1 88 CENTURY OF ENGLISH FOX-HUNTING 



boast that he had hunted with more than seventy 

 packs of hounds should have been reduced to Hving 

 in a Continental town, and to considering francs 

 where he had never considered five -pound notes. 

 The moralist may say that it was merely the 

 result of his own extravagance in living beyond 

 his income. Granted, but let it be remembered 

 that in his forty-fourth year he put his shoulder 

 to the wheel. He had never worked before, but 

 when he was called upon to work he answered to 

 the call in a plucky manner, and achieved a revo- 

 lution in sporting literature. Let us consider this 

 revolution for one brief moment. Prior to 1822 

 there was no periodical sporting literature worthy 

 of the name, for the Sporting Magazine was a 

 vulgar production, and had no news concerning 

 field sports. Peter Beckford's Thoughts upon 

 Hunting was, to the best of my belief, the only 

 book upon fox-hunting which had any circulation. 

 Mr. Pittman, the proprietor of the Sporting 

 Magazine, considered that there was room for a 

 better class of literature dealing with country sport, 

 and Mr. Apperley was chosen to write the work. 

 He had a practical knowledge of fox-hunting and 

 of the road, for he was a good man with four 

 horses, and knew a large number of stage drivers. 

 He was already enrolled amongst the ranks of 

 gentlemen riders on the Turf; and, what was of the 

 greatest importance, he could use his influence in 

 making the new policy of the magazine known in 



