xviii INTRODUCTION 



almost forgotten playwright was fond of setting forth the contrast which, no 

 doubt, did exist between Londoner and countryman ; his country gentle- 

 men are de facto fox-hunters ; they speak like ploughboys, bully their wives, 

 drink beer in quantity and prefer the society of the servants' hall. ' Sir 

 Francis Wronghead ' and his son ' Squire Richard ' in The Provotfd 

 Husband are fair examples of the type Beckford had in mind. 



Of the literary quality of Beckford' s writing there is little to say. This 

 merit was frankly recognized by the Monthly Review when the book first 

 appeared and it remains the best written, the most polished work ever 

 penned on a sporting subject. There is nothing laboured in the author's 

 style ; his sentences flow easily, as he clothes thought in graceful scholarly 

 language ; never for a moment does he lose sight of the form he had selected 

 for his book, ' familiar letters to a friend.' It is difficult to believe that 

 these chapters were not real letters, so deftly does the writer take advantage 

 of his method to explain, amplify or amend. 



He had the gift of putting truths in a few well-chosen words. His crisp, 

 pointed sayings are household words among hunting men. ' It is the judi- 

 cious cross that makes the pack complete ' ; ' I look upon a fox well found as 

 half -killed ' ; ' When hounds are at a check let every one be silent and 

 stand still ' ; ' Take not out your hounds on a very windy or bad day ' ; 

 ' When hounds are out of blood there is a kind of evil genius attending all 

 that they do ' ; ' Digging a fox is cold work.' 



Perhaps he was more prone to quotation than modern taste approves, 

 but it was a characteristic of his time. He was a highly-educated man, 

 and he made good use of his opportunites at Westminster and during his 

 continental travels ; his pages bear witness to it that he was well read in 

 French and Italian as well as in English ; tags of Latin came to him naturally, 

 and when such tags seemed apposite as they in variably are he used them. 



It has seemed preferable to make any comments on the text in these 

 introductory remarks rather than cumber the pages with lengthy footnotes. 

 The few brief notes which are not the author's are distinguished by an 

 asterisk, e.g.* \ 



E. D. CUMING. 



