, and a loathsome 
 business too, seeing that the trade is chiefly in foul 
 fish. The killing of spawning salmon used to be, — 
 it is happily a diminishing practice, — a great cause of 
 hurt to the fisheries. Were the proprietors of any 
 given river to co-operate, there is no doubt but that 
 they could make that river an enormously profitable 
 speculation. What is to hinder a body of anglers from 
 leasing a stream and cultivating it as a salmon farm ? 
 They could so regulate the take of fish as to keep out of 
 the market when there was likely to be a glut, and, by 
 employing one or two servants of their own, they could 
 
 N 
 
186 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 obtain tlie profit made by the usual twenty or thirty 
 lessees ; they could also regulate and greatly extend 
 their close time, so that an abundant number of fish 
 would be enabled to reach the spawning grounds, 
 which would still further enhance the value of the 
 property. " Routine,'' as Dr. Esdaile says, *' is as fatal 
 to fish as to men, and so torpifies the understanding 
 that self-interest even is insufficient to stimulate to 
 take a simple step in advance in a new direction." 
 The river Spey may be cited as an example of what 
 can be done by good management. It has been told in 
 Parliament, by the Duke of Eichmond in person, that 
 the profits of that river, which is mostly his own, were 
 over twelve thousand pounds per annum. To put the 
 case in a stronger way, or as Mr. Eussell puts it in his 
 work on ''The Salmon," "the weight of salmon produced 
 by the Spey is equal to the weight of mutton annually 
 yielded to the butcher by each of several of the 
 smaller counties of Scotland." And the value of a 
 salmon farm is still greater than that of a mutton farm, 
 because there is no cost price of stock to put down, no 
 food to purchase. As Benjamin Franklin has it, fishes 
 are " bits of silver pulled out of the water." Common 
 fishes may be represented by silver, but the salmon 
 must be represented by good red gold. In the spring 
 time of the year a twenty-five pound salmon on a 
 Bond Street counter may be estimated at seven pounds 
 ten shillings sterling. To conclude this part of our 
 subject, we say that the Spey being providently 
 
FISHING. 187 
 
 managed as the property of one man, althougli it 
 yields a greatly less number of fish than the Tweed, 
 is far more profitable ; and while the Tweed at one 
 time was fished till the middle of October, the 
 Spey closed in August, thus afibrding a long rest to 
 the breeding fish, and ensuring the success of future 
 seasons. 
 
 The reader may think that we are too partial to 
 Scotland, with its lordly salmon and sport-yielding 
 trout, and that we ought not to slight Wales, which 
 some anglers describe as a j)erfect paradise. We have 
 never fished there, but believe there is really as fine 
 sport to be obtained in the principality, as there is in 
 Cumberland and Westmoreland, where the lakes teem 
 with trout and char. Men who visit these places 
 during their few weeks of yearly holiday, and enjoy 
 the sport they afibrd in temperance, may for a time 
 " throw physic to the dogs." All we say is, that for real 
 angling the sportsman must leave behind him the 
 baited waters of the Thames, and the dace and chub 
 which have hitherto made him happy, and take to the 
 hills and dales of Scotland and Wales, and the capture 
 of trout and salmon. Of course each angler has his 
 own peculiar tastes, his likes and dislikes, both as to 
 the rivers in which he prefers to fish, and the kinds of 
 fish he prefers to take. We prefer an angling com- 
 petition on Loch Leven, but many prefer " the Hoxton 
 Derby." One man thinks any fish but the salmon 
 below his notice ; another man will prefer to angle in 
 
188 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 the broads of Norfolk, whilst many an enthusiastic 
 fisher has to be contented with an hour or two's 
 permissive sport on the ornamental water of the Lon- 
 don parks. Exclusives, again, hie themselves away 
 to the fiords of Norway. In fact, anglers are being 
 driven abroad because of the foul state of many of our 
 own rivers. 
 
 "Whilst the polluted rivers are being purified, and 
 arrangements are being made to throw on to the hungry 
 land that debris of the numerous mills and manufacture 
 which would so enrich the soil, why should not men 
 angle in the sea ? We have over and over again tried 
 sea-fishing as a sport, and can pronounce it excellent. 
 We have speared mullet in the basin of Arcachon, 
 we have caught single herrings in the bay of Wick, 
 we have killed saithe in the Clyde, we have handled a 
 smelt net on the coast of Holland, we have taken 
 mackerel in Largo Bay, we have " howked " for eels 
 in the broads of Norfolk, have netted whitebait below 
 Woolwich, caged lobsters at the Orkney Islands, 
 " trotted '* for whelks everywhere, dug sand eels from 
 the banks of Fisherrow, dredged for oysters at the 
 Pandores, caught sea trout at Lamlash, handled gobies 
 at Joppa, seen a shoal of pilchards landed in the south 
 of England, participated in the cod fishing at the Well- 
 bank, taken parr wholesale out of the Isla, at the Brig 
 o' Riven, and viewed a whale- hunt in the Frith of 
 Forth ! Therefore, we can vouch that sea-fishing has 
 in it all the elements of sport, — and it will yet become 
 
FISHING. 189 
 
 fashionable ! Does not the Duke of Argyll occasion- 
 ally relieve the tedium of his intellectual pursuits by 
 going out to the Loch Fyne herring fishery, and do we 
 not know a noble Marquis who brings in his fish in 
 the herring season, and sells his '* take " on the quay 
 at Dunbar ? The angling apparatus required by sea- 
 anglers, too, is of the simplest kind, and is generally 
 provided by those who have boats for hire in the vil- 
 lages of the coast. There are places on the English 
 sea-board where this kind of sport may be pursued with 
 the greatest possible success, and after a thoroughly 
 economic manner. It is no joke to play a thirty-pound 
 cod fish, and a large conger eel will try the powers 
 of the most stalwart man we know. Crab fishing 
 among the rocks is good sport, and the spearing of 
 flat fish is not altogether devoid of excitement. Many 
 a pleasant hour might be spent on the glancing 
 waters of the sea in search of the minor monsters of 
 the deep. 
 
 In penning the foregoing remarks we have not 
 attempted to dogmatise or dictate in the matter of 
 angling. Nor have we ventured to deal in the slang 
 of the art, or to impart instruction to the novice. As 
 has been hinted, angling cannot be effectively learned 
 from a book. Practice is the one thing needful. A 
 student would learn more from a day passed with 
 Francis, Stewart, or Russell, than he can ever hope to 
 learn from the books of these gentlemen, good as they 
 are. Angling, as all the world knows or should know. 
 
190 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 was one of the chief recreations of Christopher North. 
 He has described his work on the rivers with the 
 enthusiasm of a keen fisher, but he says,^ — and we 
 believe him, — that he never learned the art from books. 
 In fact, the very best anglers cannot write. We knew 
 a great angler living on the banks of Till who could 
 not sign his name ; yet he knew more about fish and 
 fishing than all the writing anglers of the age. Per- 
 sons about to angle for the first time should get a 
 practised friend to " coach *' them, and they should 
 commence in a quiet and humble way, and they can 
 begin on any "bit" of water that is within reach. 
 They need not invest in an expensive salmon rod till 
 they have been a few years at the business ! Try a 
 worm to begin with. The art of fly fishing will come 
 in good time. New modes of angling are difiicult to 
 find out. There are experts who, every year, invent 
 and manufacture new flies, many of them being very 
 unlike anything ever seen in nature. But after all 
 that can be said or done, what the angler desires is a 
 load of fish. Indeed, the crave for fish with some men 
 is so insatiable that they are not too particular as to 
 how they take them. Let them but fill their baskets, 
 never mind the modus operandi ! Other anglers, again, 
 will treat with contempt all modes of fishing but fly 
 fishing. "Worm fishing to some is contemptible. Such 
 cognoscenti are great in rods and tackle ; they have 
 the slang of the art at the end of their tongue ever 
 ready for use ; but we like the quiet fisher best. He 
 
FISHING. 191 
 
 is more deadly at the business ; and, as has been already- 
 hinted, the gipsy will beat most of our anglers in ob- 
 taining a trout or a salmon, and that too with the 
 humblest kind of apparatus. Angling can at least be 
 praised for this, — that, like fox-hunting, it is a purely 
 recreative sport. It can never become, except to a 
 very few, a business or trade ; neither can it ever be- 
 come a business for betting on, such as is horse-racing. 
 We cannot charge our recollection with ever having 
 seen as much as one shilling change hands on a bet 
 about fishing. 
 
 Some anglers hold that their year does not commence 
 till May, — that they cannot fish till they find the May 
 fly upon the water ; while others, more determined for 
 sport, are on the river side early in April, and keen 
 salmon fishers will have a pull at the monarch of the 
 brook in February. Again, there are enthusiasts who 
 will be at work before the end of January. These are 
 like the gouty man in the well-known engraving. 
 They would angle in a tub in their dining-room rather 
 than not fish ! Men who never obtain their annual 
 holidays till August or September, or who do not live 
 near a river, do not obtain the full pleasure of the 
 angler, however fond they may be of the sport. The 
 country, to our mind, is more beautiful in May than at 
 any other season of the year ; the leaves are greener, 
 the water is more crystalline, the birds chirrup more 
 cheerfully on the trees, and the fish, after a stormy 
 winter, ^'feed'' with greater willingness than at the 
 
192 
 
 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 faU of the year. Happy is the angler who is able to 
 pursue his Yocation during the balmy springtime, when 
 the surrounding scenery is surpassing in its beauty, 
 and fresh from the easel of ^ture, the sublimest of all 
 painters. 
 
ON YACHTING. 
 
 A FEW years ago the wildest Anglo-maniac among our 
 gallant neighbours would have thought and spoken of 
 going afloat for pleasure, as the Latin poet sang of the 
 first man who committed his frail boat to the cruel sea. 
 There exists, however, in these latter days a " Society 
 of Paris Sailing Club," so called, presided over by a 
 French commodore, and consisting of some thirty-two 
 vessels, from one to thirty tons ; and, with scarcely an 
 exception, all these yachts belong to French owners. 
 Whether Commodore Benoit Champy's tiny squadron 
 disport themselves on the lower reaches of the Seine, 
 or tempt, from time to time, the rougher waters of the 
 Channel, we cannot tell, but it is pleasant to observe 
 that French sport is no longer limited to the Turf. 
 !Nor is it at Paris only that the s^^ort of Yachting has 
 found French disciples. At Cannes, almost, it is true, 
 a British colony, we find established " Le Cercle 
 iTautique de la Mediterranee," with a French commo- 
 dore and vice-commodore, and some twenty-four small 
 craft, owned, with only six or seven exceptions, by 
 
194 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Frenclimea. Probably here, too, tbe original impulse 
 
 came from England, or rather from English yachtsmen 
 
 cruising in the Mediterranean ; but it is not the less 
 
 gratifying to note that both these French clubs, at 
 
 Paris and at Cannes, are principally composed of native 
 
 yachtsmen. In the regatta held at Havre, in honour 
 
 of the International Maritime Exhibition, a prize, to 
 
 which the Emperor contributed, was to be sailed for by 
 
 yachts of French construction and belonging to French 
 
 owners. One yacht answering to that description was 
 
 entered in the Channel match from Havre to Cherbourg, 
 
 all the rest of the competitors being English. The 
 
 " Imperial Yacht Club '' of St. Petersburg owes its 
 
 foundation to the Grand Duke Constantino, himself a 
 
 sailor, and a frequent visitor to the Isle of Wight, 
 
 where, a true descendant of Peter the Great, he has 
 
 doubtless appreciated the national importance to a 
 
 maritime State of a sport so favourable to the science 
 
 of naval architecture, and to the employment of the 
 
 population of the coasts, as yachting. Of the twelve 
 
 vessels, all of considerable tonnage, belonging to the 
 
 St. Petersburg Club, six are owned by members of the 
 
 Imperial family. The Emperor's yacht, called after 
 
 our Queen, was built at Cowes. Russia is not an 
 
 essential^ maritime State ; nor are the majority of the 
 
 wealthy classes in Pussia in the habit of seeking the 
 
 seaside, except for baths, gaieties, or the climate. 
 
 Yachting in Pussia is, in fact, an English importation. 
 
 Eussian yachts come from English yards. The Poj^al 
 
YACHTING. 
 
 195 
 
 Swedish Yacht Club is no doubt a more genuinely 
 national institution. It counted recently thirty craft 
 of various tonnage, and is under the patronage of Prince 
 Oscar, who, both as a sailor and a poet, can appreciate 
 the merits and the charms of the sport. The Swedes 
 are skilful yacht-builders, as the Sverige and the Aurora 
 Borealis have shown. Among our Swedish yachting 
 brethren there are, however, one or two unmistakably 
 English names, as there are also in the Royal Nether- 
 lands Yacht Club, and indeed in all foreign Yacht 
 Clubs of our acquaintance. In justice to our Scandi- 
 navian comrades, we must remember that if they have 
 borrowed yachting from England, it is from their 
 Scandinavian ancestors that the peaceful English sea- 
 rovers of the nineteenth century fetch their birth. 
 And our jolly Dutch neighbours, who spend as much 
 genius and energy in literally keeping their heads above 
 water as some other nations do in maintaining their 
 rank as Great Powers, are certainly no mere imitative 
 yachtsmen. To their prowess at sea our own naval his- 
 tory bears ample witness. As pleasure- sailors, Dutchmen 
 are entitled at least to the merit of having given us a 
 noun, which many yachtsmen never succeeded in spell- 
 ing correctly. Dutchmen certainly built the first 
 " yachts,'' though Dutch yachting seems originally to 
 have consisted in towing and being towed sluggishly 
 up and down a canal in a sort of cut-down Noah's ark. 
 Some antiquarians have ascribed to the Venetians, — 
 those Dutchmen of the Adriatic, as a Hollander might 
 
196 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 call them, — the honour of having invented this amuse- 
 ment. It may be so. But to all the intents and purposes 
 of our present essay, which deals with yachting as an 
 organized national sport, there can be no question that 
 that sport belongs to the British Isles. The gentlemen 
 at ease, who, on either side of the Atlantic, go down to 
 the sea for pleasure, and not for business, or profit, or 
 duty, will be found, with very few exceptions, to combine 
 in their blood the great kindred elements of the Saxon 
 and the Scandinavian ancestry. It is to the Pagan 
 pirates from the Saxon coasts and to the Slayers of 
 the North, of the ninth and tenth centuries, and to the 
 " Brethren of the Coast " of the Tudor times, that the 
 harmless yachtsman of the Solent or the Thames owes 
 the passion that urges him afloat. 
 
 In claiming for yachting as a *' national sport " of 
 the British Islanders a certain distinction, we are not 
 insisting on the obvious fact that it is absolutely free 
 from those parasitical industries or vices of gambling 
 and betting which unfortunately degrade so many of 
 our land sports, and have reached even our professional 
 fresh-water aquatics. We do not mean to say that 
 yacht-racing has wholly escaped those sharp practices 
 and crooked arts which have wrested the noble sport 
 of horse-racing from its original purpose as an encou- 
 ragement to the breeding of the finest and fleetest 
 animals of the purest blood. We shall have occasion 
 to touch presently upon some analogous corruptions 
 which have grown into the customs and usages of 
 
YACHTING. 197 
 
 yacht-racing, but which, we are happy to believe, are 
 already tending to disappear rather than to increase. 
 But it has escaped that widespread popular demora- 
 lization which notoriously surrounds and infests every 
 racing -stable in the kingdom, and has created a new 
 and disreputable profession, fruitful in crime and 
 misery. From these diseased excrescences Yachting, 
 even in the limited sense of yacht-racing, is, perhaps 
 by the essential conditions and circumstances of the 
 pursuit, singularly free. We do not exalt the practice 
 of yacht-sailing to the rank of a virtue on this account. 
 The absence of corrupting influences and habits is to 
 its credit, no doubt, but only to its credit as the 
 absence of some vices is to the credit of early youth or 
 of old age. A man may be ruined by yachting, if in 
 order to keep a yacht he live beyond his income. He 
 cannot be ruined by yachting as many a racing man 
 is ruined by the Turf. Yachting, like any other amuse- 
 ment, may lead a man into many ways of mischief; 
 but the mischief will neither be the fault of the yacht, 
 nor of the pleasure and sport of cruising. Yachting 
 will always be a tolerably select, if not an exclusively 
 aristocratic, sport ; and the more sea-going it is, the 
 manlier, the healthier, the more unexceptionable it 
 becomes. One obvious reason for the comparative in- 
 nocence of yachting is, that it takes a man away from 
 the artificial pleasures of ^' the world," breathes into 
 his lungs the purest air, and brings him into close 
 communion with the serenity, the simplicity, the free- 
 
198 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 dom, and tlie repose of Nature. Yerily, the sea-life 
 returns the love of its adepts with usury. It strengthens 
 and braces their limbs, steadies their nerves, clears their 
 brains, refreshes their spirits, cools and calms their 
 tempers, appeases and consoles their hearts, and reno- 
 vates every fibre in their moral and physical frames. 
 
 Another sufficient reason for the comparative select- 
 ness of yachting is, that a sea -going yachtsman must, 
 in the most exact sense of the word, have a " stomach'' 
 for the sport. Now, a sea- going stomach is, — happily, 
 perhaps,— by no means universal, even among Great 
 Britons, who, as Captain Marryat used to insist, should 
 be, one and all, more or less sailors. This previous 
 question of a stomach will always limit the number of 
 active sporting yachtsmen, — more effectually than that 
 other previous question of an income sufficient- to buy, 
 tit out, and keep a yacht afloat for four months of the 
 year. Probably in no country in the world, — except- 
 ino- always the United States, — can there be found so 
 many sea-going stomachs as in the United Kingdom. 
 'Not should it be forgotten that in no seas throughout 
 the surface of the globe are finer opportunities and 
 excuses for sea- sickness to be found than in the waters 
 of Great Britain and Ireland. Here some unfortunate 
 migratory reader, who has made a voyage to Australia 
 and back in a Blackwall liner, or some soldier who has 
 been boxed up for ninety days in a transport, or some 
 man of business who has crossed the " Pond " half-a- 
 dozen times in one of the magnificent Cunard steamers, 
 
YACHTING. 199 
 
 interrupts us with a protest. " You know," he says, 
 ^' Vm. never sick. But I most cordially accept Dr. 
 Johnson's definition of life at sea, — ^ a prison, with the 
 chance of being drowned.' Intolerable monotony, — a 
 dull, insuperable sense of discomfort and uneasiness, 
 even under the most favourable conditions of weather, 
 and with the pleasantest passengers." To such a 
 protest we can only reply, as the monk of the Camal- 
 doli did to the too-enthusiastic tourist, " Cosi pas- 
 sando ! " Three months in a packet- ship may well be 
 wearj^ work ; ten days in a steamer, with an engine 
 always thumping, and a deadly-lively mob of intimate 
 strangers always in your way, may well be a purga- 
 torial infliction. But, in a vessel of your own, — in a 
 floating home with a choice of companions of congenial 
 tastes and equal temper, — with the faces about you of 
 your own ship's company, — honest fellows who " ever 
 with a frolic welcome take the thunder or the sun- 
 shine," — with 3^0 ur own times and seasons for sailing 
 and staying at anchor, your own pick of ports to visit 
 or to pass. Yachting is what the monastic life appeared 
 to the tourist, rather than what it was to the old 
 monk's life-long experience. 
 
 The Yachting world is perhaps more heterogene- 
 ously composed than any other of our numerous 
 sporting confederations. From a Lord Chancellor to 
 a fashionable music-master, all sorts and conditions 
 of men have belonged to it. Parliament and Downing 
 Street, the Stock Exchange, the clergy, the bar, the 
 
200 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 medical profession, the army and navy, the civil 
 service, the fine arts, literature, commerce, Manchester, 
 and country squires, may all he found side by side in 
 the club lists. Some of the boldest riders and best 
 shots are the most adventurous and devoted, of yachts- 
 men. All the three kingdoms are represented in the 
 sport. We take pleasure in recording that in the 
 history of yachting, the first in point of date, and 
 certainly not the second in all the qualities that 
 ennoble the sport, stands Ireland. No better or braver 
 yachtsmen than Irishmen exist ; no heartier or more 
 hospitable shipmates ; no stauncher or more thorough 
 sea- going vessels than those that hail from the Cove 
 of Cork and the Bay of Dublin ! Their home is on the 
 blue water, and their daily cruising-ground is on the 
 edge of soundings. Among no set of men, let us 
 confess, are there more eccentric characters, or more 
 strongly-marked varieties of species, than among the 
 yachtsmen of the United Kingdom. For example, 
 take the man who keeps a yacht as a sort of Greenwich 
 dinner afloat, en permanence ; the man who keeps a 
 yacht as a racing-machine ; the man who keeps a 
 yacht like a man-of-war ; the man who keeps a yacht 
 as what the Chinese would call a " family boat ; '* the 
 man who buys a yacht for a single cruise in the Medi- 
 terranean or the Baltic, and sells it on his return, and 
 never goes yachting again ; the man who keeps a 
 yacht because he loves the sea, and the freedom and 
 quiet of a sea life ; the man who keeps a yacht as a 
 
YACHTING. 201 
 
 trawler ; the man who keeps a yacht for the love of 
 seamanship, and who is his own sailing-master; the man 
 who keeps a yacht, and never stirs beyond the Isle of 
 Wight ; the man who goes round to all the regattas, 
 and never enters for a match ; the pert little London 
 cockney who, as poor Albert Smith depicted him, 
 sleeps in a chest in Margate harbour, within a few yards 
 of a comfortable hotel, dresses like the hero of a nau- 
 tical drama at the Surrey, and, — to do him justice, — 
 knows how to handle the pack-thread, the walking- 
 stick, and the pocket handkerchiefs of his own morsel 
 of a cutter, which he thinks as big as a line-of-battle 
 ship ; — there are these, and we know not how many 
 other originals. 
 
 Let us show as briefly as possible in what a noble 
 national sense Yachting, as an organised sport, deserves 
 most honourable mention. We are not writing about 
 such acrobatic vanities as " canoe '' sailing, which is to 
 yachting what circus-riding is to fox-hunting, — how- 
 ever worthy of admiration, as a somewhat self-conscious 
 exhibition of personal daring and endurance, such 
 imitations of the aquatic sports of our ancient British 
 forefathers may be. 
 
