PREFA CE. 7 



bore. But when you apply this rule to a picture 

 of field-sports — especially with small game, limit 

 the action to a narrow background, and against 

 this group the actors so clearly that every one 

 must understand it at a glance, you have por- 

 trayed rank murder. Though easy killing occa- 

 sionally happens, it is a matter always of regret, 

 not of pride ; a parade of it is simply digusting. 

 Fine drawing of shiny guns, fancy leggings, 

 and other fashionable ''toggery" on the killer 

 behind the gun, help this kind of ''art" like a 

 red rosette on the tail of the prize ox falling 

 beneath the sledge at the shambles. Even a 

 butcher would be disgusted with a painting of a 

 lamb bleeding on the block ; and the more per- 

 fect the dripping blood, the more damnable the 

 outrage upon art in the selection of such a 

 subject. 



A picture that should even touch the field 

 that charms — with its wide range, its varied 

 features and colors, and its almost invisible game 

 — would be more of a map than a picture. The 

 rules of art cannot be safely violated. Neither 

 can the rules of the sportsman's taste : and Posi- 

 tively no nmrder is the first of these. I have 



