Russell - Fox Russell-Sporting Society, Vol. II / or, Sporting Chat and Sporting Memories

BOOKS FOR SPORTSMEN

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IN SCARLET AND SILK. Recollections of Hunting and Steeplechase riding. By Fox Russell . With two drawings in colour by Finch Mason . 5s. net.

NEW SPORTING STORIES. By G. G. 3s. 6d. net.

The Times says:"New Sporting Stories are written by a man who evidently knows what he is writing about. The sketches are short, racy and to the point."

TRAVEL AND BIG GAME. By Percy Selous and H. A. Bryden . With Illustrations by Charles Whymper . 10s. 6d. net.

THE CHASE: a Poem. By William Somerville . Illustrated by Hugh Thomson . 5s. net.

In this fine old poem now ably illustrated by Mr Hugh Thomson are the original lines, quoted by the immortal Jorrocks

"My hoarse-sounding horn

Invites thee to the chace, the sport of kings,

Image of war, without its guilt."

GREAT SCOT THE CHASER, and other Sporting Stories. By G. G. With Portrait of the Author. 4s. 6d. net.

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CURIOSITIES OF BIRD LIFE. By Charles Dixon , Author of "The Migration of Birds." [In the Press.

ANIMAL EPISODES AND STUDIES IN SENSATION. By George H. Powell . 3s. 6d. net.

TALES OF THE CINDER PATH. By an Amateur Athlete [ W. Lindsey ]. 2s. 6d. net.

REMINISCENCES OF A YORKSHIRE NATURALIST. By the late W. Crawford Williamson, LL.D., F.R.S. Edited by his wife. 5s. net.

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SPORTING SOCIETY

IN FULL CRY. By R. Caldecott .

OR

SPORTING CHAT AND SPORTING MEMORIES

STORIES HUMOROUS AND CURIOUS; WRINKLES OF THE FIELD
AND THE RACE-COURSE; ANECDOTES OF THE STABLE AND
THE KENNEL; WITH NUMEROUS PRACTICAL
NOTES ON SHOOTING AND FISHING

FROM THE PEN OF

VARIOUS SPORTING CELEBRITIES AND
WELL-KNOWN WRITERS ON THE TURF AND THE CHASE

EDITED BY

FOX RUSSELL

Illustrations by Randolph Caldecott.

IN TWO VOLUMESVOL. II.

LONDON
BELLAIRS & CO.
1897

CONTENTS

SPORTING OF THE PAST AND THE PRESENT DAY

"O tempora! O mores!" how our grandsires would stare if they could only see how differently sporting in all its branches is carried on now-a-days; it would make their pigtails stand on end, and the brass buttons fly off their blue coats in very fright.

There are few of the Squire Western school now left; but occasionally you may still come across some jovial old sportsman of eighty years or more, who, though his form is shrunken, and his snow-white head proclaims that many winters have passed over it, yet carries a pair of eyes as bright and keen as of yore, eyes that glisten again when he launches forth on his favourite hobby.

I know several gentlemen nearer eighty than seventy who still shoot, and keep a fine kennel of dogs. One of these gentlemen only last year took a moor in Scotland for five years. May he live to enjoy it and renew his lease.

I could name many close on, ay, over fourscore, who ride well yet to hounds; and though they may not be such bruisers as they once were across country, yet are difficult to choke off.

It is just forty-one years [this was written twenty years ago] since I had my first mount to hounds. There is no non mi ricordo with me. I can recollect the day as well as yesterday, the pinks, the beaver-hats of curious shape, the short-tailed horses, are too vividly impressed on my memory ever to be effaced. Men went out in those days for hunting, and not merely for a gallop. Time changes all things, and I suppose we must change with the times; but are these changes for the better? Well, I will not give an opinion, but leave others to decide.

The hounds of those days were not nearly so fast as those of the present; and I am inclined to think that our hounds are now bred too fine and speedyfor some countries they certainly areand often flash over and lose a scent which ought not to be lost.