 In. 1867 there were thirty-one yacht clubs in the 
 United Kingdom, — and, with two exceptions, sea- 
 going yacht squadrons, — bearing the Admiralty war- 
 rants ; and about 1,740 yachts, of which 240 only 
 were under twelve tons' admeasurement. The total 
 tonnage of these yachts amounted to about 55,700 
 
 o 
 
202 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tons. Allowing one man for every ten tons, we find 
 here a force of 5,700 men, — and boys, — employed in 
 the yachting service. The Royal Thames Yacht 
 Clii})^ — it is the grant of the Admiralty warrant that 
 confers the title of "Royal," — stands first on the list 
 in date of establishment, the Royal Western of the 
 sister island comes second, and the Royal Cork third. 
 But in justice to our gallant Irish brethren it should 
 be recorded that the Royal Cork is probably the oldest 
 yacht club in the world. It was established as long 
 ago as 1720, although it was not until 1827 that the 
 " Old Cork Water Club " was re- christened the Royal 
 Cork Yacht Club. The earliest record of the Royal Yacht 
 Squadron of England, — as it is now called, — is that of 
 a meeting held in 1815 at the Thatched House Tavern, 
 at which Earl de Grey presided, in the capacity, we 
 suppose, of commodore. The seal of the R.Y.S. bears 
 date 1812, in which year we may assume the original 
 Club was established. But that distinguished society, 
 which is now regarded by all as the head-quarters of 
 the yachting world, comes only tenth on the list, 
 according to the date of its Admiralty warrant, having 
 been preceded in this privilege by the Royal Thames, 
 the Royal Northern, — of Scotland, — the Royal 
 Western, — of Ireland, — the Royal Cork, the Roj^al 
 Eastern, — of Scotland, — the Royal Western, — of Eng- 
 land, — the Royal Southern, — of England, — the Royal 
 St. George's, of Ireland, — and the Royal London. The 
 Admiralty warrant confers much more than a title ; 
 
YACHTING. 203 
 
 it constitutes, in fact, the ^'pleasure navy" of tlie 
 United Kingdom ; it gives the yachts, at home and 
 abroad, a distinct rank second only to that of men-of- 
 war ; permits them to carry one or other of the ensigns 
 of the fleet ; exempts them from the payment of ton- 
 nage dues in British and foreign ports, — local dues on 
 going into basins or private harbours of course ex- 
 cepted ; enables yacht-owners to remove their furniture 
 or property from place to place in the United Kingdom 
 without coasting license, to deposit wine and spirits 
 in the Customs warehouses on arrival from foreign 
 ports free of duty, until reshipped for another voyage ; 
 and authorises the yachts to take up man-of-war moor- 
 ings, and their boats to go alongside and land com- 
 pany at the King's sally-port at Portsmouth, and 
 similar landing-places of her Majesty's ships'-boats at 
 the other naval ports. All the foreign Powers of 
 Europe have granted the like privileges in their ports 
 to the yachts of the United Kingdom bearing the 
 Admiralty warrant. No yacht on hire is allowed to 
 carry the colours of the club, or to enjoy the privileges 
 of the Admiralty warrant ; and any infringement of 
 the local laws and customs in foreign ports forfeits 
 the warrant, and entails expulsion from the club. 
 When the Admiralty first recognised the public policy 
 of granting their warrants to yacht clubs, no doubt it 
 was not only a privilege that was conceded, but a cer- 
 tain responsibility that was intended to be enforced. 
 The crews of these 1,740 yachts come from all parts 
 
204 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 of the kingdom ; principally, it seems, from the Isle of 
 Wight, which even in the time of Queen Elizabeth was 
 a royal yachting station. In the days of Queen Bes^ 
 there were twenty-nine royal yachts, — that is, vessels 
 in her Majesty's service employed for conveying great 
 personages of State, — always stationed at Cowes. A 
 yacht was understood, in those days, to be a small ship 
 with one deck, carrjang from eight to ten guns, and 
 averaging from 30 to 160 tons. 
 
 The principal yacht seamen of our day come from 
 Cowes, Bembridge, St. Helens, and Yarmouth, — Isle 
 of Wight, — from Portsmouth, Southampton, Lyming- 
 ton, Poole, Dartmouth, Plymouth, and the fishing 
 villages adjoining these two latter ports. There are 
 some, too, from Gravesend, and other places on the 
 Thames and the coast of Essex. The Cowes men 
 are considered to be, in many respects, the best for 
 yacht-racing ; but otherwise there undoubtedly exists 
 among the most influential yachtsmen an objection, too 
 probably founded on experience, to Cowes men. Many 
 of them are said to be lazy, insubordinate, and insolent. 
 Our own impression is, that the Cowes yacht- sailors 
 are for the most part a superior class of men in smart- 
 ness and intelligence, and in general character, if 
 properly treated, — that is, if placed under a strict 
 and firm, but judicious sailing-master, and kept at a 
 proper distance by the owner of the yacht. There are 
 obvious disadvantages in shipping a whole crew from 
 any one place, and in taking a sailing-master and a 
 
YACHTING. 205 
 
 crew from tlie same port. It becomes an effort of will 
 to get away from a port where your whole ship's com- 
 pany reside. The sailing-master finds it difficult to 
 maintain his authority over men who, as an Eton boy 
 would say, *' know him at home." A Cowes sailing- 
 master is rather apt to be on too friendly terms with 
 the tradesmen w^ho fit out and *' find " the yachts in 
 everything that is necessary or superfluous. In 
 short, a Cowes crew have some of the defects of the 
 servants' hail. But, taken singly, we believe a Cowes 
 yacht- sailor to be above the average of his class, and a 
 certain, proportion of Cowes men to be very valuable 
 elements in a crew, which should always be mixed. 
 
 What becomes of these yacht seamen from October 
 to May ? Well ; there are usually from twenty to thirty 
 yachts cruising in the Mediterranean in the winter ; 
 some with a whole family, — children and nurses, — on 
 board. But how do the crews of the yachts that are 
 laid up on the mud all the winter obtain a livelihood ? 
 Many of the men who have been employed in racing- 
 yachts all the summer remain idle all the winter, as 
 the crews of racing-yachts get an increase of pay on 
 the days when the yacht is engaged in a race. Many 
 of the Isle of Wight men (from St. Helens and Bem- 
 bridge) take to fishing and to pilot-boats during the 
 winter. The Portsmouth men are pretty generally 
 watermen, and return to that occupation when the 
 yachting season is over. It should be added that there 
 are first-class yachtmen from Harwich and the Essex 
 
206 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 coast who are oyster- dredgers, and who go back to 
 their business in August or September. Some of the 
 Southampton men may be found perhaps in the great 
 packet steamers out of the yachting season, but we 
 should say that, as a rule, few of the five or six 
 thousand men engaged every summer in the yacht- 
 ing service engage themselves for distant voyages in 
 the winter. A few yacht- owners, — especially naval 
 men, — prefer to employ man-of-war's men as more 
 amenable to discipline, and less disposed to give them- 
 selves fine gentlemen airs, than the Isle of Wight men. 
 Yet it may be questioned whether seamen accustomed 
 to the discipline of men-of-war make the best crew for 
 a yacht : seamen who have only served in square-rigged 
 ships are seldom the fittest for small fore-and-aft 
 rigged craft. A sailing-master who had only served 
 in square-rigged ships TYOuld be absolutely run away 
 with by one of these cutters or schooners which a 
 Cowes man c^n put through all the figures of a 
 skating-match ; or, as we once heard an old hand say, 
 "make her do everything but speak." It has been 
 suggested that every owner of a yacht bearing the 
 Admiralty warrant should, — by a general concert of 
 all the Royal Clubs, — undertake to employ no man 
 who had not joined the Eoyal Naval Reserve. Of 
 course the Admiralty could not take the initiative in 
 suggesting such a condition. But it would certainly 
 be a fair and honourable recognition, on the part of 
 yachtsmen, of the privileges they enjoy in consideration 
 
YACHTING. 207 
 
 of the services they are supposed to render to the 
 nation. JSTor, we think, could yacht sailors, although 
 perhaps more than any other class of seamen averse to 
 service in a man-of-war, decline employment on terms 
 which would involve no real hardship or interference 
 with their liberty, while their value as yacht sailors 
 would be sensibly enhanced, and the country would 
 receive a reinforcement of superior and available 
 seamen, sufficient in an emergency to take a flying 
 squadron to sea. 
 
 Many of our finest and roomiest schooners belong to 
 owners who seldom, if ever, transgress beyond the 
 sheltered waters of the Sol^^nt. Many never go beyond 
 Cherbourg, or the Channel Isles, or the western 
 ports. But, if there are conspicuously home-staying 
 yachts, there are also cruisers that have ^^ sailed beyond 
 the sunset and the baths of all the western stars," 
 doubled the Hope and the Horn, and encountered and 
 defied the icy gales of the Polar seas. Five-and-twenty 
 years ago the Wanderer schooner was astonishing 
 the natives of the South Sea Islands. In 1841 the 
 late Rajah Brooke made his memorable expedition to 
 the Eastern Archipelago in the Royalist, and founded 
 a kingdom. Need we cite the Corsair cutter, a famous 
 cup- winner in her time ? She defeated the Talisman 
 cutter, in a match from Cowes, round the Eddystone 
 and back in a gale of wind, by four minutes, and is 
 now, we believe, an ornament of Australian waters. 
 The Albatross cutter went out to Sydney, and so did 
 
208 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 the Chance schooner. The IS'ancy Dawson schooner 
 circumnavigated the globe. The Themis schooner 
 returned a year or two ago from a voyage round the 
 world. The famous Marquis of Waterford visited 
 New York in his brig, the Charlotte, and, the story 
 goes, jumped overboard in a gale of wind in the 
 Atlantic, for a wager. The Alerte cutter is remem- 
 bered at the Antipodes. The St. Ursula schooner 
 fetched New York in thirty days from the Clyde. 
 There are more British burgees than British pendants 
 in the Mediterranean every winter ; and, if proof were 
 wanting that the same spirit animates the fighting and 
 pleasure navy of Great Britain, and that our yachts 
 are not the butterflies of a summer hour, we might 
 recall the service of a schooner of the R.Y.S. on the 
 coast of Syria, when, in the absence of a man-of-war to 
 protect the Christians, she ancbored as close to the 
 shore as her draught of water would permit, and, with 
 her little deck guns run out and double-shotted, saved 
 the Christian population of a Syrian village from 
 massacre. 
 
 Every smnmer sees a fleet of British yachts hovering 
 round the coasts of Norway, while the owners are 
 salmon-fishing in the fiords. The late Sir Hyde 
 Parker, in the Louisa schooner, was, we believe, the 
 first to set the example. He has been followed, among 
 others, by Mr. Graves, M.P., Commodore of the Eoyal 
 Mersey Club, who published a most agreeable account 
 of his cruise in the lerne ; by Lord Dufferin, whose 
 
YACHTING. 209 
 
 delightful ''Letters from High Latitudes'' made the 
 Foam for ever famous, as the first British yacht that 
 ever showed her colours at Spitzbergen ; by Mr. Rath- 
 bone, Mr. Lament, Mr. Brassey ; and last, but not 
 least, by the little ten-ton Romp, which frisked one 
 fine morning into a Swedish harbour. A cutter of 
 that modest tonnage accompanied the British fleet to 
 the Baltic in 1854. These instances are enough to 
 show that our Transatlantic kinsmen performed no 
 superhuman exploit, when they crossed the Atlantic in 
 the Sjdvie, the American, the Gipsy, the Henrietta, 
 the Fleetwing, and the Vesta. If we are disposed to 
 smile at some owners of big schooners who seldom 
 venture out as far as the chops of the British Channel, 
 we may take comfort in knowing that many of our 
 American friends, who hail from the '' Elysian Fields," 
 are bantered by their countrymen for their very 
 moderate cruises up and down the Bay of New York. 
 But it is fair to remark, that out of the forty schooners 
 and sloops of which the New York Yacht Squadron is 
 composed, a very fair proportion have done more than 
 any yachts afloat to sustain the character of a sport of 
 all others most congenial to the energy and enterprise 
 of the Anglo-Saxon family. We shall neither exagge- 
 rate nor undervalue the importance of the visits of the 
 American yachts to our waters, when we say, that the 
 easy victory of the America schooner in the Solent 
 over eight English cutters and seven schooners in 
 August, 1857, was well won, though not quite on equal 
 
210 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 terms. The America was a vessel of 208 tons, O.M. ; 
 length over all 100 feet ; draught of water aft 10 feet , 
 beam 23 feet. She had crossed the Atlantic under: 
 reduced sj)ars and sails, and made a tolerably comfort- 
 able passage of it. But she was built all for racing, 
 and the English yachts that sailed against her were 
 about as fit to contend with her, as a roadster with a 
 winner of the Two Thousand. From the moment 
 when she came into English hands, and had her 
 bulwarks raised, and was converted into an ordinary 
 English yacht, her glory as a cup-winner departed. 
 She was beaten in the following year by the old Arrow 
 cutter, and by the Mosquito cutter, the latter, it is true, 
 a racer all over, and an excellent sea boat into the 
 bargain. 
 
 The American schooner Gipsy, which had beaten 
 the celebrated Maria sloop yacht in a breeze, and was 
 considered by her builders twenty- five per cent, faster 
 than the America, was sold in England, and handsomely 
 beaten in a private match by Mr. Weld's Alarm. 
 Both the America and the Gipsy were built for racing 
 only, and, though they crossed the Atlantic, were not 
 adapted to the ordinary service of an English yacht. 
 It is no reproach to a vessel to observe, that she could 
 only win in certain hands. Some horses are only good 
 to win when ridden by certain jockeys. The Americans 
 did their English yachting brethren valuable service in 
 showing them a longer, a finer, and a bolder bow, — the 
 bow of the America was almost that of a Japanese boat ; — 
 
YACHTING. 211 
 
 and in teaching them to lace their mainsails to the boom, 
 to make their canvas to stand as flat as a board, and to 
 set their masts up without a " rake." Perhaps the neces- 
 sity for lacing, however, is now superseded by the new 
 patent " graduated " sails. The three American yachts 
 which sailed a match from New York to Cowes in the 
 mid-winter of 1866, would certainly have found many 
 dangerous competitors in a match in the British 
 Channel. These schooners were not like the America, 
 mere racing craft ; their sea- going qualities were 
 tested to the utmost at every point in the course 
 of a stormy Atlantic passage, and were found not 
 unequal to the strain. Handled, as they were, with 
 admirable skill and courage, they fully deserved all the 
 honours they received. They are vessels of much 
 greater power, however, than their reputed tonnage 
 represents. According to the English system of ad- 
 measurement, they would show a much higher register. 
 Their spars and sails were such as only a vessel of 
 extraordinary power could carry with safety. In a 
 gale of wind there is scarcely an English yacht that 
 could beat them. In light winds, and a time race over 
 a short course, their powerful qualities would probably be 
 of little avail against yachts more lightly rigged and 
 ballasted. But British yachtsmen would do well to 
 note, that the Americans made the Atlantic passage 
 under comparatively easy sail, and that, of the three 
 rivals, the winner of the stakes was the most cautiously 
 and snugly sailed. In their internal fittings, comfort 
 
212 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 was certainly sacrificed, in some measure, to racing] 
 considerations. Kor does this detract from the merits 
 of the craft. There is a possibility, we hear, though] 
 not, we fear, a probability, of a match being made tc 
 New York from Ryde. One spirited yachtsman- 
 member of the Royal London — has put down his nam( 
 for £500 towards a prize. We should be glad to se( 
 such a match contested by some of our crack schooners, 
 It would teach them the folly of " carr^dng on," an( 
 persuade our j^acht builders and owners to trust mor< 
 to trim and shape and seamanship than to excessive 
 spars and driving canvas, and a dead weight of lead or 
 iron ballast laid along from floor to keel to counteract 
 the "tophamper." On all accounts, it would be credit- 
 able to English yachtsmen to respond to the generous 
 challenge of their kinsmen bej^ond the Atlantic by 
 appearing in the Bay of New York with their racing- J 
 flags at the fore. * 
 
 About a quarter of a century ago an active and 
 zealous member of the R.Y.S., who owned a fine sea- I 
 going cutter of the old school, proposed to sail a match 
 against all the world round the British Islands. His 
 offer was treated as a joke; but it pointed at least in 
 the right direction, as a protest against the then pre- 
 vailing habit of keeping yachts for racing only, and 
 without reference to sea- going capabilities. In those 
 days an evil analogous to that which still afflicts the 
 Turf flourished in the yachting world, and produced 
 similar efiects. The practice of running two-year- olds. 
 
YACHTING. 213 
 
 and of training for higli speed for short distances, has 
 resulted, if we are to believe the most trustworthy 
 testimony, in deteriorating the breed of useful horses 
 in this country, — that is, of hunters, roadsters, and 
 carriage horses. In like manner the production of a 
 class of vessels good for racing only, and utterly unfit 
 for any other purpose, threatened to deprive yachting 
 of all its substantial merits as a national sport. Yachts 
 without a bulkhead or any cabin fittings were sent 
 round the coast to all the regattas, under the charge 
 of a special sailing-master and a scratch crew. These 
 cup-hunters were worn and torn to pieces by this 
 usage, and good for nothing except to race, and race, 
 and race again, while yachts which stood no chance 
 in a sailing-match under such conditions were fulfilling 
 regularly all the purposes of seaworthy and sea-going 
 craft. It is highly praiseworthy on the part of the 
 sailing committees of the leading clubs that they should 
 have seen the error of this invidious distinction between 
 racing and sea- going vessels, and have resolved to put 
 an end to a most injurious system. There is, unfor- 
 tunately, as yet, no permanent and general committee 
 of reference, analogous to the Jockey Club, and com- 
 posed of flag ofiicers of the Royal Yacht Clubs, to 
 draw up and interpret a code of rules and regulations 
 applicable to all yacht- racing, and enforced by all 
 clubs bearing the Admiralty warrant, for the summary 
 settlement of all disputes. This is a desideratum which 
 we have good reason to hope will be supplied ere long, 
 
Zii BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 thanks to the efforts of the most eminent yachtsmen, 
 particularly of the present Commodore and Yice- 
 Commodore of the Royal Victoria Yacht Club, who 
 have always insisted on sea-going trim for all matches 
 within their jurisdiction. Already, we would fain 
 believe, the days are past and gone when, in a race, 
 men were stowed away below to run over from side 
 to side of the yacht as she lay over on either tack, 
 to trim her as she turned, because every pound of 
 ballast had been shelled out to lighten her. The bad 
 practice of shifting or trimming ballast has been 
 decisively condemned by nearly all the leading clubs 
 of the three kingdoms. There is, however, a diversity 
 of opinion, not so much upon the practice itself as upon 
 the means of preventing it. One of the great difficulties 
 of prevention is the want of uniformity in the rules 
 of the various clubs. It has been suggested that a 
 simple rule forbidding yachts engaged in a match to 
 carry more than their proper complement of hands, — 
 one for every ten tons, — would meet the case. All 
 hands would thus be wanted on deck, and none could 
 be spared below. Each vessel might be required to 
 send a representative on board another to certify that 
 the rules of the race were strictly observed. Occasion- 
 ally difficulties arise in a contest which only a central 
 board of reference, applying a carefull}^- considered 
 code of rules, can adjust. For example,' it was once 
 an almost universally accepted sailing regulation that 
 yachts could not anchor during a race without forfeiting 
 
YACHTING. 215 
 
 the prize. Some years since, in a match on the Thames, 
 a coal-smack came bearing down upon the winning 
 yacht, and the latter, eager not to lose an inch of the 
 way, and trusting in vain that the huge barge would 
 put her helm up, held on her course until, to save 
 herself from a collision, she was compelled to drop her 
 kedge. Notwithstanding this mishap, the famous little 
 Phantom got her anchor up, and was off again the 
 moment the danger was passed, and, still leading, held 
 on her way, rounding the flag-buoy nine minutes 
 before the Mystery, gaining on her every mile to the 
 end of the race, and finally winning in a canter. A 
 protest was entered when her owner claimed the cup, 
 because he had dropped his kedge, though she was 
 winning easy from first to last, and only anchored for 
 a moment to avoid destruction. Here was a case in 
 which a general Committee of Eeference would have 
 quashed a most unreasonable protest, and assigned the 
 cup to the unquestionable winner. The JS'ew York 
 Yacht Club, whose sailing regulations appear to be 
 most carefully drawn, permits anchoring during a race, 
 and it can hardly be doubted that the permission is, 
 on the whole, judicious; although, in the case of a 
 drifting match in a dead calm with a strong tide 
 running, the reason for forbidding a contesting yacht 
 to anchor is obvious enough. Some other questions 
 have lately been under consideration of the Sailing- 
 Committees, such as the restrictions upon canvas and 
 spars in match- sailing. Oj)inions are much divided 
 
216 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 on these points. Some would insist on racing yachts 
 being restricted to "all plain sail;" others demand 
 unlimited liberty of canvas. Without presuming to 
 speak dogmatically on the subject, we would take the 
 liberty to suggest the possibility of fixing a happy 
 medium between the pedantry of restriction to all plain 
 sail only, and the ingenious devices which are carried 
 to excess in the Thames. Of the two extremes of 
 license or restriction, surely the former is the less 
 objectionable. Wetting sails, or " skeeting," may 
 fairly be left to the discretion of each yacht. The 
 principles enforced in yacht-racing, it should not be 
 forgotten, are apt to affect the whole character of 
 yachting as a national sport. We should not regret 
 any regulations which would tend to the reduction in 
 ordinary cruising of both spars and canvas. The 
 complaint of all good sailing-masters of crack yachts 
 now is that they are over-ballasted, over-canvassed, 
 over-sparred. Keduce the sails and the sticks, and 
 there is no need of a lead lining to the kelson to make 
 the yacht stiff enough in a sea-way. Reduce the heavy 
 ballast and the spars at once, and the wear and tear 
 of the vessel will be proportionately decreased, and, 
 with the wear and tear, the continued necessity for 
 repairs on the patent slip. Yachts, like men-of-war, 
 seldom come to grief in a sea-way, because they are 
 admirably found and handled ; they wear out rapidly 
 because they are torn to pieces by excessive spars, and 
 b}^ the yachtsman's proverbial love of " carrying on," 
 
YACHTING. 217 
 
 as if a vessel could be driven faster by dragging ber 
 lee quarter tbrougb tbe sea. 
 
 Tbere can be no doubt of tbe progressive improve- 
 ment in yacbt-building during tbe last twenty years. 
 Cutters like tbe Hebe, tbe Ganymede, tbe Aurora, — 
 wbicb were considered prodigies of speed and beauty 
 in tbeir day, would appear to tbe present generation 
 of yacbtsmen as antiquated as tbe Great Harry among 
 tbe Cbannel fleet. Tbese goodly old tubs, witb tbeir 
 bluff bows and flat floors, possessed qualities not to be 
 despised even in our time, and not always found in 
 tbe faster and more elegant craft of a later date. Tbey 
 were stiff", weatberly, safe, powerful, and comfortable 
 vessels, fit for any service, not absolutely dull sailers 
 on a wind, and, witb tbeir sbeets eased off" tbe least 
 bit, speedy enougb to sail round and round a square- 
 rigged sbip under a press of canvas, as if sbe were 
 at ancbor. Perbaps tbey plunged ratber beavily in 
 a sbort confused Cbannel lop, but tbey would lay to 
 in tbe beaviest gale " like a duck,^' and run before tbe 
 fiercest following sea witbout taking a pailful of water 
 on deck. Tbey steered like a boat, and on sbort tacks 
 in smootb water bebaved witb all tbe nimbleness and 
 alertness of tbe airiest of waltzers in a crowded ball- 
 room. To tbe yacbts of to-day, tbey were wbat tbe 
 racc-borses of two generations back were to tbe 
 favourites for tbis year's Derby, — slower for sbort 
 distances, less fine about tbe legs, but stouter, more 
 serviceable, and more enduring. As roadsters or 
 
 p 
 
218 BRITISH SPORTS AIND PASTIMES. 
 
 teamsters of the sea, they were unexceptionably sure- 
 footed, safe, and clever goers. To judge from a 
 specimen, exhibited in a Club-house, of the timbers 
 of a schooner-yacht, purchased by one of the most 
 experienced of our yachtsmen, we should not hesitate 
 to add that these vessels of the old school were built 
 with a solidity and a sincerity which are now as rarely 
 to be found in the construction of our yachts as in the 
 walls of our town houses. Nor must it be supposed 
 that there was no such thing as racing-power in the 
 yachts of that ancient epoch. Happily we can appeal 
 to two survivors of the pre- American period to rebuke 
 the conceit of an age which is apt to fancy it has 
 nothing to learn from its grandfathers. Look at the 
 old Alarm and the old Arrow, both designed by that 
 immortal yachtsman, the late Mr. Weld. The Arrow 
 was built more than six-and-thirty years ago. After 
 her defeat by the Pearl, — a famous cutter of that 
 period, belonging to the Marquis of Anglesey, — Mr. 
 Weld laid her up on the mud, in disgrace, and built 
 the Alarm, as a cutter. I^either as a cutter, nor under 
 her later rig as a schooner, could the Alarm find her 
 equal, on either side of the Atlantic, while she remained 
 in Mr. Weld's hands. Her victories were as many 
 as the matches she sailed in. The Arrow, after 
 languishing some years, was bought by Mr. Chamber- 
 lay ne, who lengthened her bow. She defeated the 
 America in splendid style, and, until the present 
 summer, had only been beaten by a younger sister 
 
YACHTING. 219 
 
 of her own, — the Lulworth, a cufter some twenty-two 
 tons smaller, and designed also by Mr. Weld. In 
 1863 she defeated the Phryne, a cutter then just 
 launched by one of the ablest and most successful of 
 our yacht-builders, and which has since become 
 renowned for her achievements. 
 
