100 Neiv Puhlicatians. 



apte for the wanes; and also for gentilwomen, which fcare 

 nether soniie nor wynde for appayryng their beau tie. And, 

 perad venture, they shall be thereat lesse idell, than they shold 

 be at home in their chammers."" And the author of " The 

 Booke of Hunting," annexed to Tubervile's Falconrie, con- 

 cludes his treatise with the following singular panegyric, " con- 

 cerning coursing with greyhounds,'" — " the which is doubtlesse 

 a noble pastime, and as meet for nobility and gentlemen, as any 

 of the other kinds of Venerie before declared, especially the 

 course of the hare, which is a sport continually in sight, and 

 made without any great travaile ; so that recreation is therein 

 to be found without unmeasurable toyle and payne : whereas, 

 in hunting with hounds, although the pastime be great, yet 

 many times the toyle and paine is also exceeding great ; and 

 then it may well be called eyther a painfull pastime or a plea- 

 sant payne.'" 



Coursing, move than the other laborious diversions of rural 

 life, while it ministers to our moderate sensual eii^oyment, ad- 

 mits also, during the intervals of the active pursuit of hound 

 ?ind hare, much rational reflection, opportunities of conversa- 

 tion with our brethren of the leash, and mental improvement. 

 It tends, as Markham quaintly expresses himself, " to satisfie 

 the mind and body in a joynt motion ;" for, in the beautiful 

 poetry of a living patron of the Celtic dog, there is no interval 

 of idleness with the well-read courser : 



" Nor dull between each merry chase, 



'' Passes the interiuitled space : 



" For we have fair resource in store, 



" In Classic and in Gothic lore." Mahmion. 



But there are those who anathematise hunting and coursing, 

 and other rural recreations, either as sinful *, or indicative of 



• The reader will be amused with Simon Latham's epilogue to the third 

 edition of his " Faulconry," wherein he combats (for he wrote in ticklish 

 times, 1658), with his usual quaintness of style and illustration, the notion 

 of the sinfulness of rural sports, inferring that they may be " lawfully and 

 conscientiously used with moderation by a magistrate or minister, or lawyer 

 or student, or any other senously employed, which in any function heat their 

 brain, waste their bodies, weaken their strength, weary their spirits ; that as 

 a means (and blessing from God), by it their decayed strength may be re- 

 stored, their vital and animal spirits quickened and refreshed, and revived ; 