 There is, we fear, considerable faultiness in the 
 materials of which yachts are built at present, and 
 if yacht- builders wore exposed to the searching 
 criticisms of a committee on the Naval Estimates, 
 some damaging exposures might be made of the state 
 of a yacht's timbers after two years' service. We are 
 bound to express our belief that, if unsound timber 
 is put into a yacht, the owner has often himself to 
 thank for the purchase of a bad article. There is no 
 warranty of the soundness of a yacht's timbers, as of 
 the wind and limb of a horse. Nine out of ten yachts- 
 men build or buy their vessels in the dark. They 
 seldom, if ever, take the trouble to have the vessel 
 rigorously and systematically inspected while she is 
 on the builder's slip. Perhaps they leave this duty 
 of inspection to the future sailing-master, who is a 
 native of the place, and who cannot be expected to 
 quarrel with the builder. Probably, in most cases, 
 they would not be much the wiser if they depended 
 on their own inspection. Then they are almost in- 
 variably in a desperate hurry to get the yacht finished 
 and fitted out, and it may be absolutely impossible 
 for the most honest of builders to provide properly 
 
220 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 seasoned timbers at the shortest notice. The majority 
 of yachtsmen who buy their yessels, — and who should 
 be advised never to buy between April and October, — 
 are at once too hasty and too uninstructed to pronounce 
 an opinion between a sound and an unsound vessel. 
 They rush down, with a return ticket, to Cowes, look 
 at the yachts " on the mud," take a fancy to one, go 
 on board, ask the price, rush back to town, and buy ; 
 engage a sailing-master, probably a Cowes man, and 
 leave to him all the business of fitting out. Among all 
 the owners whose names appear in Hunt's List, very 
 few are qualified to command their vessels. They may 
 be able to steer, and perhaps to sail them ; but very 
 few know anything of the mysteries of the rope- walk, 
 the building-slip, and the mould-loft, — of sailmakers, 
 of furnishing ironmongers, brass- founders, ship-chand- 
 lers, and other necessary cormorants. The consequence 
 is that many yachtsmen are disgusted at the incessant 
 and everlasting wear and tear, which makes up so 
 much of the cost of the sport. Yet there is really no 
 natural or necessary reason why yachting should be 
 more expensive than fox-hunting. A man who makes 
 his yacht his home for half the year ought to live 
 more economically than he can ashore ; — he gets his 
 wine and groceries and spirits free of duty ; he has 
 no travelling expenses when he goes abroad. In 
 travelling with a wife and famil}^, a yacht is at once 
 a saving and a convenience. We say nothing of the 
 comfort of carrying a little England with us wherever 
 
YACHTING. 221 
 
 we go, and of sleeping at home among our own people. 
 What, in fact, are the legitimate expenses of a yacht ? 
 For something like £26 a ton you can build or buy 
 a new yacht, in all respects ready for sea, — excepting 
 iron ballast, — with bedding and blankets complete. 
 The cost of a suit of sails may be estimated by the 
 following proportions : — A suit of racing sails for a 
 twenty-five ton cutter would cost about £125 ; for 
 a fifty-ton cutter, about £160. Wages have risen 
 considerably within the last ten years. At present the 
 rate is scarcely less than twenty-five or twenty-six 
 shillings per week for an able seaman, — finding himself 
 in food, but not in clothes ; thirty-two shillings for 
 the mate, — who looks after gear and stores, from a 
 needle to an anchor, and should be able to lay his 
 hand on what he wants in a moment on the darkest 
 night ; and for the sailing-master, who takes care of 
 the yacht during the winter, an annual salary of 120 
 to 150 guineas, or more, according to the size of the 
 yacht. Then there is the cook, at, say, seven- and- 
 twenty shillings a week ; and the steward, — supposing 
 him not to be the owner's own servant, — thirty 
 shillings. All these expenses, however, vary according 
 to the size of the yacht and the caprice of the owner. 
 They vary much according to the rig of the vessel. 
 Four men and a boy, — exclusive of sailing-master and 
 steward, — should be sufficient for a forty-eight ton 
 cutter or a sixty ton schooner ; seven men and a boy 
 for a sixty-five ton cutter, or a ninety ton schooner. 
 
222 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 A cutter is always tlie most expensive of all rigs, and 
 a fore-and-aft schooner the least expensive. Between 
 the cutter and the fore-and-aft schooner comes the 
 yawl. The insurance of a yacht whilst cruising would 
 be something like ten per cent, per month ; and against 
 fire only, when in harbour or dismantled, a maximum 
 of seven shillings per cent. 
 
 Cutters will always be a favourite rig for racing 
 and Channel cruising, because nothing touches them 
 in light weather and in beating to windward. But 
 in a gale of wind, the taking in of a cutter's main- 
 sail, and " stepping " the boom, is like putting a 
 strait- waistcoat on a madman. A yawl has nearly 
 all the speed of a cutter, looks almost as close to the 
 wind, and has the inestimable advantage of a reduced 
 mainsail and boom, and may be sailed very snug in 
 heavy weather under her mizen and headsails only. 
 In a schooner the foretopsails are of very little use, 
 except, perhaps, for running. The fore-and-aft 
 schooner requires fewer hands, because all her sails 
 can be sent up from the deck ; and if she chooses to 
 indulge herself in jibheaded topsails, she can send 
 them up " flying." We believe there is no rig at once 
 so easy, so safe, and so cheap as this. Since "the 
 good old commodore'' Lord Yarborough's little frigate, 
 the Falcon, there has, if we are not mistaken, only 
 been one ship-yacht, the Sylphide, built at Bremen, 
 and when last in commission, in the Mediterranean, 
 belonging to the Marquis of Downshire. We know 
 
YACHTING. 223 
 
 of only one considerable lugger yacht, tlie New 
 Moon, built for Lord Willougbby D'Eresby, by 
 Firth of Hastings. She is, in fact, an enormous 
 boat, 136 feet long, and only 11 feet beam, and even 
 in fine weather and smooth water must require a 
 large and powerful crew. In bad w^eather and in 
 *' blue water " she would be simply impossible. Steam 
 yachts appear to be decidedly and rapidly on the 
 increase, and we must honestly confess we regret the 
 fact. A small auxiliary lifting screw may be useful 
 in a calm ; but, however small, it must seriously inter- 
 fere with the comfort of the vessel, even when the 
 engines are not in motion. If a yachtsman prefers a 
 steamer, it would be impertinent to call his fancy to 
 account, but, for our own poor part, we cannot under- 
 stand screw - driving for pleasure. A voyage in a 
 steamer is bad enough when it is for business. If 
 there must be steam yachts, let them be steamers out 
 and out, and not attempt to combine the schooner and 
 ttie dispatch-boat. 
 
 For home cruising a comparatively short comple- 
 ment of hands is enough, even for a cutter; for 
 foreign cruising, few hands are a false economy. It is 
 perhaps advisable to have two sets of sails and of 
 rigging, the one for home, and the other for foreign, 
 cruising. One result of the want of concert among 
 clubs, and of a common code of regulations for yachts 
 and yachtsmen, is the frequent difficulty of preserving 
 discipline, in crews which too often include '^ sea- 
 
224 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 lawyers " and long-shore loafers. Nor is this always 
 the fault of the seamen. Yacht-owners are apt to be 
 too easy-going or too fidgety. The crews have too 
 much idle time or too much fussy duty. There is 
 supposed to be a black list kept at all the clubs, in 
 which the names of men discharged for insubordina- 
 tion or bad conduct are inserted, so as to prevent 
 their further employment. But as these lists are not 
 exchanged between the different clubs, a man who is 
 black-listed at Cowes or Kyde may get a berth at 
 Plymouth or at Cork. And there are too many 
 instances of a man discharged from one yacht getting 
 a berth, — probably through the sailing-master, — in 
 another yacht of the same squadron, lying in the same 
 roadstead. 
 
 An essay on Yachting would be incomplete without 
 some mention of the most famous racing- cruisers of 
 recent years. We say racing-cruisers advisedly, be- 
 cause these celebrated vessels do not sacrifice the sea- 
 going to the racing qualities. The fastest schooners 
 now afloat are the Aline and the Bluebell, built by 
 Camper and Nicholson; the Egeria, by Wanhill; the 
 Pantomime and the Gloriana, by Patsey ; the Cambria, 
 by Inman. Among the cutters, the most remarkable 
 for speed are the Yanguard, built by Patsey ; the 
 Hirondelle, by Wanhill ; the Yindex, built by the 
 Millwall Iron Y^orks Company; the Phryne and 
 the Niobe, by Hatcher of Southampton ; the Fiona, 
 by Fife of Glasgow ; the Sphinx, by Maudslay of 
 
YACHTING. 225 
 
 the Thames ; the veteran Mosquito, by Mare ; and, 
 although lately defeated, the venerable old Arrow, 
 whose owner was politely requested some years ago 
 by a correspondent of Bell's Life to renounce contests 
 which must be unequal. 
 
 One of the most remarkable sailing -matches was 
 the Royal Victoria Ocean Match from Ryde to Cher- 
 bourg in 1863. It was run in a gale of wind, and 
 won in capital style by one of the most gallant and 
 generous of yachtsmen, Mr. Thomas Broadwood, in 
 the Galatea schooner ; the Commodore Thellusson's 
 schooner, the Aline, leading the way with the most 
 liberal ease, and being safely anchored and made snug 
 in Cherbourg roads when the racing squadron passed 
 the breakwater. These Channel matches deserve every 
 encouragement. They tend to make sea-going the 
 rule of yachting ; they create a bond of union between 
 different clubs ; and the only objection we have heard 
 to them is, that they take the yachts away from their 
 stations, and so injure the trade of the local shop- 
 keepers, — an objection which does not strike us as 
 being very formidable. When the yachting world 
 shall possess an institution analogous to the Jockey 
 Club, it will perhaps deal not only with the questions 
 of shifting ballast and restrictions upon canvas in 
 matches, but will abolish the present unsatisfactory 
 system of time for tonnage, which, whether half a 
 minute for one class or a quarter of a minute for 
 another, is full of absurdity and injustice. Were no 
 
226 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 time for tonnage allowed, yachts would naturally range 
 themselves in broad classes within certain limits of 
 tonnage, and the public would have the satisfaction 
 of seeing the winning vessel declared the winner. If 
 this should be considered too sweeping a change, at 
 least it would be desirable to fix a uniform system of 
 admeasurement for racing allowances. 
 
 Have we justified the " distinction " we claimed 
 for Yachting as the most emphatically characteristic 
 of all our national sports? Consider the amount of 
 money spent every year by private gentlemen in the 
 British Islands in building, fitting out, and repairing 
 this magnificent fleet of 1,740 vessels ; the number of 
 seamen they employ, — of seamen's families they 
 support, — -the spirit of maritime adventure and enter- 
 prise they promote among the population of the coasts, 
 — the heroic founders of colonies, and pioneers of 
 commerce and civilisation they have sent out, — the 
 help and succour they have sometimes carried to their 
 countrymen amidst the sufferings and hardships of 
 distant wars and protracted campaigns ! Is it not a 
 cause for satisfaction that the Yachtsmen of the United 
 Kingdom are increasing in numbers year by year ; 
 and that to go down to the sea in their own ships, and 
 carry the flag of their country at their own mastheads, 
 is a passion of hundreds of our country gentlemen, 
 who cannot be persuaded to live at home at ease ? 
 
ON EOWmG. 
 
 There is a large 23art of the Britisli public to wlioni 
 the name of rowing recalls only the great annual con- 
 test at Putney, as horse-racing recalls nothing but the 
 Derby. And it is not without reasons that the attrac- 
 tions of the former event are beginning almost to rival 
 those of the great English festival. A very phlegmatic 
 nature is needed to resist the attractions of such races 
 as those of 1866 and 1867. When Hammersmith 
 Bridge is a black festoon of human beings, swarming 
 like bees, — when a score of over-loaded steamboats are 
 jostling each other for the lead, — when a crowd four 
 miles long is covering the banks and choking the roads 
 from Putney to Mortlake, and the two racing crews 
 dash past, oar to oar, each with its eight human 
 machines driven by fiercely-compressed excitement 
 instead of steam, — at such a moment philosophers find 
 it hard to refrain from shouting, and ladies from crying. 
 Mr. Skey himself would, we fancy, forget the very ex- 
 istence of heart diseases, and the most unbending hater 
 of muscular Christianity will, for a moment, set his 
 
228 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 teetli hard and clencli his fists as tliougli they grasped 
 an oar. 
 
 " That needs must be a glorious minute 
 Wlien a crowd has but one soul within it," 
 
 as Sir Francis Doyle very truly observes, a propos to 
 the St. Leger ; and even the excitement of a Doncaster 
 crowd of genuine Yorkshiremen may be matched on 
 the Thames, where, happily, there is less money on the 
 event, but where nobler animals than horses, — for even 
 rowing men have souls, according to theologians, — are 
 struggling for victory. 
 
 Yet if we had to give the intelligent foreigner of 
 fiction a taste of the genuine rowing fervour, we should 
 take him to a difierent scene, where true amateurs are 
 not swamped in a crowd of noisy spectators. We would 
 place him, for example, somewhere below Sandford, or 
 halfway between Baitsbite and Clayhithe, some three 
 we^ks before Easter. A bitter March wind should be 
 curling the surface of Nuneham Keach, or tormenting 
 even the sullen Cam into a feeble imitation of rough 
 water. Presently a little knot of men, on foot and on 
 horseback, should approach us at a round trot, and the 
 University crew come swinging with a long sweeping 
 stroke round a corner. As the oars touch the water 
 the boat bounds forward, and sends a long wave wash- 
 ing through the reeds. To inexperienced eyes the 
 crew seems to exhibit a faultless precision of style ; 
 but some sagacious mentor, who is watching every 
 
ROWING. 229 
 
 action with, the eager solemnity of a general preparing 
 for battle, occasionally breaks tbe silence by shouting 
 a hypercritical observation at the top of his voice. 
 "Two/^ it would seem, is not getting far enough for- 
 wards, or " Four " is rowing himself up to his oar, or 
 " Seven" running away with the stroke. The accom- 
 panying crowd watches every motion, without daring 
 to utter a sound above their breaths ; and the whole 
 phenomenon speaks of a vigorous purpose, as though 
 eight-oared boats were by no means playthings, but 
 part of our national defences. I may perhaps assume 
 that my intelligent foreigner would not be anxious to 
 follow this singular running procession, and that he 
 would turn to me for some explanation to satisfy his 
 curiosity. I will attempt to give the substance of the 
 dialogue that would probably ensue. 
 
 What, my friend would ask, — especially if he were a 
 German, — is the ground- idea of this phenomenon ? 
 Are these fine lads at work by way of discharging a 
 religious duty ? Or is it with a view to promoting 
 their health ? Or is it possible that some insular idio- 
 syncrasy leads them to take pleasure in voluntarily 
 undergoing the discipline of the galleys ? In short, 
 how do you account for the spectacle we have just 
 witnessed ? 
 
 To this I should reply after the manner of ancient 
 philosophers by asking another question. What are 
 the conditions the perfect fulfilment of which would 
 entitle a sport to be the best of all actual or con- 
 
230 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 ceivable sports? And here would follow a Socratic dia- 
 logue, wliich I suppress for several reasons ; — firstly, 
 a Socratic dialogue is a bore to the reader, in the hands 
 of any but a master ; secondly, it is very difficult to 
 bring it to the desired inference ; and thirdly, the Saint 
 Pauls Magazine, like Mr. Weller's vision, is limited. 
 I will therefore take the liberty of jumping at once to 
 the conclusion. We are finally agreed, I should say 
 at the end of a brilliant display of logical fence, that 
 that sport is the best which affords the amplest scope 
 for the employment of the greatest number of the 
 highest faculties ; or, in other words, which is the best 
 trial of the skill which makes the body a perfect in- 
 strimient of the mind, of the muscular strength and 
 general power of endurance, and therein of the high 
 moral quality known vulgarly as "pluck," and, finally, 
 of the various intellectual powers which are necessary 
 to success in any game that deserves much expenditure 
 of energy. Let us consider rowing under each of these 
 heads, and if it has not the first place in all, I think it 
 must be admitted that as a combination of the three it 
 occupies the highest place amongst all known athletic 
 sports. We will first take the question of skill. 
 
 There, the intelligent foreigner would remark, you 
 must admit your case to be weak. Bowing appears to 
 be the amusement of all others in which brute force 
 has the highest value as compared with a trained 
 and cultivated application of inferior powers. Your 
 great brawny University oarsmen are very fine-looking 
 
ROWING. 231 
 
 lads ; they may remind one of tlie gigantic Gauls and 
 Germans who used to astonish the feebler races of the 
 south ; but you must admit that they are a trifle 
 clumsj^, or, at least, that grace is not precisely their 
 strong point. They may have the loins of a bullock 
 and the arms of a blacksmith ; but one would scarcely 
 pick them out £ls promising pupils for a dancing- 
 master ; they come of the race which prefers boxing 
 to fencing, and would bear down its antagonists by 
 sheer weight rather than gracefully transfix them by 
 superior skill. 
 
 There is, I should reply, a grain of truth in your 
 remark, but it shows that your powders of observation 
 require to be trained by a little more experience in the 
 art. It is quite true that strength does more to secure 
 success in rowing than in such games as cricket, tennis, 
 or billiards. The weakest point about it is, in fact, 
 that it does not involve much training of the eye. It , 
 has often been observed that nothing is more curious 
 in its way than the extreme delicacy of perception and 
 power of instinctive calculation that is brought out in 
 some popular games. To perform a difficult stroke at 
 billiards implies a combination of different powers 
 which is little short of the marvellous. Two or three 
 red and white surfaces upon a green ground form an 
 image on the retina from which the eye, by an uncon- 
 scious process, infers the position of certain balls on a 
 table. Then by an instinctive calculation the mind 
 determines the precise force and direction in which one 
 
232 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 of the balls is to be propelled, and tbe mode in wbicb 
 it is to rotate so as to produce a given result. Finally, 
 the arm has, by a single blow with the cue, to execute 
 the orders thus given, making a spontaneous allowance 
 for the distorting effect of perspective. The delicacy 
 with which the action of the various muscles called 
 into play has to be combined is almost inconceivable, 
 and the most refined mathematical analysis would fail 
 to solve the problem, whose conditions a good player 
 learns to satisfy instinctively. There is certainly little 
 in rowing to correspond to this wonderful delicacy, 
 which is illustrated on a different scale in such games 
 as cricket and tennis. And yet, there is ample oppor- 
 tunity for a display of skill, which, it is true, is apt to 
 be ignored by a casual observer. A looker-on judges 
 of skill in two ways, — by noticing the results or the 
 causes. In the majority of games he looks chiefly to 
 results. A spectator of a game at cricket sees that a 
 ball is caught or a stump displaced, and admires the 
 skill of the players accordingly. Unless he has a very 
 keen eye, trained by long experience, he cannot judge 
 of a player by his action with any great certainty. 
 "We can see that a target is hit, but we cannot in the 
 least tell by looking at the rifleman whether he is a 
 good shot or a bad one ; we can see that he avoids 
 certain gross pieces of awkwardness, but no eyes are 
 microscoj)ic enough to tell whether he is bringing his 
 muscles into that perfect harmony which is necessary 
 to secure the desired result; it is impossible for any 
 
ROWING. 233 
 
 observer to judge of the performer's keenness of vision 
 except by arguing backwards from bis bits. Tbe tele- 
 graphic communication between eye and band takes 
 place through a set of wires which are entirely hidden 
 from our sight. When, however, a man is successful 
 in a competition of this kind, everybody may be an 
 almost equally good judge of the performance. JSTow 
 rowing exemplifies the opposite case. Here the result 
 generally escapes our notice. A good observer can tell 
 with considerable accuracy the pace at which an eight- 
 oared boat is going through the water, though it is apt 
 to be affected by many causes for which we cannot 
 make the proper allowance, but it requires further 
 experience to know which of the oarsmen is chiefly 
 contributing to the result. You, my intelligent friend, 
 see eight men swinging backwards and forwards, and 
 are happily unconscious that one is a model of every 
 perfection, and that another scarcely deserves his place 
 in the crew. To you they resemble each other as the 
 sheep in a flock resemble each other to every one but 
 the shepherd, or dogs in a pack to every one but the 
 huntsman, or niggers to every one but a slave-dealer 
 or a missionary. The reason is that rowing has one 
 thing in common with sculpture and other high arts. 
 A statue of first-rate excellence may be copied so 
 closely that it requires a practised eye to discover the 
 difference, and a delicate mathematical instrument to 
 measure it ; and yet the copy may be immeasurably 
 inferior to the original. The whole merit depends 
 
 Q 
 
234 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 upon the last refined touclies, — the delicate manipula- 
 tion which eludes any of the rough tests which we can 
 applv. And so between the first-rate oarsman and a 
 respectable imitator there are imperceptible shades of 
 difibrence which must be felt rather than seen. If one 
 man's oar strikes the water an inch further forwards 
 than another's, it makes a difierence which may deter- 
 mine the fate of a race. If another allows the rest of 
 the crew to anticipate him by an imperceptible fraction 
 of a second, he may shirk half his labour. A gain of 
 an inch in a stroke would win the University race by 
 more lengths than decided the race of last year. 
 Hence the distinction between a winning and a losing 
 crew may depend upon this last refinement of polish in 
 the individual oarsmen and the skill with which the 
 crews are combined. That "coach" whose stentorian 
 remonstrances to "Four" and "Seven" excited your 
 astonishment was engaged in this delicate work ; he 
 was the sculptor finishing his statue by touches imper- 
 ceptible to vulgar eyes ; the manufacturer who is con- 
 scious that the success of his instruments may be 
 damaged by the smallest touch of rust, or by the 
 most trifling imperfection in one of the joints of the 
 machinery ; the poet who knows that perfection of 
 form is as necessary to the genuine vitality of his work 
 as force and vigour of conception, 'Now you will 
 perhaps understand what is the merit of rowing con- 
 sidered as an exhibition of skill. Inexperienced per- 
 sons see little of the higher refinements of the art ; but 
 
ROWING. 235 
 
 a connoisseur lias a field for his observations scarcely 
 equalled in any other game. The great art of '' coach- 
 ing," — a term which I must assume my foreigner to 
 understand, — has acquired an exceptional development 
 in rowing, or, in other words, the theory of the right 
 mode of applying force has been more carefully elabo- 
 rated there than elsewhere. In cricket, a man practises 
 bowling till by frequent applications of the rule of 
 thumb he has found out how to produce the desired 
 efiect, and the consequences of his skill soon make 
 themselves felt. But in rowing we have to apply a 
 more delicate, critical process, and to judge from a 
 man's form, — that is, from minute peculiarities in his 
 attitudes, — whether or not he is an effective workman. 
 To all which, I must add, that the tendency of every 
 modern improvement is to make rowing more of a fine 
 art, and less of a mere rough contest of strength. In 
 old days, two crews simply set to work with raw, 
 uncultivated strength, shoving a heavy bulk by main 
 force through the water. In the graceful skiffs of the 
 present day it is essential that strength should be 
 applied at the right moment and in perfect harmony ; 
 that the boat should be kej)t steady, that it should be 
 neither jerked nor pressed downwards, but propelled 
 by a steady force in precisely the right direction. It 
 is the difference between cutting off a man's leg with a 
 hatchet and amputating it with proper surgical instru- 
 ments. And when all the necessary conditions have 
 been fulfilled, the sight of a man applying his power 
 
236 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 SO as to produce the greatest possible effect, is one in 
 which, the connoisseur may recognise a skill equal to 
 that of arts far more refined in appearance. 
 
 Well, replies my inquisitive friend, I am not con- 
 vinced by vour ingenious argimient ; — this sentence has 
 the merit of paying an indirect compliment to myself, 
 and of being obviously true, for no man is ever con- 
 vinced on such points till he can judge for himself; — 
 but perhaps you can make a stronger case upon the 
 other heads. 
 
 There, I reply, you are certainly right. No one 
 can doubt that, whatever else rowing may be, it is an 
 admirable trial of pluck. It is, with one exception, the 
 only out-of-door sport practised by gentlemen for which 
 any serious training is undertaken ; and training may 
 be defined as the art of developing pluck. There are, 
 as all moralists know, certain virtues which depend 
 directly upon our physical organs. No man can be 
 thoroughly healthy in mind who has a bad digestion. 
 It is said that Calvinism was eradicated from a certain 
 district in America simply by drainage. A thorough 
 system of drains improved the general tone of health, 
 and put an end not only to agues, but to the gloomy 
 spirit favourable to unpleasant doctrine about predesti- 
 nation. On the same principle, courage is intimately 
 connected with a vigorous condition of body. It is 
 physically possible to go through efforts after a few 
 weeks' regular living which would have knocked you 
 up at the beginning of the period ; but training, if we 
 
ROWING. 237 
 
 look at it from a general point of view, should raise a 
 man's courage, not only by diminishing the painful 
 obstacles arising from excessive fat and other evils that 
 flesh is heir to, but by more directly raising the morale 
 of the subject. A trainer has not done half his work 
 who allows his crew ever to get out of spirits, to con- 
 template the possibility of disaster, or to dwell upon 
 their own fanciful or real ailments. A man about to 
 start in a severe race should not only be clear in com- 
 plexion, and well- developed in muscle, but should have 
 the hearty confident smile which, being translated, 
 means "death or victory." There is, as I have said, 
 only one other game which, in this respect, is com- 
 parable, and it perhaps is superior to rowing, — namel}^, 
 running. A man at the end of four miles on land is, 
 on an average, far more fatigued than after four miles 
 on water. His heart has by that time become totally 
 irreconcilable with his other internal arrangements ; it 
 seems to be jumping into his mouth, knocking at his 
 ribs, and swelling as though, like a young cuckoo, it 
 considered all neighbouring organs as intruders to be 
 crowded out. Running is perhaps pre-eminent as a 
 means for giving a man a sensation suggestive of 
 sudden death ; but in other respects it falls far short of 
 rowing. It develops less skill, for the directions which 
 can be given as to style in running are comparatively 
 few, and an awkward runner more frequently wins by 
 sheer superiority of lungs or legs. And, as I may 
 presently have to remark, it is a very inferior trial of 
 
238 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 intellect, because people run on their own legs alone, 
 and not on a system of sixteen legs, therein avoiding 
 the difficulty of bringing the said legs into harmony. 
 Putting running out of the question, rowing has an 
 unquestionable advantage in this department over all 
 its rivals. Cricket is a noble game, and a man plays 
 all the better for being in good health. I believe 
 indeed that the mid-day luncheon is frequently observed 
 to be a critical period in a match. Liquor of different 
 kinds has a singular faculty for getting into bats and 
 balls, and rendering their course unaccountable to the 
 performers. This fact shows that a certain amount of 
 training would be highly desirable ; but the occurrence 
 of such aberrations proves also that the necessity for 
 training has not yet forced itself very strongly upon 
 the cricketing mind. A man who could exceed in beer 
 the day before a University boat-race would certainly 
 be capable of murdering his aunt ; whereas, a cricketer 
 guilty of a parallel excess would probably shrink, we 
 may say, from any injury to the same relative of a 
 deeper dye than assault and battery. In short, a 
 severe training is the first condition of rowing races. 
 The commandments obeyed by a University crew 
 include severe prohibitions of eating or drinking be- 
 yond certain limits for five or six weeks previous to 
 the race ; and no similar code is provided for elevens 
 or for the competitors in any other match. If any 
 doubt remains upon your minds, I may quote the 
 dictum of an eminent surgeon, Mr. Skey, that the 
 
ROWING. 239 
 
 University race involves tlie greatest cruelty to animals 
 of any known game. I consider the term " cruelty " 
 to be exaggerated ; but substituting some such words as 
 trial of their muscular and constitutional strength, it is 
 undoubtedly true ; and what would you have more ? 
 
 What, indeed ! is the obvious reply of the intelligent 
 foreigner ; but I should like to know in what way a 
 boat-race tests any intellectual faculties ; for, to say 
 the most, that term of " animals " which you have just 
 employed, though not excluding the human race, seems 
 to imply that in the opinion of a good judge, the com- 
 petitors in that contest have the lower element of our 
 nature most prominently developed. They are, I 
 repeat, fine-looking lads, but there is something in 
 their looks, — or perhaps in the way in which they 
 are swaddled in divers wrappers, — which suggests 
 affinities to a highly trained racehorse rather than 
 to a transcendental philosopher. 
 
 In so saying, is my answer, you show a certain super- 
 ficiality. To be captain of a University Eight requires 
 qualities which would go some way to make a successful 
 general, though not perhaps to enable their possessor 
 to grapple with the theory of the Absolute and the 
 Infinite. He ought to be a refined diplomatist, to 
 have a rapid and decisive judgment, and the power of 
 enforcing discipline. He should have the courage to 
 hold firmly to his own opinion, and the rarer courage 
 to make changes when it is necessary. A captain 
 requires as much skill in composing a crew as a 
 
240 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 minister in forming his cabinet. It is not enough, that 
 the men separately should be good, — and the break- 
 down of any one at a critical moment may ruin the 
 whole plan, — but each must fit into his proper place. 
 There are infinite difficulties in soothing small vanities, 
 and propitiating silly jealousies. As in the larger world, 
 each man chosen is apt to make one grumbler at his 
 selection and half a dozen grumblers at their exclusion ; 
 and the mere task of keeping eight men in good temper 
 who are all in a feverish state of hard work and excite- 
 ment, and who have to take all their meals and pass 
 most of their vacant hours in each other's company, is 
 itself enough to try an angel. Bow is an unpopular 
 man, and ill-natured people maintain that he has been 
 put in out of favouritism. Two takes the captain aside 
 every other morning to reveal to him, — not without 
 gloomy satisfaction, — a sure symptom of some new and 
 fatal disease which he has just detected in a vital 
 organ. Three is a picture of health and strength, but 
 is so clumsy that no one knows whether he can be 
 licked into tolerable shape in time. Four is a heavy 
 good-tempered giant, who serves the invaluable pur- 
 pose of being a butt to the rest of the crew at feeding 
 times, but he is apt to lose his head, and then he is 
 about as dangerous in a boat as a startled elephant in a 
 caravan. Five would be unimpeachable, but for dark 
 hints that he has a private score at some unknown 
 public-house. Six labours under a chronic grievance, 
 declaring with much loss of good temper to all his fellows 
 
ROWING. 241 
 
 that Four does not take his share of the work. Seven is 
 really delicate, as Two professes to be, and will conceal 
 his ailments till it is too late to find a substitute. And 
 if the captain does not himself row. Stroke probably 
 considers himself to be the one man in the University 
 who understands the art of rowing, and has to be 
 coaxed and wheedled into a decent subordination. The 
 coxswain has been chosen after long deliberation on 
 the ground that it is worth securing an ounce more 
 brains at a cost of a stone more flesh, and all the crew 
 are profoundly convinced that if they lose it will be 
 owing to that superfluous weight in the stern-sheets. 
 Then there are perplexities about the boat, about the 
 details of the work, about the cruel examiners who will 
 torture some members of the crew, about the food 
 supplied, and about a hundred other matters which are 
 a constant tax upon the unlucky captain's fund of good 
 humour. In short, a captain of a University crew is a 
 man who has to put together a complex machine 
 formed of human beings ; he has to choose it properly 
 in the first instance, to adjust all its parts to each other, 
 to keep it in good temper and due subordination, to 
 prevent its stomachs from getting out of order or its 
 muscles from growing flabby, and generally to devote 
 to this compound Frankenstein an amount of time and 
 attention which would almost entitle him to preside 
 over an episcopal synod. Many races have been lost 
 from the weakness of the crew, from the badness of the 
 ship, from ill-luck in the start, and from a hundred 
 
242 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 otlier causes ; but the one great and irremediable defect 
 is a want of brains. Of course, this is not peculiar to 
 rowing ; a cricket match requires the exercise of swift 
 and decisive judgment still more than a boat-race ; and 
 there are many other games in which, for the time, 
 the strain upon the nerve and powers of self-com- 
 mand is greater than in rowing. But that which is 
 peculiar, or almost peculiar, to rowing is the necessity 
 of enforcing discipline for weeks, and indeed for 
 months, before the critical day ; — for a good captain will 
 sometimes have made a race safe before his opponent 
 has begun to choose his crew ; his men will be ready 
 to be set in action at a moment's notice. It is the 
 great demand upon this, as I may almost call it, states- 
 man-like quality, which leads me to prefer rowing, on 
 the whole, even to cricket, and certainly to any other 
 amusement. 
 
 Assuming that you have established your point, my 
 friend might reply, there is still one question which 
 occurs to the philosophic mind. You have sung the 
 praises of rowing on the ground that above all other 
 amusements it makes great demands upon a man's 
 moral and physical energies ; granting this to be true, 
 there is one thing which, if possible, seems to me to be 
 a still more essential property in an amusement, — 
 namely, that it should amuse. Now rowing, by your 
 account, is, above all things, admirable for the system 
 of training which it renders necessary, or, as it seems, 
 
ROWING. 243 
 
 for the trouble which it gives to the gentlemen in com- 
 mand, and for the amount of deprivation which they 
 have to inflict upon their subordinates. Can you then 
 seriously lay your hand upon your heart and say that 
 rowing is pleasant ? 
 
 To that I must answer that philosophers require to 
 look into matters rather more deeply than the outside 
 world, in order to make out their case. If millstones 
 were not in some degree transparent, we should be in 
 danger of many unphilosophical conclusions. No doubt 
 most that meets the eye in this, as in some other 
 athletic pursuits, is the endurance of labour and dis- 
 comfort. There is indeed a certain pleasure about any 
 exertion of power to the man who feels that he has a 
 sufficient stock to draw upon ; and neither rowing nor 
 any other exercise should ever be pursued until the 
 system becomes bankrupt, or till a man has to draw 
 upon his constitutional capital as well as upon his daily 
 supplies of strength. Still, there is a certain amount 
 of pain connected with even a moderate degree of this 
 exercise. There are blisters and excoriations upon 
 various parts of your person. There is a horrid aching 
 in the muscles to be overcome. There is the annoy- 
 ance of turning out in all weathers, when the sun is 
 blistering your bare arms, or the snow forming a soft 
 chilly plaster upon your back. There is the severe 
 strain when a strong headwind makes the labour of 
 forcing your oar through the air almost equal to that 
 
244 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 of driving it tlirougli the water, or when a flooded 
 stream seems to bring the boat to a standstill as soon as 
 the pressure of the oars ceases to act upon the rowlocks ; 
 and, which is perhaps the most vexatious circumstance 
 of all, there is not unfrequentlj^ the misery of feeling 
 that other men in the crew are shirking their work, 
 and cultivating an elegant at the expense of a forcible 
 style. You will seldom feel more inclined to use strong 
 language than when your neighbour rises from his seat as 
 dry as a bone, without a hair turned, and complacently 
 observes that he has found the boat go very easily 
 to-day ; and there are many other vexations to be 
 endured at the hands of the faint-hearted and in- 
 different. There is in every crew some one who makes 
 it a favour to row ; he generally keeps a mythical 
 parent in the background, who disapproves of the 
 amusement, and occasionally forbids him to continue it 
 at the moment when he has become indispensable ; and 
 there is the over-zealous man who conceals a swelled 
 hand till it has to be cut open, and its proprietor laid 
 on the shelf for a fortnight. And then there are all 
 the detestable annoj^ances with which fortune persecutes 
 the brave, — the oar that breaks at the start, the boat 
 that has a hole knocked in it at the last moment, and 
 the brutal tutor, now, — it must be admitted, a rarity, 
 — who cuts through all your arrangements by enforcing 
 compliance with some tyrannical regulations as to 
 lectures and examinations. All this, and much more, 
 might be urged by an ingenious advocatus diaboli, but 
 
nowiNG. 245 
 
 it is based upon a sophistry. There is nothing from 
 Christian morality down to playing dominoes which 
 may not be made to appear unpleasant by insisting 
 upon the incidental annoyances that may result from 
 the practice. After all, the greatest pleasure in life is 
 to have a fanatical enthusiasm about something. It 
 may be the collection of pictures or of foreign postage 
 stamps, — the preaching of teetotalism or of ritualism ; 
 — it matters comparatively little what is the special 
 hobby upon which a man should mount ; but the pos- 
 session of at least one hobby, if not of a complete stud 
 of hobbies, is the first condition towards a thorough 
 enjoyment of life. It is commonly said that chess is too 
 severe an intellectual trial to be suitable as an amuse- 
 ment ; and the argument is a very sound one against 
 learning chess for those who cannot devote their time 
 to it; but the intense attention which is willingly 
 granted by a good chess-player is the best proof of the 
 powerful attractions of the occupation. Now this is 
 the real glory of rowing ; it is a temporary fanaticism 
 of the most intense kind ; whilst it lasts it is less a 
 mere game than a religion ; and unlike other games, it 
 lasts throughout a year, and whilst it continues it may 
 be made to occupy every hour of the day. 
 
 A rowing man passes his whole day, and day after 
 day, if he chooses, in some occupation connected with 
 his favourite sport. When he is not actually rowing, 
 or running, or conscientiously devouring his allotted 
 modicum of victuals, he may be picking up gossip, 
 
246 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 proving to tlie satisfaction of his own crew that they 
 did the course the day before in 8' 19" instead of 8' 21", 
 and that their rivals were at most 2' less, which is not 
 enough to secure a success. Or he may be going 
 through some subtle piece of diplomacy, — persuading 
 some man to row whose friends, or studies, or health 
 forbid it, or simply lounging about in a dignified 
 manner at some other resort, with the pleasant uncon- 
 sciousness that men are whispering behind his back, 
 *' There is the stroke of the Boniface boat," — as per- 
 haps in the larger world, though vanity is no longer 
 so simple or so easily satisfied, a man may like to be 
 pointed out at a club as the future solicitor- general, or 
 the best candidate for the vacant bishopric. Little 
 knots of such enthusiasts gather together in each 
 other's rooms, when they might be better emploj^ed, 
 and discuss the prospects of the next race as eagerly as 
 their elders canvass the state of the Funds. And the 
 day ends, perhaps, with dinner and a prolonged chat 
 with some celebrity of former times, who discourses of 
 races won by eighteen inches, of the great struggle 
 when the losing crew imitated the fabulous feat of the 
 Yengeur, and rowed till the water reached to their 
 waists, of the more ancient race when the immortal 
 seven-oared crew defeated their antagonists with eight, 
 and of contests in still remoter ages, some of the actors 
 in which have long since attained to bisho]3rics or high 
 state offices. Miserable trifling, you say, for a human 
 being endowed with a soul, and with more or less of rea- 
 
ROWING. 247 
 
 soiling powers ! But that is exactly my point. A man 
 is not a thorough historian till he grudges no expen- 
 diture of toil upon trifles, till he is ready to spend a 
 week in determining the true Christian name of some 
 one who died and was forgotten by the world three 
 centuries ago. He is not a lover till he cares about 
 the smallest flower that has dropped from his mis- 
 tress's hand. And, by a parity of reasoning, he cannot 
 be thoroughly in love with an amusement till its very 
 trifles become sacred in his eyes. The fact that some 
 men spend many days of their youth after the manner 
 I have described, is a proof of the intensity of the 
 passion which rowing can occasionally inspire ; and 
 though some industrious men boast that it need only 
 occupy a small part of their time, I think it is gene- 
 rally found to be like other objects of a devoted passion, 
 — rather jealous of any rival. Too warm an enthu- 
 siasm necessarily burns itself out in a short time ; and 
 few men have any opportunity to devote time to it in 
 later life. There are very few navigable rivers where 
 the art can be practised, especially after the epoch at 
 which a man's stomach is inclined to interfere with his 
 knees. Most oarsmen, therefore, confine their period 
 of zeal to the years when they have no distraction more 
 serious than their studies ; or, in other words, can 
 devote their whole time to rowing. And yet, though 
 soon laid aside, there is no amusement which leaves 
 behind it pleasanter memories. To be in the same 
 boat with a man is a proverbial expression imj)lying 
 
248 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 the closest conceivable bond of union. If you take a 
 walking tour with a friend, there are hours at least 
 during which he is your bitterest enemy, for no insult 
 is more grievous than that put upon you by your 
 partner in such a temporary alliance when he proposes 
 with an off-hand air to increase the pace by a mile or 
 so an hour, just as you have developed a peculiarly fine 
 specimen of blister on the ball of the foot. It is not in 
 human nature to be yoked to a fellow- creature in a tie 
 of such a nature without occasionally finding that it 
 galls. In such games, again, as cricket, I need hardly 
 say that the pleasure of having made a good score 
 frequently reconciles a man to the disgraceful defeat of 
 his side. But the bond established for the time being 
 between the members of a racing crew, is perhaps the 
 closest known, with the single and doubtful exception 
 of marriage. If Bow has a pain in his inside, its 
 effects communicate themselves to Two, Three, Four, 
 and down to Stroke. They are for the time being a 
 consolidated whole, — like those polyps which, as 
 natural historians tell us, live in a strange community 
 with but one stomach amongst the lot. Anj^hing that 
 disagrees with one, is immediately felt by the rest. 
 They have a common glory or a common disgrace ; 
 and the consequence is that in after life there is no 
 bond which establishes a greater claim than that of 
 having belonged to the same crew, whilst the next 
 strongest claim is to have belonged to the rival crew. 
 The Cam is a very ugly stream ; perhaps, take it alto- 
 
ROWING. 249 
 
 gether, the ugliest in Europe. Yet an old Cambridge 
 oarsman, walking down its slimy banks, is often moved 
 b}^ a strange emotion, of course to be sternly suppressed. 
 There is not a corner nor a reacb which is not asso- 
 ciated in his mind with triumphs or misfortunes of 
 which it is the greatest pleasure that they were en- 
 countered in common with the friends of perhaps the 
 pleasantest j)arts of his life. If rowing does nothing 
 else, it serves as a bond of unusual strengtli for drawing 
 men together at the time when their affections are, 
 so to speak, most malleable and most cohesive ; when 
 they have the greatest faculty for receiving and retain- 
 ing new impressions. Rowing brings back to me some 
 unpleasant associations, — especially certain hardships 
 endured in a perfectly absurd attempt to reduce myself 
 to a state of unnatural weakness, which was called 
 training, — but it is also so inseparably bound ujd with 
 memories of close and delightful intimacies, that it 
 almost makes me sentimental. To my mind, the plea- 
 santest of all such bonds are those which we form with 
 fellow-students by talking nonsense with them, and 
 mistaking it for philosophy ; but an average under- 
 graduate wants some more material bond, and I know 
 none which acts with more energy than a common 
 devotion to such an absorbing amusement. 
 
 Of course, replies my friend, the memory of having 
 been shut up in my youth in solitary confinement with 
 one pleasant companion might be incidentally agreeable ; 
 and you may sincerely enjoy the recollectoin of a 
 
250 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 bondage endured witli some early friends. Still you 
 don't deny that it is a bondage, and a very strait 
 bondage. You only say that the fact that you sub- 
 mitted to it proves that, for some inscrutable reason, 
 you must have enjoyed it. But this suggests one other 
 question. You liked your sport so much as to submit 
 to great hardships in its pursuit ; did you not like it so 
 much as permanently to injure your health ? The 
 fanatical devotion to boating pursuits which indicates, 
 if you please, a certain pleasure in the amusement, — 
 to me quite inscrutable, — must also lead to sacrifices 
 of obvious sanitary considerations to this strange god. 
 
 That has been the subject, I answer, of a never- 
 ending controversy. There is a floating legend which 
 is always hurled at the heads of ambitious oarsmen. It 
 is stated of a crew, which performed some astonishing- 
 feat, that every man was dead within two or three 
 years. I have heard this legend applied to at least 
 half a dozen crews, and in every case I have found that 
 it was unfounded. Not long ago I met at Henley 
 Eegatta fi^^e members of one of the crews to which it 
 is most commonly applied. They were all men of 
 unusually healthy appearance for their time of life, — 
 though perhaps a trifle fatter than might have been 
 desired, — and I happened to know two others who 
 were both at that time alive and well. I put down 
 most such stories to the continued existence of what is 
 called, I believe, the mythopaeic faculty, which means 
 the faculty of telling a lie in order to prove a doubtful 
 
ROWING. 251 
 
 proposition. Of late, however, one of tliose little 
 controversies by which the Times kindly amuses our 
 vacations and fills its columns has been raging on the 
 subject; and a distinguished surgeon has given an 
 opinion very unfavourable to rowing. To speak can- 
 didly, I have not the least doubt that rowing sometimes 
 causes severe evils to its more zealous devotees. But I 
 have known a large number of the most distinguished 
 oarsmen for the last fifteen years, and very few of them, 
 so far as I could tell, have suffered any injury from the 
 result. Certainly, if I wished to produce models of 
 health and strength, I should take some old University 
 oarsmen ; sturdy, square- shouldered, deep-chested men, 
 who seem to have been put together of the best mate- 
 rials regardless of expense. I have known other cases, 
 again, of men who have been quoted to me more than 
 once as examples of the evil done by rowing, for whose 
 weakness I could have assigned a very different cause. 
 Eowing is undoubtedly a severe exertion, and it takes 
 very little argument to prove that it- is a dangerous 
 amusement when combined with certain others of a less 
 presentable kind. A rowing undergraduate is, of ne- 
 cessity, a youth in the full flush of strength and animal 
 spirits, who labours under a total ignorance of some 
 very necessary laws of health. Moreover, he is very 
 often, I will not say generally, possessed of no par- 
 ticular ambition in regard to University studies. 
 Consequently in the intervals of racing and training 
 he is a fine, vigorous, and thoroughly idle young man. 
 
252 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Now without relying upon tlie authority of Dr. Watts, 
 we know that there is a personage who is occasionally 
 in the habit of providing employment for the hands of 
 young gentlemen of this class. Since rowing and other 
 athletic sports have become almost an authorised part 
 of the University system, and have therefore ceased to 
 be in the slightest degree disrej)utable, rowing has no 
 longer been left in the hands of those who are expres- 
 sively called "fast" undergraduates; the average of 
 morality may, therefore, be as high amongst the de- 
 votees of rowing as amongst other fragments of the 
 little University world ; but that is only saying that it 
 includes a good many lads who are rather too fond of 
 pleasure to be particular. There can be no doubt that 
 when a man alternates periods of severe training with 
 periods of undesirable indulgence, he is burning the 
 candle at both ends, and is likely to pay the penalty. 
 I mention this, which it is unnecessary to expand into 
 detail, because I have known many cases in which, so 
 to speak, the saddle has been put on the wrong horse, 
 and rowing set down as the avowed cause of evils that 
 in fact were due to a combination of rowing with much 
 less legitimate amusements, — in some cases to the 
 latter amusements only. When a young man has 
 injured his constitution he tells his mother, — unless he 
 has too strong remains of conscience, — that the evil is 
 owing to the exhausting effects of over-study ; — in the 
 same circumstances, he knows that his friends will 
 require a slightly more plausible account, and he makes 
 
ROWING. 253 
 
 rowing tlie scapegoat. I could even mention cases in 
 whicli a man has really injured his health by over- 
 reading for examinations, but in which he persisted in 
 attributing his ailments to having rowed two or three 
 scratch races some years beforehand. It is the old 
 story of giving a dog a bad name. Any one who feels 
 a pain in his leg states that the dog has bitten him. 
 
 After every deduction on this score, there doubtless 
 remain cases, — I know not whether many or few, — 
 in which rowing has been really the cause of grave 
 and sometimes fatal diseases. Mr. Skey injured his 
 case by over- statement, and by endeavouring to make 
 out what every tyro in rowing knows to be absurd. 
 He declared that over a four-mile course the boats 
 raced at full speed the whole way, each struggling for 
 the lead from start to finish. The thing is really im- 
 possible. Any crew that ever got into a boat might 
 be rowed to a standstill in a quarter of the time, in- 
 deed in much less than that, if they really exerted 
 their powers to their utmost limit. Nothing is a more 
 acknowledged cause of defeat than an attempt to start 
 at too many strokes a minute, and, in short, it is as 
 mistaken a notion that boats go off at the top of their 
 speed, as it would be that horses in the Derby do the 
 same. For all this, long races such as those at Putney 
 are a severe trial ; and still more severe, in my opinion, 
 are the races at Henley. The course there is shorter, 
 but one man frequently rows three or four races in the 
 day under a burning sun, and sometimes with the 
 
254 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 result, as I can testify, of complete prostration for the 
 time. The committee ought, in my opinion, to put a 
 stop to this practice, — even at the cost of diminishing 
 the attractions of the Regatta. The great race at 
 Putney, however, is undoubtedly severe enough, though 
 the men seldom seem to suffer very much at the time. 
 One great cause of the injury sometimes resulting was 
 the absurd theory of training formerly prevalent, which, 
 instead of enabling the men to bear the race, seemed 
 carefully designed to weaken them. The doctrine which 
 used to be current amongst young men, so far as there 
 was any consistent doctrine at all, was adopted, I 
 imagine, from that current amongst prize-fighters, 
 who, whatever their own merits, are not qualified to 
 give very trustworthy medical opinions. A prize- 
 fighter was generally an older man, accustomed to a 
 rougher style of living, and bloated by attendance at 
 public-houses. It was a great thing to cut off his 
 liquor, to sweat down his suj^erfluous fat, and to put 
 him on a simple diet. When University lads were 
 trained on the same principles, it was something like 
 training a two-year-old in the same fashion as an aged 
 horse. They had been accustomed to a varied, though 
 not immoderate diet, and were suddenly reduced to 
 great masses of raw beef steak, of which it was a point 
 of honour to swallow as much as possible, with the 
 natural consequences of boils, indigestions, and various 
 other inconveniences. Then, although they were gene- 
 rally in good condition and wind, it was held that they 
 
RowixG. 255 
 
 must be sweated till they liad lost perhaps a stone in 
 weight, and a man was proud of the number of pounds 
 of which he could get rid. There was a theory about 
 " internal fat," which was supposed somehow or other 
 to fill up a man's inside, and impede the action of his 
 other organs. It was thought that this might be 
 melted down Avhilst the muscles were strengthened by 
 steady exercise. I am no physiologist, but I imagine 
 that the human frame has a more delicate and complex 
 organisation than this mechanical theory implies, and 
 that you can't safely melt bits of it out, any more than 
 you can cut bits out, without a danger of deranging 
 the other organs. In short, men were over-fed with 
 indigestible lumps of meat, and at the same time 
 were reduced arbitrarily in weight till they frequently 
 came to the final contest in the lowest tone of health, 
 and broke down immediately afterwards. I hope that 
 more sensible modes of treatment have lately come 
 into fashion, and that even the astonishing fact has 
 been learnt that different men have different constitu- 
 tions, and consequently require different styles of treat- 
 ment. And I feel no doubt that with reasonable pre- 
 cautions, the exercise of boat-racing might be made as 
 safe as any other strong exercise. Only the authorities 
 should certainly take care, as they might with perfect 
 ease, that men should not join in such contests without 
 due medical authorisation in all doubtful cases. 
 
 What you say, my friend would reply, is doubtless 
 admirable. You have shown, to your own satisfaction 
 
256 BKITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 at any rate, that rowing implies an amount of skill, of 
 energy, and of judgment, which makes it an admirable 
 school for many good qualities ; that it is a sport which 
 is pursued with a spirit which proves it to be really 
 enjoyable, and that with due precautions it need not be 
 hurtful to the health. I will add, — without troubling 
 you to prove it, — that the love of such athletic pursuits 
 is a very admirable characteristic of English institutes, 
 and, so long as it is preached with common- sense and 
 without cant, deserves the approval of all intelligent 
 persons. But with your permission I must ask one 
 question more ; — is not the devotion to such pursuits 
 somewhat incompatible with a due devotion to study ? 
 Universities should encourage athletic sports, but surely 
 not to the prejudice of learning. 
 
 To this my reply would be, — Pray look at that 
 admirable specimen of Early English architecture which 
 you are in danger of passing unnoticed. Or if no such 
 specimen were at hand, I should endeavour to hit upon 
 some other means for giving a new turn to a conversa- 
 tion which threatened to become embarrassing. 
 
o:n' alpine climbing, 
 
 Some future philosoptier may turn aside from more 
 important topics to notice the rise and development of 
 the passion for mountain-climbing. He may pick up, 
 in that humble field of inquiry, illustrations of some 
 principles of wider application. The growth of the 
 passion is accompanied, for example, if it is not caused, 
 by the growth of the modern apjDreciation of mountain 
 scenery ; and few things would be more interesting, in 
 proper time and place, than to investigate the real 
 meaning of that curious phenomenon. Meanwhile we 
 will endeavour to point out another, and a humbler, 
 lesson, upon which our imaginary philosopher may, if 
 he pleases, insist. The history of mountaineering is^ 
 to a great extent, the history of the process by which 
 men have gradually conquered the phantoms of their 
 own imagination. We read in our school-days of 
 certain rash barbarians who entered the majestic 
 presence of the senators of Rome. For a long time 
 they were awe- struck by the reverend air and the long 
 white beards of the old men, and remained quiescent, 
 as though petrified by a supernatural terror. At length 
 
258 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 an accident revealed that tlie senators were mortal like 
 themselves, the superstitious fears vanished, and the 
 barbarians proceeded, according to their pleasant 
 custom, to massacre the objects of their late reverence. 
 — Which things are an allegory. There is many a 
 venerable political institution that has imposed upon 
 the imaginations of mankind, until some bold man 
 ventured, as Mr. Carlyle says, to take it by the beard, 
 and say. What art thou ? A^Hiereupon it has suddenly 
 collapsed. AYe will not, on the present occasion, pursue 
 our argument into such lofty regions. It will be 
 quite enough to illustrate the doctrine by the particular 
 case of mountaineering exploits, and to leave our 
 readers to invent such applications as they please. If 
 we were writing a complete record we should have to 
 show, in relating the development of mountaineering, 
 how at first men stood appalled at the savage terrors of 
 the Alps ; how gradually they came nearer, and found 
 that the mountains were haunted by no terrible phan- 
 toms ; and how, when the bolder hojs had ventured 
 into the haunted house and come back unscathed, there 
 followed a general rush, into its furthest recesses, of a 
 crowd of followers — perhaps gifted with equal courage, 
 but certainly with less to try it. And we should 
 further have to explain that though the fanciful terrors 
 had proved groundless, there were still some very real 
 dangers to be encountered. At present we must be 
 content with a few remarks upon the most prominent 
 events in the annals of climbing. 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 259 
 
 For centuries, as we need hardly say, the human 
 mind was in a state of utter darkness as to the merits 
 of mountaineering. Doubtless a few chamois-hunters 
 and goatherds wandered over the slopes of the hills, 
 and found therein a mysterious pleasure, of which they 
 could give no clear account to themselves or to others. 
 If we turn over the pages of any of the early works 
 which treat of the Alps, we find in them a few scat- 
 tered notices derived from such peasants and hunters 
 who had evidently a fine natural turn for enlarging 
 upon the wonders of their country to the few who 
 would listen to their tales. It is enough to mention a 
 distinguished traveller at the beginning of the last 
 centur}^, named Scheuchzer, whose state of mind may 
 be inferred from a single statement. He labours to 
 prove that such things as dragons really exist, and 
 the principal ground of his argument is the strong a 
 priori probability that, in so savage a country as the 
 Central Alps, there must be dragons. Considering 
 that Scheuchzer lived at Zurich, within sight of some 
 lofty peaks, he must have had a strange terror of 
 a region, at his very door, so savage, in his opinion, 
 that it could not but produce dragons, as the natural 
 product of its own intrinsic ferocity. Soon after 
 Scheuchzer's travels, the Alpine mania seems to have 
 begun. Pocock and Wyndham discovered Chamouni ; 
 and it became the fashion, as Gibbon tells us, towards 
 the end of the century, "to view the glaciers.'' The 
 great start, however, is due to Saussure, whom all true 
 
260 BRITISH SPOUTS AXD PASTIMES. 
 
 mountaineers revere as tlie founder of their craft. The 
 year 1786, in which the summit of Mont Blanc was 
 for the first time reached by his guide Balmat, should 
 be the year one in their calendar ; and if it were 
 marked by saints' days, the festivals of Saussure and 
 Balmat would be the chief solemnities of the year. 
 Although Balmat and Saussure thus climbed the 
 highest European mountain, the imaginative prestige 
 of the Alps was still enormous. Balmat must have 
 been a first-rate mountaineer, and possessed of unusual 
 strength and toughness of constitution. Saussure 
 himself performed at least one feat which has scarcely 
 been equalled in its way, when he lived for ten days 
 on the top of the Col du Geant, appearing as a magi- 
 cian to the inhabitants of the valley below. Yet the 
 mode in which Saussure and Balmat set about the 
 ascent of Mont Blanc is to the system of modern 
 travellers what the old warfare, with its marchings 
 and countermarchings, and going into winter quarters, 
 was to the audacious tactics of Napoleon. As an old- 
 fashioned general thought he had made a good cam- 
 paign when he had advanced a few miles and taken a 
 fortress or two in the course of the summer, so Saussure 
 attacked Mont Blanc in due form, with gradual ap- 
 proaches and operations, extending over years. He 
 threw out reconnaissances, established lodgments in 
 the flanks of the mountain, and at last moved to the 
 assault with an army of eighteen guides, spending 
 three days in reaching the summit, and returning to 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 261 
 
 Cliamouni on tlie fourtli. One assault was repulsed by 
 **tlie reverberation of tlie sun from the snow ;" after 
 that a party of men having passed all the real diffi- 
 culties, shrank back from the last and really easy bit 
 of ascent ; and it was not till a quarter of a century 
 after Saussure had offered a reward for the discovery 
 of a path to the summit, that the first ascent was 
 actually made. Everything shows, as we have said, 
 that the mountaineers of those days were as good on 
 their legs, as sound in their lungs, and fully as 
 courageous as their modern successors ; but they could 
 not overcome their instinctive dread in the presence of 
 the Monarch of Mountains. 
 
 Saussure opened what may be called the scientific 
 era of mountain ascents, which lasted sixty or seventy 
 years. During that time, that is, till about 1850, 
 there were indeed many ascents made without any 
 pretence of scientific motives, and probably many with 
 nothing but the pretence. The great mountains of the 
 Bernese Oberland, the Jungfrau, and the Finster- 
 Aarhorn, were climbed, and many ascents were made 
 of Mont Blanc, chiefly, as we may venture to say, 
 " for the fun of the thing." The leaders in discoveries 
 were, however, still the men of science. Towards the 
 end of the period, especially. Professors Agassiz, Desor, 
 and other distinguished Swiss mountaineers, and our 
 countryman. Professor Forbes, did a great deal to open 
 up the districts of eternal snow for less eminent tra- 
 Tellers, whilst their principal motive was to investigate 
 
262 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 the theory of glaciers. During all that time, however, 
 mountain ascents were becoming popular for their own 
 sakes. The view which was generally taken of the 
 amusement may be measured by the respect still felt 
 for Mont Blanc. The hold which that noble summit 
 retained upon the imagination is a kind of barometer 
 of the height reached by the mountaineering art. It 
 was still the fashion to attack him after the mode 
 commemorated by Albert Smith. Each traveller had 
 four guides and four porters ; the guides went to mass 
 and took leave of their relatives before the start ; guns 
 were fired at critical moments ; the whole tourist 
 population turned out to watch the ascent ; and a 
 dinner was solemnly eaten and toasts duly drunk after 
 the adventurers had returned to the bosom of their 
 families. To have been up Mont Blanc was a sufficient 
 excuse for publishing a book, and the curious in such 
 matters may study sundry small publications of this 
 kind. They are generally thin pamphlets with fearful 
 illustrations. The party is represented at breakfast 
 on a large block of ice, which is balanced in doubtful 
 equilibrium across a yawning chasm which presumably 
 descends for hundreds of feet into the bowels of the 
 earth ; or a bending ladder supports the whole party 
 across a tremendous gulf, into which a single false 
 
 step • we need not finish the quotation. In Albert 
 
 Smith's lecture, the sj)eaker abandoned his jokes and 
 puns, and became terribly serious as he described the 
 horrors of the final climb, that being a matter much 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 263 
 
 too serious for even a professional wit to toucli with- 
 out, as the reporters say, being ^'visibl}^ affected." 
 The modern tourist rather apologises for having any 
 feelings at all under similar circumstances, and pokes 
 fun at his readers at the most thrilling passages of his 
 narrative. 
 
 But now a new era was approaching. The task of 
 analysing all the causes by which it was produced must 
 be left to the unfortunate being for whom so many 
 endless puzzles are proposed, — the philosophical his- 
 torian. The sect of muscular Christians was arising ; 
 it had not yet developed a dogmatic theory, nor 
 appeared in the pulpit or in novels with a purpose ; 
 but its future heroes were beginning to stir themselves, 
 and to leaven the world imperceptibly with some por- 
 tion of their spirit. Their energy in the mountain 
 districts was perceptible in introducing what we may 
 call the transitional era between the ancient and 
 modern forms of the art. Two or three publications 
 revealed their existence to the outer world. Of these 
 we may specially mention two interesting volumes 
 which both appeared in 1856. One was the " Wander- 
 ings in the High Alps," by Mr. Wills, and the title 
 of the other was " Where there^s a Will there's a 
 Way ; or. An Ascent of Mont Blanc without Guides," 
 by Messrs. Hudson and Kennedy. These two books 
 revealed to their readers the existence of a new sport, 
 whose devotees exhibited an enthusiasm unaccountable 
 to ordinary mortals. Some hints had already been 
 
264 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 given by Professor Forbes, whose travels in tbe Pen- 
 nine Alps had appeared as early as 1843 ; but although 
 the true mountaineering spirit is very evident in his 
 descriptions, it was overlaid by scientific disquisitions 
 from which the mountaineering enthusiasm only crops 
 out at intervals. Mr. Wills, however, and still more un- 
 mistakably Mr. Hudson and Mr. Kennedy, were open 
 preachers of the new creed. Mr. Wills, whilst giving 
 many admirable descriptions of adventure, might per- 
 haps leave it to be imagined by the careless reader 
 that a love of scenery and a love of science were the 
 principal motives which would justify mountaineer- 
 ing, and that no one ought to climb without a sketch- 
 book or a barometer. His rivals put the matter in a 
 clearer light by their book, and still more by the 
 adventures that it recorded. They had shown that 
 the ambition of getting u-p hills, the excitement of 
 encountering danger in the A1]3S, and the interest of 
 skilfully surmounting difficulties, were a sufficient in- 
 ducement in themselves. Incidentally, perhaps, they 
 might open a path for scientific observers ; more cer- 
 tainly they themselves enjoyed, and taught others to 
 enjoy, the scenery of the remote mountain labyrinths ; 
 but they also made it distinctlj^ understood, — for the 
 first time quite distinctly understood, — that moun- 
 taineering, whatever its other merits, was a sport to 
 be put beside rowing, cricket, and the other time- 
 honoured sports of Englishmen. Both of the gentle- 
 men named were well-known oarsmen on the Cam, and 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 265 
 
 they carried the energetic spirit cultivated in boat- 
 racing into a different kind of athletic exercise. Whilst 
 tliey were the esoteric prophets of the new creed, 
 whose followers had not yet organised themselves into 
 a distinct sect, Albert Smith was preaching to the 
 populace. The more energetic devotees looked with 
 a certain contempt upon a man who could not but 
 confess that he had been dragged to the summit in 
 a semi-conscious condition, and who professed his in- 
 tention of never repeating his rash experiment. The 
 impartial historian must admit that the singular suc- 
 cess of his lectures did much to attract popular notice 
 to a pursuit in which he was certainly not a j)ractical 
 performer. 
 
 Meanwhile the small band of true zealots had done 
 much towards lowering the terrors of the high sum- 
 mits. They had thoroughly humbled the highest 
 mountain in the Alps. It was their professed inten- 
 tion to break down the old Chamovmi system. They 
 endeavoured to prove that the elaborate apparatus of 
 guides and porters was unnecessary, and that Mont 
 Blanc was by no means deserving of the respectful awe 
 with which he had hitherto been treated. To compare 
 small things with great, they did in mountaineering 
 what Xenophon did in the Eetreat of the Ten Thou- 
 sand. He conclusively proved the weakness of the 
 great Eastern monarchy, and prepared the way for his 
 mighty successor, who was to look round and sigh for 
 more worlds to conquer. Just so Messrs. Hudson and 
 
 s 
 
266 BKITISH SPOKTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Kennedy proved that tlie mountain power was not 
 what it had been thought to be ; but the days were not 
 yet come when the mountaineer should pause for want 
 of a field for victory. These gentlemen and their party 
 had gained their object, but only after long trouble and 
 preparation. They had failed more than once ; they 
 had trained themselves by careful experience, and were 
 perhaps as good a set of amateurs as ever attempted an 
 ascent ; yet they spent an amount of trouble in climb- 
 ing one peak which would be sufficient, at the present 
 day, to conquer half the mountains in Switzerland. 
 In one respect, we cannot but remark, they set an 
 example which has not often been followed. They 
 made themselves independent of guides, and gaA^e a 
 much greater proof of skill than many men who have 
 made far more difficult ascents by blindly following 
 experienced natives. An amateur is never equal to a 
 man who has passed his whole life in the mountains ; 
 but it would be well if more amateurs qualified them- 
 selves, without rashness, to rely upon their own powers 
 in difficult places. On this, however, we shall pre- 
 sently have more to say. 
 
 And now new disciples began to gather round the 
 first teachers of the creed. The whole Alps lay before 
 them. In every district there were many summits 
 defying all assault. The guide-books were sown thickly 
 with descriptions of inaccessible peaks. Even in the 
 Oberland, the most hackneyed of all districts, few of 
 the loftier summits had been reached. The chain from 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 267 
 
 the St. Bernard to the Simplon had scarcely been 
 touched ; and such regions as Dauphine and the Enga- 
 dine were all but unknown to the tourist genus. There 
 seemed to be an inexhaustible field for enterprise. The 
 zealots of whom we have spoken soon formed them- 
 selves into a distinct body ; the Alpine Club was 
 founded in 1857, and in 1867 the Alps had been ex- 
 hausted. The word " inaccessible '' had, with certain 
 insignificant exceptions, been deprived of meaning. 
 The first harvest gathered was described to the world 
 in the volume called " Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers," 
 published in 1859. The general public first became 
 alive to the importance of the rising sect by the popu- 
 larity of this volume. It made a decided hit ; it was 
 treated with good-humoured ridicule in the Times ; 
 and the Alpine Club speedily became a byword for 
 a set of harmless lunatics. Like many other sects, 
 they throve upon chaff", and increased and flourished 
 mightily. The volumes which they have since pub- 
 lished, five in all, have indeed failed of the success 
 which attended the first ; but they contain an account 
 of the complete conquest and annexation of the whole 
 Alpine district. We cannot recommend their perusal 
 to any one who does not take a special interest in the 
 subject, for it must be admitted that next to accounts 
 of horse-racing and cricket-matches, accounts of Alpine 
 ascents are perhaps the dreariest variety of current 
 literature. At first they had a certain interest even 
 for persons who did not mean to risk their necks ; but 
 
268 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 it is as difficult to secure mucli variety in narratives of 
 this kind as for a young curate to preach a dozen dif- 
 ferent sermons on the same text. Certain catchwords 
 about aretes and snow- slopes and bergschrunds, and 
 staple jokes about eating and drinking and smoking 
 recur, till the average stomach is apt to be turned. 
 The general result, however, of the narratives in ques- 
 tion may, for our purpose, be easily indicated. 
 
 Mont Blanc, as we have seen, had been thoroughly 
 put down. The monarch could no longer boast that 
 he was inaccessible even to unaided amateurs. Little 
 remained to do to complete his subjection, except to go 
 up the wrong way, as people had already been up the 
 right. This duty was conscientiously discharged, but 
 without attracting much attention. It has become as 
 much a matter of course in fine weather to order 
 guides for Mont Blanc as to take a cab for the city ; and 
 it is not clear that with ordinarj^ prudence the ascent 
 is much more dangerous than a pedestrian excursion 
 across certain London thoroughfares. "We must take 
 another mountain to serve as a measure of the j)ro- 
 gress of mountaineering. The terrors of the Matter- 
 horn had now become celebrated. The boldest moun- 
 taineers looked at its tremendous cliffs with awe, 
 and felt that there at any rate was a task which 
 woidd prove beyond their powers. It was the one 
 fortress which promised to hold out after every less 
 appalling summit had been reached. The wild range 
 which extends from the Matterhorn to the Weisshorn 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 269 
 
 had the reputation of being the toughest part of the 
 Alps. The Weisshorn and the Dent Blanche, — two 
 of the noblest peaks in Switzerland, — were climbed 
 by Professor Tyndall and Mr. T. S. Kennedy, but 
 the Matterhorn still seemed so terrible that the 
 boldest guides shrank from the assault. Every one 
 knows the view of that astonishing obelisk as it 
 appears from Zermatt or the E/iffell. The extra- 
 ordinary boldness of the outline produces a perfectly 
 startling effect. One would say that the architecture 
 was too daring for stability. Indeed, we have fre- 
 quently heard it questioned whether it is not too 
 daring for beauty. The audacity is carried to a 
 point at which there is a suspicion of the grotesque. 
 Some people are half inclined to class the Matterhorn 
 amidst freaks of nature, to compare it with the 
 rocking - stones, or the natural bridges at which 
 ordinary tourists stare, rather than to put it beside 
 such superbly graceful peaks as the Weisshorn or 
 the Jungfrau. We do not agree with this rather 
 hypercritical observation, for the Matterhorn im- 
 presses us as perhaps the most sublime object in 
 the Alps ; but it is undeniable that its pyramidical 
 mass is carved into such amazing forms as to produce 
 a perfectly unique effect. 
 
 Now, the point most to be remarked here is this, — 
 that the effect described is principally due to certain 
 delusions of perspective. It is true, of course, that the 
 Matterhorn is flanked by some of the most terrific 
 
270 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 of Alpine cliffs. The face, however, which to an 
 inexperienced eye seems almost vertical, is not really- 
 steep nor difficult of access. What is more singular 
 is, that even an experienced eye is generally deceived 
 by these appalling slopes. Mr. Ruskin has taken 
 the Matterhorn as a text for expounding, amongst 
 other things, the delusive influence of certain laws 
 of perspective, and has, as it would seem, fallen into 
 some rather curious mistakes himself; but he does 
 not mention, so far as we are aware, the particular 
 fact that the Hornli arete, as it is called, — that which 
 faces the spectator from Zermatt, — is really, tremen- 
 dous as it appears, of moderate inclination. It was, 
 indeed, generally thought by the guides that it would 
 be possible to reach a considerable height by following 
 this ridge. One of the most eminent of Swiss guides 
 once stood with us at its foot, and we almost agreed 
 to attempt the ascent of the mountain by following 
 it. Unluckily, — or, it may be, luckily, — we resolved 
 to inspect it from a different point of view, and we 
 found the change of position more effectual than a 
 similar change was found in Balaam's case. The 
 mountain re-asserted its magical prestige, and the 
 cliffs again looked so tremendous that we finally 
 abandoned our intention. Yet the first successful 
 attempt was made along this ridge; and up to a 
 lofty point, where it was necessary to cross a different 
 face of the mountain, it was made without any risk 
 or difficulty. 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 271 
 
 The Matterhorn tlius frightened off all assailants 
 for j^ears simply by putting on a resolute face. It 
 looked so fierce that the boldest refused the attack. 
 All the early attempts were made from the other 
 side, and for a long time the same cause served to 
 protect it even there, although at first sight there 
 was more promise of success. For several years bold 
 mountaineers with good guides made resolute attempts, 
 and came back convinced that success, if not impossible, 
 was at least highly improbable. Professor Tyndall, — 
 one of the best am-ateur climbers, as well as one of 
 the leading scientific authorities in the Alps, — reached 
 by far the greatest height. With him was Bennen, 
 one of the boldest of guides. They both looked at 
 the final cliff, and declared it to be impracticable, 
 though an Italian guide who was with them appears 
 to have thought otherwise. At any rate, when Mr. 
 Whymper came the next year to try a final assault 
 upon the great peak, this Italian guide had engaged 
 himself to one of his countrymen to make the attempt 
 by Professor Tyndall's route. Mr. Whymper returned 
 straight to Zermatt, attacked the mountain by the 
 terrible Hornli ridge, found his way to the top without 
 serious difficulty, and was just in time to look down 
 upon the Italians who were at the foot of the last 
 climb. Since that time two routes have been found 
 for surmounting this dreaded cliff on the Italian side. 
 The ascent was made three times in the summer of 
 1867, and on one occasion a girl not twenty years 
 
272 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 old readied the point from Wjbicli Professor Tyndall 
 turned back in despair. Truly, tlie terrors of the Mat 
 terhorn have vanished, — at least on the southern side, 
 — and with them the Alps may be said to have finally 
 lost, — with one exception, — their imaginative prestige. 
 The terrible accident which occurred on the descent of 
 Messrs. Hudson and Whymper's party has indeed added 
 fresh terrors to the route by the Hornli arete, and it 
 will, perhaps, be long before that route is again taken ; 
 but it is more than doubtful whether, if it had not 
 been for the accident, this would ■ not have become a 
 favourite ascent, and one which might, under ordinary 
 circumstances, have been taken with safety. The im- 
 pression is now so great that" guides will not face the 
 one dangerous passage, and they allege plenty of 
 reasons to justify their caution. The rocks, they say, 
 are rotten and full of ice, and in the afternoon would 
 always give dangerous footing. The year 1865 was 
 unusually favourable, because the mountain was almost 
 bare of snow, and the accident was due to a different 
 cause on that occasion ; but in most years the passage 
 would always, they say, be one of more than ordinary 
 risk. We venture to doubt, in the face of this, 
 whether the reasons have not been invented to justify 
 the unwillingness to pass an ill-omened spot. This 
 place, almost alone amongst the Alps, is, as it were, 
 marked with a black stone, and defended by a super- 
 stitious feeling, which has expired in other places 
 dail}^ traversed, though of equal intrinsic danger ; and 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 273 
 
 if two or tliree successful ascents were made it w^ould 
 probably vanish here also, and the ascent of the Mat- 
 terhorn from Zormatt become a regular and acknow- 
 ledged part of the mountaineer's programme. Never- 
 theless, — in spite of our own reasoning, — we do not 
 advise any one to encounter perils which are not the 
 less real because they act chiefly upon the imagination 
 of the guides. At best, the Matterhorn should not 
 be assailed by men who cannot place full reliance upon 
 the nerves of all their companions. 
 
 The expression of this oj)inion makes it necessary 
 to say one word more, for it seems to imply a belief 
 that the accident was caused by a want of the pre- 
 cautions which might have rendered it impossible. 
 If the passage in question is not more dangerous than 
 others daily traversed, some one must be to blame for 
 the occurrence of the accident. It is painful to say 
 a word which may be interpreted as condemning brave 
 men who are now dead; and there was not in the 
 Alps a braver and better qualified guide than Croz, 
 or an amateur more daring and skilful than Hudson. 
 They were the strongest and most experienced men 
 in their party, and no two mountaineers could be 
 named superior, if equal, to them. Yet we must 
 add that the cause of the accident seems to us to 
 be perfectly plain, and one which ought to be 
 understood. It was simply that there was an inex- 
 perienced and untried man in the party, without, 
 — and this is the important point, — a due force of 
 
274 ' BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 guides. "We do not say who was to blame ; but if 
 it was right to take a novice in the art up a mountain 
 supposed to be the most dangerous in the Alps, it was 
 certainly not right to take him with only three guides 
 amongst four gentlemen. If, as is a moderate rule, 
 there had been a guide between every two gentlemen, 
 the accident could hardly have occurred. But we 
 do not wish to insist upon a very painful subject. 
 
 The conquest of the Matterhorn substantially con- 
 cluded one era in mountain-climbing, and it suggests 
 several reflections as to the future of the art. One 
 great inducement for climbing has all but disappeared. 
 IS'o one will again know the pleasure of being the first 
 to plant his foot upon a hitherto untouched summit. 
 The mountaineers may labour to make frivolous dis- 
 tinctions, to claim credit for small variations upon 
 established routes, and to describe how for the first 
 time they have walked up the right side of a glacier 
 instead of the left. But the process is a depressing 
 one, and cannot last long. It is like the efibrt of a 
 company of shipwrecked men to find a few crumbs 
 strewn about the scene of their former meals. Even 
 this resource will soon be exhausted, and then the 
 pleasure of discovery in the Alps will be reckoned 
 amongst extinct amusements. It is a mere foretaste 
 of what is coming to the world at large. We 
 have the misfortune of being confined to a limited 
 planet, and must take the consequences of our posi- 
 tion. When there is a railroad to Timbuctoo, and 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 275 
 
 another througli the central regions of Asia, our 
 great- great- grandchildren will feel on a large scale 
 the same regret for the old days, when the earth 
 contained an apparently inexhaustible expanse of un- 
 known regions, that the Alpine traveller now feels 
 on a very diminutive scale. But when the bloom of 
 romance has departed, travelling will not cease. It 
 will perhaps be more interesting to an intelligent 
 mind, though the glories of Columbus or of Living- 
 stone will be no longer amongst the possible objects of 
 ambition. It is not quite so clear that this will be the 
 case with mountaineering, or that men will feel the 
 same interest in ascents when they can no longer hope 
 to rival the glories of Saussure, of Forbes, or of the 
 modern race of the Alpine Club. 
 
 There has, indeed, been a common cry, which was 
 especially strengthened by the accident on the Matter- 
 horn and two or three catastrophes which occurred 
 about the same time, that under no circumstances was 
 the game worth the candle. And we are quite pre- 
 pared to admit that if we were to look forward to a 
 yearly repetition of such misfortunes, it would be 
 difficult to defend the practice of climbing, delightful 
 as it may be in the opinion of its true devotees. We 
 believe, however, that the facts shuw that the danger 
 is by no means such as has sometimes been asserted, 
 and that mountaineering, if pursued in a reasonable 
 spirit, will be found to be not merely a healthy and 
 delightful, but also a very safe, amusement. Thus, we 
 
276 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 may remark tliat for a long j)eriod previous to tlie 
 Matterhorn catastrophe, serious accidents had been 
 exceedingly rare. Dr. Hamel's party had come to 
 harm on Mont Blanc from a contempt of the advice of 
 the guides, and three Englishmen had perished on the 
 Col du Geant owing to a total absence of the usual 
 precautions. Still numerous parties had ascended 
 Mont Blanc and other mountains every year without 
 a single misfortune, and, even in later and more 
 adventurous times, experienced mountaineers who 
 obeyed the rules of prudence have enjoyed almost 
 unbroken security. The Alpine Clab now numbers 
 over 300 members, and has from the beginning in- 
 cluded nearly all the most enthusiastic climbers. Yet, 
 with the exception of the Matterhorn catastrophe, no 
 serious accident has ever happened to one of its 
 members. One or two gentlemen have managed to 
 tumble over their own axes, and a distinguished 
 member, in the ardour of science, succeeded in getting 
 under a falling block of ice, and being considerably 
 damaged for the time ; but with these exceptions we 
 believe that the club has remained entirely free from 
 misfortune. There have been almost as many lives of 
 tourists sacrificed on Snowdon as on Mont Blanc since 
 Dr. Hamel's accident, though it must be admitted that 
 the number of ascents of Snowdon has been consider- 
 ably larger. The explanation seems to be simple. 
 The Alps, as we have said, repelled travellers chiefly 
 by imaginary dangers ; they looked so steep, so big, 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 277 
 
 and so slippery, that people feared to attack them, — to 
 say nothing of the fanciful horrors of the '^ reverbera- 
 tion of the sun's rays" and the rarefaction of the 
 atmosphere to which the earliest race of climbers were 
 subject. As it gradually became apparent that these 
 dangers had been over-estimated, there was a natural 
 tendency to regard all mountain difficulties with con- 
 tempt. Both travellers and guides, in many instances, 
 lost sight of the plainest principles of prudence, and 
 were taught by sad experience that there were some 
 very real dangers in the Alps, though those are not 
 always the greatest which are the most conspicuous. 
 In this way, the advice most required by mountaineers 
 is opposite to that which should have been given to 
 their predecessors. They need not be told that many 
 of the apparent dangers are illusory, but should rather 
 be reminded that there are other very serious ones 
 whose presence sometimes is only perceptible to an 
 experienced eye, and that the observance of certain 
 precautions is necessary to justify them in pursuing 
 their favourite sport. 
 
 We may hope that the terrible lesson of the Matter- 
 horn has, for some time at least, impressed this neces- 
 sity upon the minds of most mountaineers, and upon 
 their recognition of it depends both their safety and 
 their pleasure. The first, and one of the most essen- 
 tial, rules applies to the position of the guides. Moun- 
 taineering differs from most sports in this, that the 
 difference between the professional and the amateur is 
 
278 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 unusually great. The players generally beat tlie 
 gentlemen at cricket, and no amateur oarsman lias 
 much, chance with a really good waterman ; but a 
 contest of gentlemen against guides on the Alps would 
 be far more hopeless than a similar match in either of 
 these games. The great reason is, of course, that most 
 men take to the mountains comparatively late in life. 
 Grown-up men of average powers of walking are 
 perfectly capable of undertaking almost any ascent. 
 There will be a very great difference, indeed, between 
 the pace and the ease with which different men can do 
 their work ; a light, active walker will beat a heavy, 
 short-legged rival by many hours in the ascent of a 
 first-rate mountain. Still, with good weather and 
 favourable snow, there is no peak in the Alps beyond 
 the reach of a good average walker, and a man who 
 can do his thirty miles a day on level ground may 
 confidently undertake the most difficult feats that have 
 been hitherto accomplished, unless he has a special 
 antipath}^ to uphill progression. So far, then, although 
 guides are as a rule very superior to amateurs, parti- 
 cularly when weight has to be carried, the superiority, 
 though decisive, is not absolutely crushing. Some 
 very good walkers will even equal, — though they 
 cannot sur|)ass, — a really good guide at a steady, 
 uneventful climb. But that in which guides have an 
 unapproachable advantage is a kind of instinct, difficult 
 to describe, which is only given by life-long experience. 
 It is not so much in performing gymnastic feats. 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 279 
 
 thougli an accomplislied cliamois-liunter will often 
 succeed in exploits at which the most active English- 
 man can only stare in astonishment. He will walk 
 and leap upon slippery edges of ice and bare surfaces 
 of steep rock as though he were possessed of a myste- 
 rious amulet, — the only magic being that of long 
 practice. There are, however, very few places in which 
 this cat-like power of keeping a footing under diffi- 
 culties is really essential. It looks brilliant, and often 
 saves time ; but a little patience will generally find a 
 way of circumventing difficulties which cannot be 
 directly encountered. In short, it is a far more 
 important element of success to have a tolerable 
 amount of endurance than to be unusually active. The 
 power of performing feats is scarcely ever indis- 
 pensable, whereas a capacity for good steady plodding 
 is generally all that is required for the ascent and that 
 is necessary to enjoyment. It is when we come to a 
 higher branch of the art, to a thorough knowledge of 
 mountain craft, that guides show that superiority in 
 skill which makes their aid in many cases indispensable. 
 A good guide, who has probably been trained as a 
 chamois-hunter, who has at least been familiar from 
 his earliest youth with the mysteries of the climbing 
 art, acquires a skill which we can only compare to that 
 which savage tribes display in following a track by the 
 eye. Suppose, for example, that a party with one of 
 the first-rate guides is moving to the ascent of a new 
 mountain. It is often thought, by those who have not 
 
280 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tried, that in this case guides and amateurs will be 
 about on a par. ^Nothing can be further from the 
 truth. There is, perhaps, a difficult glacier to be 
 crossed, and beyond it a long wall of rocks, mixed 
 with ice, to be climbed. The guide will, in the first 
 place, select the most practicable route for climbing 
 the rocks. He may not be able to say whether it will 
 prove practicable or not, for that depends uj)on minute 
 peculiarities about the rocks and the ice which only 
 reveal themselves on close inspection. But if the 
 amateurs and the guides differ as to the best route of 
 assault, the chances are at least twenty to one in favour 
 of the guide's opinion. The next thing is to lay down 
 the best line for approaching the rocks through the 
 tangled labyrinth of crevasses. Here a good guide 
 will at a glance determine the line to be taken, and 
 will follow it unerringly without a single mistake, 
 whereas a traveller has an equal chance of selecting 
 the worst route, and when he is in the midst of the 
 distorted masses of ice, will probably find that he has 
 lost his clue. On arriving at the rocks, the guide, 
 again, will be able to give a thoroughly trustworthy 
 opinion as to the state of the superincumbent snow ; 
 he will know exactly what is the danger of avalanches 
 or falls of stones, and will adopt the best means for 
 avoiding such dangers. In the actual climb the 
 travellers constantly lose their place, as it were ; that 
 is, they confuse the different pinnacles of rock, and 
 fancy that they are at one point which they have 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 281 
 
 marked from below, when they are really a long way 
 off from it. The guide never commits such a blunder, 
 which may frequently cause the failure of an expedi- 
 tion. To mention only one other point out of many ; 
 a guide has the most perfect confidence in retracing 
 the exact route by which the ascent has been made, 
 alchough on the return every feature of the mountain 
 is seen from the reverse side, and has, as every traveller 
 knows, an entirely changed aspect. In a wilderness of 
 blocks of stone, each as like to another as sheep in a 
 flock, he shows a facility like that of the shepherd with 
 his sheep in recognising each separate block at which 
 he has cast a hasty glance in the morning. There is 
 no part of a mountaineer's craft so difficult to acquire 
 as this ; and for want of it travellers are constantly 
 bewildered and hopelessly at a loss, where their guides 
 never hesitate for an instant. Even in a fog or a dark 
 night a guide will find his way by what seems an 
 unaccountable instinct, simply because his mind has 
 become accustomed to mark and retain the most 
 trifling details, which make no individual impression 
 upon an inexperienced mind. 
 
 In all these, and in many other respects, a guide has 
 the unapproachable advantage conferred by habits 
 which have become instincts, and it is a real pleasure, 
 when the traveller has become qualified to judge of 
 the skill displayed, to watch a thoroughly good moun- 
 taineer finding his way through the various difficulties 
 that obstruct every new ascent. The most obvious 
 
 T 
 
282 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 moral is that a difficult ascent should never be attempted 
 by a novice without a sufficient force of guides. It 
 will often be of no avail to have even the ablest and 
 most experienced amateur as a substitute ; for, in addi- 
 tion to the points of superiority already mentioned, the 
 guide has the professional instinct strongly developed ; 
 — that is, he is always ready to give assistance at the 
 very instant it is required ; and assistance, to be of any 
 value, should generally be given without the delay even 
 of a fraction of a second. A fall which may easily be 
 arrested at the first moment becomes irresistible at the 
 end of one or two seconds. The amateur forgets to 
 move till the accident has actually begun. A good 
 guide will see the first incipient symptoms of unsteadi- 
 ness. In the next place, when good guides are taken, 
 it should be a point of honour to listen to their advice. 
 As a rule, such a guide errs on the side of audacity; 
 he takes a natural interest in the success of the expedi- 
 tion ; and he is accustomed, in chamois-hunting, to 
 venture into far more dangerous positions than any 
 which travellers will probably encounter. It is far 
 better to give up any ascent whatever than to urge a 
 man in whom you have confidence to go on where his 
 judgment is against going ; and if you have not con- 
 fidence in your man, it is best to come back and get 
 another guide. 
 
 It is sometimes made an accusation against Alpine 
 climbers that they tempt poor peasants into positions 
 of peril by the ofier of a few francs, — to which several 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 283 
 
 answers may be made ; as that, if the risk is as 
 small as most travellers believe, the temptation is 
 not unjustifiable ; further, that the travellers them- 
 selves undoubtedly run a greater risk than their more 
 active companions ; moreover, that the guides are per- 
 lectly well able to judge for themselves, and exact a 
 sufficient payment for the risk incurred. These answers 
 are quite satisfactory, but only on the assumption that 
 a guide is never unfairly pressed to proceed at critical 
 moments; for then the danger would certainly be 
 increased to an excessive degree, and an unfair advan- 
 tage would be taken of a man's natural desire to dis- 
 tinguish himself. In short, it should be laid down as 
 part of the elementary code of a mountaineer's duty, 
 that certain prudential rules should be strictly observed, 
 and that the worst of all breaches of prudence is a 
 determination to proceed in defiance of the opinion of 
 an expert. 
 
 There is, however, another corollary to this doctrine, 
 upon which it is perhaps more important to insist at 
 the present moment. We have endeavoured to show 
 that guides have an incontestable superiority over 
 amateurs, and that the most lamentable accident that 
 has hitherto happened was caused by the want of a 
 due force of guides. We may add that it is our pro- 
 found conviction that an attempt to dispense with their 
 services on a large scale would lead to an immense 
 increase of accidents. Nevertheless, there is another 
 side to the question. It has been too much the 
 
284 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 fashion of late years for men to trust every tiling to 
 their guides. Gentlemen come out to Switzerland, and 
 before tliey know what a crevasse means, they under- 
 take the most difficult expeditions in reliance upon the 
 skill of others. This is fair neither to the guides nor 
 to themselves. It is unfair to the guides, because it is 
 an enormous tax upon their strength. A gentleman 
 was not long ago roped to a guide to cross a glacier, 
 and soon made it manifest that he looked upon the rope 
 as intended for towing purposes. He considered, that 
 is, that the guide was to drag him bodily through 
 several miles of deep snow. He soon learnt better, 
 and showed himself to be a good walker. But his 
 example may be taken as an illustration. Inexperi- 
 enced travellers become dead weights, though generally 
 after a less literal fashion, and throw the whole respon- 
 sibility upon their guides, without being able to assist, 
 or even to follow by their own unaided energies. They 
 thus impose a tax upon their guide which is in every 
 respect unjustifiable. Such a traveller is equally unfair 
 to himself. Many cases occur in which it is of im- 
 portance that each member of a party should be able 
 to answer for his own safet}^, though he need neither 
 find the way nor give any assistance to his neighbours. 
 On a steep snow slope, for example, a man should have 
 perfect confidence that his own legs are to be relied 
 upon ; he should be quite confident that he will not 
 make a slip which, at a critical moment, may endanger 
 a whole party even of able mountaineers, and with- 
 
ALPINE CIJMBTNG. 285 
 
 out that confidence no one should undertake difficult 
 expeditions. Moreover, an inexperienced man misses 
 three-fourths of the pleasure. lie has the misery of 
 being lugged over every obstacle, and feeling that he 
 is a useless clog upon his companions, and he entirely 
 fails to appreciate the skill displayed, and to take an 
 intelligent interest in the ascent. He is like a man 
 who should be strapped on the back of a horse to follow 
 a fox-hunt, — a source of danger and annoyance to his 
 friends, and a trouble to himself. 
 
 The true principle, then, seems to be obvious. 
 Every aspirant to mountaineering honours should 
 take care to qualify himself by cautious expeditions 
 on his own account. There is plenty of j)leasure to 
 be obtained in the lower mountains. Nothing is more 
 delightful than an ascent of some of the lower peaks in 
 perfect solitude, or with two or three friends. A very 
 little experience will show a man what he can safely 
 undertake. A few walks without guides will teach a 
 great deal that may be entirely overlooked when 
 another man's eyes and legs have to be implicitly 
 trusted. There is an intense pleasure in finding one's 
 own way, and gaining confidence in one's powers. 
 The traveller soon learns to attend to a number of 
 circumstances which are easil}^ missed by those who 
 are dependent upon others. He gains some of the 
 instinct which is so highly developed in the pro- 
 fessional guides, though he will never be able to rival 
 them, and, if he undertakes more difficult expeditions 
 
286 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 according to the ordinary system with a good guide, 
 he will be able to admire with intelligence their 
 splendid exhibitions of activity and mountain craft, 
 and to feel that he is not a burden upon their energies. 
 It is true that there are certain limits to his powers, 
 and he will be able to appreciate them the more 
 clearly. If he finds himself qualified to undertake 
 difficult expeditions, — such as the ascent of Mont 
 Blanc or the Finster-Aarhom, — he must be content 
 to make more elaborate preparations than he would 
 need with professional assistance, — to wait for perfect 
 weather, to retreat under a smaller stress of difficulty, 
 and to be content with more frequent failures. He 
 must be specially careful to secure a safe retreat, and 
 must not venture upon unusual feats and tours de force. 
 But he will be able to judge for himself, and to call in 
 assistance when needed. The really difficult excur- 
 sions, — for example, the ascents of the Weisshorn or 
 the Matterhorn, or expeditions which require unusual 
 skill upon glaciers, great labour in cutting steps, and 
 familiarity with the state of the snow, — will probably 
 remain forbidden to him without such assistance. 
 When he undertakes them they will be all the 
 pleasanter from the knowledge which he has acquired 
 in his own adventures. 
 
 We have insisted the more upon this consideration 
 because it seems to be the great want of this, the last 
 era of mountaineering. The adventitious charm of 
 absolute novelty has gone for .ever. But every 
 
ALPINE CLIMBING. 287 
 
 mountam is new to a man who attacks it for himself, 
 who arranges his own scheme of assault, and carries 
 it out hy his own efforts. Amongst the less dangerous 
 mountains there is plenty of room for this, which will 
 always be a charming form of exercise. For, — and 
 this is the last remark we need offer, — there is a 
 pleasure about mountaineering such as few amuse- 
 ments can afford. Those who go with some supple- 
 mentary object, to collect flowers or to make 
 observations in geology or in glaciers, will find that 
 their favourite pursuit gains additional charms when 
 it leads amongst the magnificent scenery of the Alps. 
 Whatever nonsense has been talked upon the subject, 
 there is nothing grander in nature than the wild 
 scenery of the high mountains, with its strange 
 contrasts and rapidly shifting effects. A man who 
 has passed a few hours even at the Jardin or at the 
 foot of the Matterhorn has learnt what is really meant 
 by natural sublimity. If he has a touch of poetry in 
 his composition, he cannot but be profoundly affected 
 by the strange solitudes of the eternal snow, by the 
 mighty cliffs, and the soaring peaks changing their 
 aspect with every passing cloud that drifts through 
 them and every ray of sunshine that strikes upon 
 them. When wandering amongst their inmost 
 recesses, he bears away indelible impressions such 
 as are hidden from the traveller confined to the valley, 
 and tormented by cockneys and inn-keepers. And, if 
 it is necessary to descend to lower considerations, 
 
288 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 tliere is nothins: whicli in moderation has a more 
 j^otent influence upon the health. To breathe the 
 pure air of the Alps after eleven months in London 
 streets is an escape from a close prison. The lungs 
 expand, the step becomes firm, and the appetite some- 
 times startles even its owner. Amongst all pleasant 
 memories of such delights, let us try to revive one 
 which many of our readers may have enjoj^ed. Let us 
 place ourselves in imagination on a sunny shelf of the 
 mountains about four p.m. on a glorious day in July. 
 Behind our backs towers some mighty pyramid, which, 
 after long calculations and various attempts, we have 
 succeeded in scaling that morning. A cairn, just 
 visible through a telescope from the valley, testifies to 
 all posterity that the summit has at last felt the foot 
 of man. We have descended through various diffi- 
 culties till at last we have been greeted by the sound 
 of the cow-bells floating up through the thin air. 
 And now we have reached the chalet, emptied a pail- 
 ful of delicious warm milk at a draught, eaten some 
 gigantic hunks of bread, butter, honey, hard-boiled 
 eggs, and cold fowl, and, after lighting a pipe, lain 
 down on a bush of Alpine roses, to enjoy the pleasure 
 of lazily regarding the glorious scenery and a little 
 village, — not unprovided with a comfortable inn, — at 
 our feet. Such moments leave vivid recollections, and 
 cause those who have once tasted them to vow that 
 they shall not be without successors. We hope that 
 by encouraging the proper mixture of prudence and 
 
AT>PINE CLTMFiTNG. 289 
 
 courage, of self-reliance and due respect to better 
 experience than their own, the members of the Alpine 
 Club may long continue to enjoy one of the purest and 
 most stimulating of athletic pleasures, and encourage 
 new generations to follow their footsteps, though they 
 can no longer hold out a hope of new conquests. 
 
ON CEICKET. 
 
 Dr. Johnson defines cricket as '' a sport, at wliicli the 
 contenders drive a ball with sticks in opposition to each 
 other." Whether this somewhat hazy description was 
 an expression of ill-will, like that which he caused to 
 explode upon fishing, — whether it was another specimen 
 of the *' interstitial yacuities reticulated or decussated," 
 by which he disguised the simplicity of a net, — or 
 whether it was " ignorance, madam, — sheer ignorance," 
 does not matter much now. For the game at which 
 Lord John Sackville and " Long Robin," good men of 
 Kent, challenged all England and beat them ; the 
 game which was stigmatised by the stout old ** Gentle- 
 man's Magazine" as levelling and mischievous, has 
 become, at the end of a hundred and twenty years, that 
 by which Englishmen may be recognised in every 
 corner of the earth. Where a score or so of our sons 
 are found, there is found cricket ; where they are not, 
 cricket is not ; and the ethnologist may hereafter find 
 a very sufficient guide to their presence by the in- 
 separable concomitants of fossil stumps and bats. 
 
CRICKET. 291 
 
 Into tlie causes of this peculiar institution not merely 
 failing to flourish, but steadfastly declining to take the 
 smallest root, in soils unshadowed by the British flag 
 or its successors, it is needless to enter here. Few of 
 those Avho understand the game at all, and have any 
 knowledge of national character, will fail to recognise, 
 if they cannot deflne, the inaptitude of aught but the 
 Saxon element for such a sport. At any rate, if the 
 theory lacks precision, the fact is transparent enough. 
 Far away north, our Eussian colony at St. Petersburg 
 fails to tempt the descendants of the Boyards to 
 emulate us in the field. On the race-course they enter 
 as participators ; on the cricket-ground they will not 
 step, even as spectators. Austria is, I believe, guiltless 
 of the attempt. Germany may witness a few spasmodic 
 efibrts between *' The World " and Public Schools, at 
 Homburg or Wiesbaden. At Florence, Pome, or 
 Naples, the unwonted spectacle of cricket-bags may 
 startle the natives into momentary wonder at what the 
 Forestieri are up to next. But it is the English alone 
 who take part in the game ; and, with the exception of 
 a few misguided Frenchmen, who have been tormented 
 by the superhuman energy of a certain secretary into 
 supporting the game with their occasional appearance 
 before, and hasty retreat from, a dangerous wicket, no 
 progress has been made towards any international 
 contest in this behalf. Even the Spaniard has got a 
 love for horse-racing after the English fashion ; but 
 neither Gibraltar nor Cadiz has seduced him, by 
 
292 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Anglican example, to doff his sombrero for a club- cap ; 
 and the whole Continent of Europe may be safely pro- 
 nounced to contain no real cricketer, save in these isles 
 and their dependencies. America tells the same tale. 
 In Canada the game flourishes. In the States of the 
 Union, in which English blood is not much mixed, it 
 maintains a precarious existence by the side of base- 
 ball. Elsewhere, who ever heard of it? Our own 
 dependencies in India cannot create native players ; 
 and although, by unremitting diligence, — more for the 
 pleasure of overcoming difficulties than anything else, 
 — one or two Englishmen have taught the Australian 
 native to present a more than creditable appearance, 
 their existence is a mere phenomenon which has no 
 significance so far as the nationality of the game is 
 concerned. 
 
 Were it not for the special character which is here 
 claimed, all this would be odd. Here have the French, 
 to go no farther, copied other sports, which we have 
 also carried to the end of the world, with almost 
 ridiculous fidelity. At rowing they have managed to 
 present a creditable front. Horse-racing they, like 
 ourselves, are carrying to a reprehensible excess ; the 
 minutest details of an English race-course are repro- 
 duced, and, I may add, with improvements ; the phrases 
 familiar to us all reappear there in strange garb, such 
 as " breack-down " and " gentlemans rider;" the very 
 luncheon, pride of an English drag, is served up on the 
 Marquis de T.'s coach-roof with lamb and mint sauce, 
 
CRICKET. 293 
 
 sherry and ^"palale," witliin reacli of what one would 
 have supposed more appetising delicacies from Potel's. 
 Yet on the selfsame day when this was going on at one 
 end of the Bois de Boulogne in the afternoon, the 
 secretary hereinbefore alluded to could not by smile, 
 prayer, or menace, convene a dozen French people at 
 the other end to partake in a match between Paris and 
 the Marylebone Club itself, although duly set forth as 
 the '' premiers joueurs d'Angleterre." No ; they could 
 shoot pigeons after the fashion of Hornsey Wood 
 before its destruction, within earshot of the Lac at 
 mid-day ; they could go down with English grooms 
 and English horses to the races in the afternoon ; but 
 your crickets, no. Tennis, some might urge as an 
 exception to the rule I am about to lay down ; it is 
 not so really, and very, very few Frenchmen care even 
 about that ; but it may be safely affirmed that a game 
 by which you get no money, which involves, neverthe- 
 less, much muscular exertion, and, above all, in which 
 you may get very considerably hurt, has nothing to 
 recommend itself to any one but an Englishman. Let 
 us keep it so, and enjoy it by ourselves. 
 
 Of course every sport has its advocates. I read a 
 good deal, very well said, about the special merits of 
 hunting, rowing, fishing, and shooting, which may be 
 fairly said to sum up the out- door exercises of our day. 
 Football has gained a little temporary position, but few 
 busy men can really partake of its somewhat hazardous 
 conflict. Coursing is a cross between hunting and 
 
294 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 shooting, and is, in fact, like racing to tlie multitude, 
 — a thing wliich is to be looked at only ; while archery 
 and croquet may pair oif together. IN^ow the great 
 merit of cricket is that it combines many of the 
 merits, and few of the demerits, alleged to exist 
 in the other sports. Shooting, for instance, is social 
 only by accident. In theory, and too often in practice, 
 it is eminently selfish. So in hunting, — the grandest 
 excitement out, — you share the sport with others, but 
 you grudge them that share. It is not because every- 
 body else is enjoying himself that I feel the sacred fire 
 of joy; I am not aggrieved if he should do so; but 
 when I am first over the brook, or can pound the whole 
 lot, and go on alone, the consciousness that their plea- 
 sure is over for the day lends no pang of remorse to 
 my heart, but, on the contrary, increases my demoniac 
 delight. 
 
 So far, then, as competition goes, the dearest triumph 
 in this case, as also in shooting or fishing, is obtained 
 by the ill-success of everybody except yourself; the 
 enjoyment is not therefore a social one in the true 
 sense. Eowing brings in the element of joint success 
 at once; but it seems to me to do so in rather too 
 forcible a way; for the oarsman becomes only part 
 of a machine, which will reflect great honour and glory 
 on others, but very little on himself. It takes a keen 
 eye and a good judge to pick out number four's merits ; 
 and the better the rest row with him, and he with 
 them, the less he can be singled out for praise. Here 
 
CRICKET. 295 
 
 the enjoyment is social enougli ; but the soul of man 
 must pine for a little individual honour and dignity, 
 which, while not impairing the joint effect, shall send 
 him home with more satisfaction than that of the off- 
 leader in a team. It is in this that cricket, as I con- 
 ceive, shines pre-eminent, hitting, at it does the exact 
 line between the duties of citizenship and the sweetness 
 of monstrari et dicier, &c. No man is an Ishmael here. 
 " We won," says the eleventh man, and '' I made two 
 catches, or got two runs when they were wanted,'' as the 
 case may be. In rowing, the last choice is, or ought 
 to be, the worst ; he is the blot of the eight ; he spoils 
 the lift of the whole boat ; he never ought to have 
 been in. He may row out his very inside, he may be 
 utterly unworthy of one tithe of the abuse which falls 
 to his share; but there he is, and he cannot redeem 
 himself, or ever be more than *'that man we were 
 obliged to put up with when Robinson smashed up." 
 Contrast him with the corresponding bete noire in the 
 eleven. The latter has every minute an opportunity 
 of becoming famous ; every minute of each day during 
 the match he has a marshal's baton in his pocket ; and 
 on him at any moment may the countless cheers of 
 Lord's be concentrated, as having done the thing which 
 saves or pulls off the match. If he make a mistake, 
 he has the others' merits to fall back upon ; if he does 
 a good thing, it is all his own, and he has the addi- 
 tional pride of feeling that his fellow- cricketers reap 
 the advantage ; and therefore, I say, an eleven is better 
 
296 BRITISH SPOUTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 constructed for corabining both sorts of competitive 
 ecstasy, than is an eigbt-oar boat. 
 
 If, moreover, the cricketer can enjoy virtuous plea- 
 sures to a greater degree tban bis solitary rivals in the 
 hunting-field, or tban the integral but consolidated 
 crews on the river, he can hardly copy all their vices. 
 He may be always riding jealous, he maybe constantly 
 trying to wipe other men's eyes, but he has this check, 
 that there is a duty to others to be done. Eiding over 
 hounds, or disappointing other men at fences, are 
 crimes against the code of gentlemen ; shooting your 
 friend's bird is as bad; but when you have avoided 
 such sins, you may ride your horse to pieces in the 
 first five minutes, or miss bird after bird, till you lie 
 down and gnaw turnips with rage ; — you have only 
 yourself to injure and to blame. The man at the 
 wicket is differently placed, he has a side to uphold, 
 and a ring to detect his shortcomings in so doing ; and 
 jealousy or ill-temper is best kept out of sight under 
 such circumstances. It is very annoying to miss an 
 easy leg-hit, but after a few explosions, a player sub- 
 ject to such supervision soon gets tired of whirling his 
 bat about to show how he feels it. Yery disheartening 
 is it to see your field fail in catch after catch, but a 
 bowler's benedictions are more usually deep than loud, 
 after a good public education, such as his mates in the 
 pavilion can and do give him. And the result is that, 
 take it for all in all, specimens of submission to autho- 
 rity, and of self-sacrifice for common weal, may be seen 
 
CRICKET. 297 
 
 every day in our great matches, wliicli are earnest of 
 ability to do tlic like in tlie sterner relations of life. 
 A well-organised eleven out in the field, silent and 
 obedient, is really a fine sight. Over after over, per- 
 haps, the obstinate enemy retains his place at the 
 wicket ; the bowler keeps ^' pegging away ;" the field 
 relax no jot of vigilance ; by the mere beckon of a 
 finger from the wicket-keeper a piece of strategy is 
 carried out, and one or more of the force are moved 
 to command a supposed weak point. As the good ball 
 is bowled, played well, and fielded deftly, an answer 
 of applause comes from many hands all round the 
 black line of spectators, and the several performers 
 have their reward. For it is curious how very soon 
 the public learn to be critics, and just ones. Every 
 now and then they make mistakes in injudicious appro- 
 bation, or imdistinguishing blame, but, as a rule, the 
 ring's verdicts are sound ; and incompetence or buf- 
 foonery is soon detected and reprobated, while steady 
 play, where brilliance would be wrong, is fully appre- 
 ciated. At the public school matches indeed it is a 
 point of honour to applaud everything, good, bad, or 
 indifferent, done by your own side ; but, on other great 
 occasions, no more discriminating audience than that 
 at Lord's ever sat in the most fastidious opera house of 
 Europe. 
 
 A striking instance of this true cricket feeling which 
 animates the habitual frequenters of great matches was 
 afforded but the other day at Lord's. With any other 
 
 u 
 
298 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 clientele, tlie combined attractions of a lovely day, a 
 band, playing, and twenty- two noble lords and lionour- 
 able commoners engaged in strife with such, men as 
 I Zingari, would have drawn thousands from mere 
 curiosity. How The O'Donoghue would field, I should 
 myself have believed to be a question interesting of 
 solution. But it was thought not to be real cricket, 
 and such an entire absence of humanity has not been 
 seen on the forms around during the year. As it 
 hapj)ened, Parliament distinguished itself so much 
 more up in St. John's Wood than it has done of late at 
 St. Stej)hen's Hall, and showed the blessings of good 
 government and good temper in such an engaging 
 light, that I hope, at any rate, one eminent statesman 
 was there to take a lesson, and to see what a really 
 good lot of fellows he had to sit among. But the 
 general public set their face against aught but stern 
 cricket, and stayed away accordingh^ 
 
 It is amusing to see how Ihe characteristics of 
 different men show themselves in such an arena, and 
 how opportunity is given for the exhibition of that 
 which in ordinary life stands concealed. For instance, 
 it has often been observed that a very conceited man, 
 who seems to be shamelessly bumptious, is really the 
 most nervous of creatures. At cricket this is detected 
 to a certainty. More than alive to his own merits, but 
 fearful to a degree that something will happen to mar 
 their due exposition, the brazen youth advances with 
 his bat behind his back, under his arms, — a favourite 
 
CRICKET. 299 
 
 attitude of this class, — or swinging it jauntily along as 
 if lie cared for nothing. Yain boasting ! If you wish 
 to see a real funker, look at him when the dreaded 
 moment arrives, and Wootton prepares to put down 
 one of his best. He must still feign calmness, or he is 
 nothing ; but you see by the twitch of the hand, the 
 glove rapidly raised to the face, and replaced on the 
 bat-handle, the jerk of the elbow, and perhaps the 
 uneasy lifting of the foot, that his fear of a " duck," — 
 as by a pardonable contraction from duck- egg, a 
 nought is called in cricket-play, — outweighs all other 
 earthly considerations. He escapes, — the uplifted hands 
 of the bowler j)roclaim how narrowly ; therewith his 
 spirits rise, and he walks round the wicket to show his 
 muscle. The process repeated once or twice, he takes 
 heart ; conceit assumes her sway ; he tries to hit a 
 straight one to leg, and falls, returning to the pavilion 
 with a full and complete explanation, inch by inch, of 
 the extraordinary conduct on the part of the ball which 
 led to the result. 
 
 There is one qualification which ought to be made 
 with regard to the universality of cricket among us. 
 The proposition is true only if applied to the ideal 
 Englishman, the member of the upper and middle 
 classes, who comes up to our large towns, or emigrates 
 to our colonies, and who is looked at apart from local 
 origin. When we get to considering England on the 
 map, and divide it into counties or districts, the rule 
 no longer holds good. Move your English labourer, 
 
300 BRITISH SPOETS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 and lie becomes a cricketer naturally, like otkers. 
 While at home in the coimtry village, he is governed 
 by the habits of those immediately around him. Some 
 counties have never done anything in the national game, 
 so far as the working man is concerned ; in others, 
 it is his delight, and almost single pastime. Hamp- 
 shire was the earliest in the field ; and although her 
 cricketing powers have waned, they have never wholly 
 failed. For the last thirty years, however, Kent, 
 Sussex, and Surrey, in the south, haVe been conspicuous 
 for village greens studded with evening practisers, and 
 for matches, in which superior form is shown by mere 
 labourers. Cambridge and Norfolk, in a less degree, 
 maintain this position in the eastern counties ; and 
 then come Nottingham, Yorkshire, and, of late, Lan- 
 cashire, in the north. The last-named county has 
 improved wonderfully in the last few years, and the 
 game may be fairly considered as safe to exist there for 
 many a year to come. Sheffield has been the great 
 fountain-head from which Yorkshire cricket has found 
 its way into the three Ridings. But JSTottingham has, 
 from time whereof cricket memory runneth not to 
 the contrary, stood firmly at the head of northern 
 practice. And it is curious to note how style, as in 
 the public schools, is perpetuated there to this day 
 from early years in the century. Free hitting, more 
 particularly to leg, has been a characteristic of their 
 eleven ever since the oldest memory. Sometimes they 
 have had bad bowling ; more often, as just at the 
 
CRICKET. 301 
 
 present moment, almost a superabundance of good ; 
 but no one bas ever seen tbem come up witbout lots of 
 bitting. Indeed, one particular brancb of tbis specialty 
 is indigenous. Tbe old bands used to follow tbe ball 
 wben it was capable of being played to " leg," and 
 witb a laudable indifference to tbe laws of matbematics, 
 believed tbat if bit in tbe same direction as it was 
 already travelling, tbe ball went fartber. It was at 
 Nottingbam tbat tbis was discovered to be a mistake, 
 and tbat tbe true way is tbat now invariably inculcated, 
 of getting forward to tbe pitcb, and leaving tbe conflict 
 of forces to direct tbe ball more or less square to tbe 
 bitter. Tbe value of tbe discovery is proved by tbe 
 scores made, for it would not be too mucb to say tbat 
 one-tbird of tbe bard bits are effected by tbis metbod 
 alone. It is in tbe nature of tbings tbat batting sbould 
 improve just as execution on tbe piano or violin does. 
 Passages wbicb our fatbers were scared at are now 
 played easily by every public performer ; and in tbe 
 same way boys now pla}^ balls by rote, as it were, 
 wbicb would bave puzzled an early Englisb professor 
 to deatb. Constant practice, witb a good eye and 
 ready decision, will soon make an average man into 
 a fair batsman. Bowling is more like poetry, and 
 cannot be so manufactured ; and a bowler must be 
 created witb natural advantages if be is ever to sbine. 
 Wben found, be is like a tenore robusto, — a priceless 
 treasure. Some few years ago one of tbe counties 
 named above bad an apparently inexbaustible supply. 
 
302 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Now, tliey have not one. On the other hand, J^otting-- 
 ham, then weak, has at least half-a-dozen now in the 
 very first rank. 
 
 The remaining counties may be divided into those 
 which have some native cricket, and those which have 
 none. Of the former, Leicestershire would doubtless 
 stand well from her neighbourhood to JSTottingham, 
 were it not for a lamentable absence of grounds in her 
 villages. Herefordshire, Wiltshire, and Devonshire, 
 I believe, can do something ; but for the rest there is 
 little sympathy with the game, — and as for the Prin- 
 cipalit}^, a Welsh cricketer is as scarce an article as 
 a Welsh cricket-ground. Probably the Welsh are 
 too much employed in providing the needful flannel 
 for more enlightened districts. 
 
 A hundred and fifty years ago, our fathers played 
 in the Artillery Ground, Finsbur}^ Square. Then 
 Londoners came to White Conduit Fields, and the 
 " noblemen and gentlemen " made laws at the " Star 
 and Garter,'^ in Pall Mall, scene of the Chaworth 
 tragedy, in which Lord Byron's predecessor in the 
 title got ofi* so easily. From this by lineal descent 
 came the present Lord's ; the pedigree being first 
 Dorset Square, then the site of the Regent's Canal 
 between South and JN^orth Banks, and lastly, let us 
 hojDO and believe, a final resting-place hard by the 
 Clergy Orphans. Private liberality advanced the 
 money necessary to acquire the ground so as to avoid 
 future pilgrimages ; and now, after many vicissitudes. 
 
CRICKET. 303 
 
 tLe M.C.C. can boast of managing their own matclios 
 on their own ground. The oilier great metropolitan 
 place of sport is far more modern than most visitors 
 believe. It is not jet thirty years old, but in that 
 short time it has fixed itself firml}^, — among a certain 
 class more firmly, than ever the more exclusive club 
 in the North- West has been able to do. There may 
 be fewer carriages, and fewer ladies, — but a great 
 day at the Oval will show more citizens, and witness 
 more chafi", than the most crowded performance at 
 its rival. They may drink less cider-cup ; but then 
 have they not 'Atfield, as the pleasant compound of 
 gin, noyeau, gingerbeer, and ice, is joyfully called? 
 And with or without the initial asj)irate, an excellent 
 drink it is. Possibly the growing outrecuidance of 
 the professionals may have at one time received a little 
 more encouragement on the Surrey side than it ought, 
 but the Committee seem to have seen the error of 
 their ways in this respect. In all others they have 
 done much for the cause of cricket, and although not 
 law-givers, they have always set an example to law- 
 abiders. 
 
 In the country, daj^s gone by tell of Broad Half- 
 penny and the Hambledon Club, and these, with the 
 grounds of Lord Tankerville, the Duke of Dorset, and 
 Sir Horace Mann, formed the playing- grounds of the 
 inventors of cricket as it is. Since then cricket at 
 Canterbury and Nottingham, Oxford and Cambridge, 
 has flourished on the same grounds till the present 
 
304 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 (lay, althoiigli at the latter university tlie stage has 
 been changed from the public common to an enclosed 
 field hard by. Brighton has been driven from house 
 and home more than once, and Sheffield also ; both, 
 however, finding pastures new. The Leicester ground, 
 upon which manj^ a grand match has been played, 
 and as many runs got as on any, is now a series of 
 streets of the conventional pattern of red brick houses 
 with chimneys at each end. All honour to the Com- 
 mittee at Lord's for rescuing the old place from similar 
 profanation. 
 
 It is not, however, to the old idea of a club with 
 its local habitation, whence it sallied forth to do battle 
 with the stranger, and to which it expected the stranger 
 to come in his turn, — not to the great county grounds 
 with their home and return matches, — that the present 
 increase of cricket is due. It is no doubt true that in 
 days gone by the idea of a club without a ground was 
 an impossible one ; but within the present generation of 
 cricketers a new order of things has arisen. Subscrip- 
 tions for keeping the turf in good order, for engaging 
 professional players to the end of practice, and for 
 defraying expenses of transit on the annual outings, 
 were generally found to hamper the progress of cricket. 
 Many a man was willing to play w^ho had no ground near 
 him ; there was many another who could ill afford to 
 subscribe to the numerous clubs anxious to avail them- 
 selves of his prowess ; and all were inclined, if possible, 
 to emancipate themselves from the trammels and 
 
CRICKET. 305 
 
 expenditure wliicli the employment of professionals 
 involved. The founders of the far-famed Zingari saw 
 this, and inaugurated a new phase of the game which 
 bids fair to become of dimensions enough to swallow, 
 or at least unduly interfere with, the older and more 
 legitimate form of contest. They started the heresy 
 of a purely amateur body, with no ground, and no 
 professional assistance, to which the subscription should 
 be nothing, the entrance-fee never to exceed the sub- 
 scription, and which should pla}^ at the individual 
 expense of each man wherever and whenever they 
 could light upon ground fit to receive them, and enter- 
 tainment for man and bat should be offered. The 
 early advantages were great. The founders improved 
 gentlemen's bowling, — alwaj^s the weak point, and 
 which few had the courage and determination to 
 practice ; they created a strong esprit de corps in the 
 limited body of members, and they took good cricket 
 into places where county contests were impossible. 
 It seems strange that men should have waited so long 
 for such a simple enlargement of a possible field of 
 action ; but when the egg had been once set on end 
 the Zingari were not long in finding imitators. Cam- 
 bridge set up her Quidnuncs ; Oxford followed with 
 her Harlequins ; and now a countless body of cricketers, 
 with nearly every name, reasonable or absurd, by 
 which such a fellowship can be indicated, flood the 
 columns of our newspapers. To say the truth, these 
 imitators are but a servum pecus as to nomenclature. 
 
306 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 Tlie Zingari indicated their principle of action clearty 
 enough, and were therefore for some time annoyed 
 by absurd plagiarisms of their defining name and stjde. 
 This wore off after a space, and some attempt at 
 originality was made. The army had their Knicker- 
 bockers, Rugby her Butterflies, Eton her Wanderers, 
 Harrow, I think, her Blues, and the sons of Erin their 
 '' 'Na Shuler." These were perennial. The Incogniti, 
 the Etceteras, the Perambulators, the Cricket Companj^, 
 are also all alive ; of the Peripatetics and several like- 
 named institutions, we do not hear much now ; and 
 many having been founded with no original bond of 
 uaion, and for no imaginable reason except that they 
 may flaunt a name and a ribbon, perish almost in the 
 first year of their existence. Their number becomes 
 almost a nuisance ; but it is at any rate a distinct 
 testimony to the soundness of the original idea, and 
 makes the reminiscence of a time when no such com- 
 bination was dreamed of almost incredible. For after 
 all there ought to be a moving, inspiring idea in the 
 formation of every club of this sort. It is of no use 
 to endeavour to get up fictitious sympathy with what 
 are technically termed sides. I can't do it, nor can 
 you. Married and Single, Tall and Short, Old and 
 Young, are only so many variations of the first half 
 of the alphabet against the second ; and, for utter 
 lack of interest, commend me to an " A to K.'' Such 
 a division makes a good practice game, and is better 
 than none; but it never can be more than a side. 
 
CRICKET. 307 
 
 Bring a lot of hardy Norsemen to ilght incli by incli 
 witli the South, and you see a real contest, and take 
 your side ; better still, if you set county against 
 county, and watch the patriotism which an artificial 
 division can never evoke ; or set school against school, 
 universit}'- against university ; and in days which seem 
 never likely to return, — the Gentlemen against the 
 Players. Party feeling is after all the true mainspring 
 of life, and party success the pleasure above all others. 
 If you cannot contribute, you can at least share it. 
 The English are accused of reducing all things to 
 pounds, shillings, and pence ; the money-boxes at 
 Lord's or the Oval know well by this standard the 
 difference between the anxious crowds who watch one 
 sort of match, and the listless indifference of the few 
 loungers who drop in at the other. 
 
 xind this brings me to the monster cricket nuisance 
 of the day. It is bad enough to see a parcel of ninnies 
 airiner a flamina: ribbon and a sonorous name in the 
 newspapers, and duly paying for the insertion. It 
 annoys one, but it does no real harm. It pleases them, 
 and don't hurt the game. But it is far otherwise with 
 the so-called England Elevens, which go caravaning 
 about the country playing against two bowlers and 
 twenty duffers for the benefit of some enterprising 
 publican. If it were only for the bad cricket on the 
 side of the twenty-two, the thing would be intolerable 
 enough. Imagine a whole district scoured for miles 
 for anything in the shape of a player, and the strange 
 
308 BurrrsH spouts and pastimes. 
 
 ill-matclied result in the shape of twenty poor beggars 
 treading on each other's toes with bran-new spikes, 
 missiDg catch after catch, and eventually going in one 
 after the other, like sheep to the slaughter, to " 'ave 
 their hover of Jackson," as " Punch '' put it in that 
 wonderful cartoon by John Leech, — and you have a 
 fair average of the locals. What good it does them to 
 have a round duly affixed to their names in the 
 county paper, and to pay in purse and person for the 
 privilege, is hard to conceive. But it is their own 
 business. The real evil is that done to their hired 
 antagonists, and to the game which they at any rate 
 are competent to adorn. There are, perhaps, some 
 thirty or forty men who would, before the name had 
 become a byword, have been honoured by being called 
 " England " players. In time past the mass of these 
 men stuck to their counties, while a few of the best 
 were hired by the great metropolitan clubs as bowlers, 
 and released when claimed by their county. They 
 were proud of being asked to play. They came up to 
 Lord's and earned their five pounds for winning a 
 match. They were civil and contented. In an evil 
 hour for cricket, old Clark of Nottingham, a shrewd 
 man, and one who saw where money was to be got, 
 conceived the idea of propagating cricket in distant 
 parts. In the exercise of his quasi-episcopal functions, 
 he took to himself a dozen other missionaries, and 
 before and after the regular cricket season transported 
 them to any place ready to pay for their services. But 
 
 I 
 
CRICKET. 309 
 
 tlien it Wiis only before and after tlie regular season 
 that this was done, except when a blank week offered 
 itself. There can be no question that, for the time, a 
 great deal of good was done. Many a man who had 
 imbibed the rudiments soon learnt to play better. 
 Many more were stimulated to begin, who had never 
 dreamed of cricket before. Clubs were formed, and all 
 went well for the true interests of the game. The 
 mine, however, was soon discovered to be rich enough 
 to tempt fresh adventurers, and a second eleven was 
 formed in opposition. Both sets, too, began to look 
 upon the casual engagement in a great match, or the 
 more permanent employment at so much a week, as a 
 thing not to be compared in point of profit with the 
 new method ; and, moreover, the vanity of the profes- 
 sionals was tickled. They found themselves rated 
 higher in the rural districts, more petted and praised, 
 than was possible at a good honest inning or a fair 
 day's bowling at Lord's ; and by degrees the two duties 
 began to clash. Fresh rivals, too, sprung up. The 
 Eleven and the United Eleven found themselves met 
 by new if less influential bands, and a competition 
 arose which was not other than acrimonious. Un- 
 luckily, just at this time Australia and America seemed 
 fair fields for earning fresh honours and fresh money. 
 A rivalry as to who should share in the new venture 
 was originated ; animosity was engendered ; and from 
 the effect of this petty strife metropolitan cricket has 
 not yet recovered. Whether it will ever do so is still a 
 
310 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 moot point. Xearl}^ tlie wliole available talent lias 
 been withdrawn. Men of one faction refused to meet 
 men of the other in the iield ; and paid professionals 
 insisted on dictating to those who paid them the asso- 
 ciates with whom alone they would consent to act. The 
 result has been to destroy one match of the greatest 
 interest, for it is absurd to consider the matches 
 between Gentlemen and Players for the last two or 
 three years as worthy of the name ; and it would be an 
 easy task to pick at least two elevens able to defeat that 
 which contended under the name of the Players of 
 England in the matches of the other day. "What was 
 still worse, this absurd jealousy for a time precluded 
 some of the county matches altogether ; and it is only 
 in the present year that Nottingham has condescended 
 again to enter the lists against her old antagonist, 
 Surrey. Ji.t Lord's, the Marylebone Club, unable to 
 endure the dictation of their own servants, are com- 
 pelled to lose the services of men who have on that 
 ground won all the honours on the prestige of which 
 they now trade ; and it is certainly well for the true 
 interests of cricket that the committee persevere in 
 refusing to give way. The struggle will be long, but, 
 I fiuicy, none the less certain in its result. When 
 those who have carried a reputation earned in London 
 to the provinc3s have passed away, — and a career like 
 that of a travelling cricketer is not a long one, — their 
 place cannot be filled. Xo calico will be needed to 
 conceal gaj^s in the hedge at Fuddleton-cum-Pipes, 
 
CRICKET. 311 
 
 and to repress tlie undue attention of non-paying spec- 
 tators, when all that can be offered to the rustic gaze is 
 a worn-out Lord's man or two, backed by eight or nine 
 youths who have never won their spurs. To London 
 they must come before they can earn a livelihood at 
 starring, and it will be the fault of the managers of 
 our great clubs if they again find their engaged players 
 deserting them in the middle of a season for the flesh-pots 
 of Twenty- twos. But, in the meantime, much mischief 
 will be done ; the new hands will lose the chance of 
 forming themselves on the style of the old, and many 
 a day will probably go by before such cricket can be 
 seen again as but a very few years ago might be seen any 
 Monday at Lord's or any Thursday at the Oval, The 
 evil of schism is bad, but I think that even worse 
 remains behind. It must be that the style of play in 
 the next generation will be materially injured by the 
 habits induced. To play carefully against t went v- two 
 fielders cramps the hitter ; to play carelessly against 
 the two poor slaves of bowlers who are engaged match 
 after match to assist, and indeed supplant, rustic in- 
 competence, must be still more injurious ; while the 
 effect on the professionals' own bowling and fieldino-, 
 with nights spent in the train, and with days passed in 
 hammering against a side positively annoying from its 
 incapacity, ma}^ very well be conceived. I once saw a 
 rural authority in one of these abominations hold his 
 bat stiff* and stark for three mortal hours against the 
 best bowling England could then produce. He made 
 
312 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 four runs, or rather the ball did for him, in that time. 
 Fancy a man like Hillyer having to bowl against forty- 
 four such people every week ! ISo wonder that bowling 
 is not so straight, and not so killing ; — no wonder that 
 innings increase to figures w^hich our forefathers would 
 discredit. 
 
 This brings me to ask, Do people play better than 
 they did ? I think an impartial looker-on would say 
 that the}^ hit loose bowling better, and then he would 
 have nearly epitomised the truth. Hitting, like play- 
 ing the violin, as I said in another page, is a matter of 
 education, depending upon your tools and your expe- 
 rience. When a man had a hook to bat with, he was 
 compelled to hook every ball to the side which nature 
 points out. When he got the present bat to deal wdth, 
 and three stumps to guard, he naturally learnt to keep 
 his weapon straighter, and to hit in that position also, 
 — in fact, to drive. His offensive tactics were governed 
 by his defensive necessities. Individuals grow wiser, 
 and so do nations ; and the cut, the old leg-hit, thn 
 draw, the new form of leg-hit, and finally what they 
 call, in cricket phraseology, the " Cambridge poke," 
 supplemented the original drive. As the bowling was 
 not so straight as the old underhand, the power of 
 making fresh hits supervened. And I think it would 
 be wrong to deny that more balls are hit in more 
 diflPerent places and different methods than was the 
 case years ago. It is natural, and it is so, as far as we 
 can learn from past heroes. But whether the game is 
 
CRICKET. 313 
 
 played throughout as scientifically, whether bowlers 
 are better, — they are certainly not so straight, — and 
 fielders more careful, is a very different question, and 
 might receive a different answer. Cobbett and Lilly- 
 white, and in later days Hillyer and "Wisden, were 
 most assuredly more on the wicket than the same class 
 of bowler is now ; and, so far as brilliancy is concerned, 
 I doubt, if Nottingham were polled, whether its players 
 would declare Wootton to be the equal of his prede- 
 cessor, Hedgate. The last-named man was, indeed, 
 more like the present school of bowlers than any of 
 the others mentioned above ; but, in his day, I should 
 think he was fully equal to any now at work. And it 
 should be remembered that it had not then been found 
 necessary to remove the restrictions on bowling which 
 then fettered his arm. It may be that the new school 
 of batters would have played down the above quartett 
 as easily as they do some of the straighter men of the 
 present day ; but it seems, to one who has seen both 
 epochs, that the older men found " devil,'' lacking in 
 our lot of bowlers now-a-days, and had the precision 
 and uniformity which is certainly not now a charac- 
 teristic of the other school. You hear often now of 
 " So-and-so's day." Cobbett never had a " day." The 
 evening and the morning were the same. 
 
 Still, to recur to the hitting, it must be acknow- 
 ledged that the rising stars of the present day are more 
 numerously brilliant. And it is with pride that the 
 young men can tell their " temporis acti " friend to 
 
 X 
 
ul4 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 look at BuUer aud Lubbock as tbey are, at Mitchell as 
 he was and may be again, and to mark how they get 
 runs safely and easily off good balls, and how all round 
 they hit. Our fathers justly admired Pilch, referring all 
 other batting to his standard. It may be presumption, 
 but I suspect our young friends would be right in 
 saying that off the same number of balls either of the 
 two first-named would get half as many runs again as 
 that renowned ancient, and that without causing a 
 pang to the most rigid precisian. 
 
 So far, then, let us rejoice in progress, and admit it 
 is not altogether the badness of the bowling which has 
 improved the hitting. If representative men are wanted 
 of the two styles, one would give Pilch for the one, 
 George Parr for the other ; and those of the old school 
 who might hesitate to put Kentfield behind Hoberts at 
 billiards would, I fancy, be nevertheless ready, taking 
 them upon all sorts of ground and against all sorts 
 of bowling, to give the palm to the younger man in 
 cricket. 
 
 Before 1800 there may be said to have been two 
 periods of cricket ; — one antediluvian, — cricket in a 
 state of nature, when everybody hooked balls to the on 
 side with a thing like a packing-needle, in wood, and 
 the ball might or might not run through the middle of 
 a sort of gallows without getting the man out ; — when 
 the wicket-keeper had to put the ball with his fingers 
 into a hole, and the batsman might knock such fingers 
 about as much as he liked. 'No Boxes or Lockyers in 
 
CRICKET. 315 
 
 those days. Then there came a great Star- and- Garter 
 meeting in 177G, when, by addin;^- a third stump, they 
 made the game something like what it is now. Just 
 before the present century began, the stumps were 
 raised, and remained as then fixed for many years, — three 
 inches lower, and one inch narrower, than at present. 
 
 From that date cricket may be divided into five 
 periods. The first of batting, gradually overcoming 
 bowling, according to its certain tendency. The 
 struggle may be protracted, but the result is no less 
 sure. As grounds are made better, and bats more 
 precisely adapted to bring out the full mechanical 
 power of the striker, the ultimate triumph of defence 
 over attack is assured. The cricketer can bring no 
 Armstrongs to countervail the newest iron plates. In 
 his mimic war the one is capable of improvement ; the 
 other depends solely on the adroitness of hand, to 
 execute what the head plans. And so it was that 
 men bearing names still remembered among cricketers, 
 — Budd, Osbaldeston, and Lord F. Beauclerk for the 
 gentlemen ; Lambert, Beldham, and Howard for the 
 players, — made the scores too long against the under- 
 hand bowling of the day. Old Mr. Ward, too, and 
 Beagley, were just beginning their long careers in a 
 way which showed too plainly that something must be 
 done ; and some time in the year 1817 the stumps were 
 raised and widened to their present limits. 
 
 Still on through this second period marched the 
 batting force. Old Beldham at fifty- five showed that 
 
316 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 lie could stop in all day with forty- eight more square 
 inclies to cover ; and before ten years had elapsed the 
 attackers again began to complain. But out of this 
 darkness arose light in an unexpected quarter. Whether 
 Miss "Willes did or did not invent round bowling is 
 not quite clear. If anybody practised it before, the 
 aspirations of that ingenious person were nipped in the 
 bud ; and it had no separate cricket existence until 
 the lady's brother noticed the " spin " received from a 
 delivery with the arm straight, and the brave Kentish 
 man forthwith essayed it under the very nose of the 
 high priests at Lord's. This was in 1822. That con- 
 servative body had not yet been educated to such a pitch, 
 and sternly forbade him ; whereupon a contemporary 
 record says that he left the ground in dudgeon. Five 
 years later Lillywhite and Broadbridge started the new 
 system for the rival county of Sussex. Another emeute 
 was the consequence, and the most noted cricketers of 
 the day signed a round-robin, pledging themselves not 
 to play against such an innovation. As the merits of 
 the system soon became obvious, the opposition failed ; 
 and the third epoch of cricket commenced after a very 
 rough fashion. Those who could bowl well did so 
 with the new light ; those who could not, let it alone ; 
 and for some time the two men from Sussex, with 
 Cobbett of Lord's, kept the innings down, and the 
 extras, as they are called at cricket, were still of 
 reasonable dimensions. Perhaps these, though long 
 past, were the palmy days of cricket, and those to 
 
CRICKET. 317 
 
 whicli old Fuller Pilch, in his well-earned retirement, 
 must look back with the most pleasure. But there 
 arose a first-rate fast bowler in the new style, one 
 E-edgate. Forthwith every one said, — Let us bowl as 
 fast as he does, and we, too, shall get wickets ; and 
 with that commenced what I have called the fourth 
 period. Byes innumerable, wides out of all proportion 
 to the runs got, may be found in the scores of the 
 second decade of the new system. Smashed hands and 
 broken shins were the necessary concomitants. This 
 state of things necessitated pads ; and a man who had 
 scorned to interpose aught but the jaunty silk stock-^ 
 . ing, which underlaid the breeches of his youth, between 
 the ball and his leg, was now compelled to come up to 
 the wicket a thing of cork, india-rubber, and wash- 
 leather. A better day, however, was sure to dawn. 
 The fast bowling, entrusted to incompetent hands, soon 
 became too expensive ; and old Clark of JN^ottingham 
 showed that there was some good in the old system 
 yet, and that at any rate it made men play at the ball, 
 instead of making the ball run against their bats. Thus 
 the due commixture of the two systems, applicable at 
 different seasons and to different patients, which we 
 now see mainly practised, was obtained ; and until the 
 last few years, when practice has brought batting to 
 such perfection, the contests of my fifth period were 
 pretty even. I^ow, however, it seems as if something 
 more must be done. It takes a column of a newspaper 
 to give the names of those who have this year alone 
 
318 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 made more tlian a hundred runs, — a thing our fore- 
 fathers regarded as an event to be specially chronicled. 
 That such large innings are hurtful to the game is 
 obvious. Besides showing theoretical inequality, they 
 destroy interest by making it impossible to finish 
 matches ; and, what is more to the purpose, they make 
 the game too expensive by prolonging the duration. 
 Some new reform is imperative. It will doubtless be 
 efiected ; and I do not think that our legislators will 
 follow a bad example by quarrelling as to whose the 
 honour of instituting it shall be. 
 
 Now that the Gentlemen and Players have lost their 
 sj)ell, and the JN^orth comes no more to fight the South, , 
 the two most interesting matches of the year are Oxford 
 against Cambridge, and Eton against Harrow. For we 
 have one school-match left, and volumes might be 
 written upon it, even shorn as it is of older glory. 
 Why twelve thousand people come at all ; why, when 
 they do come, they all shout ; why, if a ball is within 
 a yard of the wicket, everybody bawls " bowled ; " and 
 why the batter, who hits round in empty space, and 
 nearly knocks his stumps and the hostile wicket-keeper 
 over in one fell blow, is always declared, by an ellip- 
 tical form of expression, to have " played ; " — these 
 and many other matters, such as why people who never 
 were at any school at all wear the supj^osed winning 
 colour, are too wonderful to be found out. Not so 
 difficult is it to see why Harrow beats Eton. They 
 have no river, it is said sometimes ; but that is, as all 
 
CRICKET. 319 
 
 who know what a school eleven is, beside the question. 
 There are quite as many good fish out of the river as 
 in it. The real reason is shown as soon as the first 
 ball is bowled ; when the Eton boy, whether he be at 
 the wicket with his bat, or out in the field with nothing 
 but his good right and left hands to take care of him, 
 stares startled at the bounce and hop. A dead flat, — 
 dead in more senses than one, — does not prepare the 
 young idea for Lord's, as does the side-long hill, lively 
 enough itself, at Harrow. In the palmy days when 
 Eton had fine elevens, she was much better than Har- 
 row, and won accordingly. But when pretty evenly 
 matched, it seems that Harrow wins here ; and as the 
 ground has certainly not been better since 1850 than 
 it was before, the score against Eton has told its tale. 
 Many say it is always six to four against Eton at Lord's, 
 and I really believe it is. 
 
 One great merit which cricket has now, it had not 
 always : I mean the absence of gambling. At one 
 very sad time, when matches were made for money, 
 and each side had its avowed backer, they were bought 
 and sold as a natural consequence. Intentional over- 
 throws were constantly spoken of, and it was well 
 known that certain players were as much under the 
 thumb of particular men in the ring as certain jockeys 
 are now-a-days, by the voice of scandal, declared to be. 
 This all died away, however, forty years ago. The 
 game was not safe enough, and betters grew shy. 
 Since that time, with the exception of a year or two 
 
320 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 when they took to book-making about who should get 
 the highest score on each side in great matches, 
 gambling has been unknown, I believe, upon the 
 cricket-ground. Betting, of course, there is. What 
 will not Englishmen bet about ? — but it is all outside, 
 and unconnected with the game itself. Players, except 
 when specially engaged for the season, as at Lord's, 
 earn their five pounds for winning, and three for losing, 
 like jockeys. With that they were once content, and 
 will be so again, when the rage for starring is over ; 
 and what with the indiscriminate prodigality of the 
 public towards a favourite, and the opportunity for 
 turning an honest penny at practice, or by selling 
 cricketing gear to admirers, a steady- going young 
 fellow will do very well during the portion of his life 
 available for cricket as a profession. 
 
 The literature of cricket is boundless. It fills half 
 the sporting papers, and a good deal of the others. It 
 may be rather monotonous ; and, unless it be a very 
 ready writer who holds the pen, it is necessarily so. 
 There was once, I remember, an excellent reporter, 
 whose evident pride it was to use a difierent word for 
 every victory in the wrestling-rings of Cumberland. 
 When as many as forty or fifty falls were tried, it was 
 hard work ; but he was equal to the occasion, and 
 Rabelais himself could not have been more fertile 
 in varied epithets. Such powers, however, are given 
 to but few ; and our cricket reporters are doomed to a 
 bead-roll of pretty cuts and magnificent drives. Still 
 
CRICKET. 321 
 
 their reports are carefully studied. Every line has its 
 earnest and conscientious reader ; and. when the final 
 match of the year comes, greedy minds give themselves 
 up to that most astoundingly recondite lore, the 
 *' Averages." Marvellous is the compiler ; more mar- 
 vellous the reader. There is one class of cricketers, 
 indeed, who live but for this. They have been most 
 unwholesomely stimulated by the j^rominence given, 
 and do and think nothing but how to increase their 
 figure. They will go down to obscure places, and 
 obtrude themselves upon unwilling colleagues, for the 
 sake of an ignoble score ; and they afford during the 
 season unmixed amusement by the pertinacity of their 
 efforts. Their sole aim is to see, stuck at the end of 
 their names, some cabalistic figure, like this, 23 — 39, an 
 ingenious device for avoiding fractions ; and to have 
 added a number of asterisks, denoting "number of 
 times not out," 
 
 Bowlers also have of late been infected with this 
 curious itch. In their case, however, it is attended 
 with more serious injury to the game. A desire to 
 deliver so many "maiden overs," is opposed to the 
 whole object in view, — which is to get the man out ; — 
 as cheaply as possible, but at all events, out. If this 
 can be done by temptation to hit, the giving of such 
 temptation involves far more credit than the mere 
 pounding of a succession of balls which a man can 
 play down harmlessly. Especially as the player by 
 the mere force of doing so gets his eye in most 
 
 Y 
 
322 BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES. 
 
 dangerously. The number of maidens can never do 
 more tlian indicate mediocrity or poverty of conception 
 at one end or the other. It is well to keep on 
 knocking at the door, as Wisden did, but not always 
 at the same panel. 
 
 The Lord Rector of Aberdeen has thought fit to say, 
 upon a recent occasion, that "athletics now assumed 
 the dimensions of a national calamity.'' It is from no 
 personal experience of his own, we may feel sure ; but 
 he might, as an old Balliol man, remember that the 
 most honoured names in the cricket-field, as well as on 
 the river, have sprung from the college which has long 
 stood first in literary power at Oxford. I venture to 
 give him one parting bit of advice to substitute for 
 some portion of the metaphysical curriculum of the 
 university which has placed him for a time at its 
 head, — a slight modicum of cricket. It may teach 
 his pupils one or two things they do not apparently 
 learn at present, and it will, at any rate, contribute 
 there, as it does here, to manliness, self- dominion, and 
 modesty. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 VIRTUE AND CO., PEINXEES, CITY BOAD, LONDON. 
 
Webster Famffyl 
 
 Cummh-.r-.r- o-. ran/ McWjQjpQ 
 
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