734 MANUAL OF MODERN FARRIERY. 



agility before their mistresses, and game thus taken in their 

 presence was considered a gift of high value by them, and 

 formed the principal viands of their feasts. Long spears, 

 javelins, bows and arrows, were the weapons then employed 

 by hunters ; and they were followed by large packs of dogs, 

 which, in those times, were highly esteemed on account of 

 their strength, courage, and exquisite sense of smelling. From 

 an illustrated manuscript, which was written early in the 

 fourteenth century, it appears evident that ladies at that 

 period had hunting parties, without male attendants. These 

 female Nimrods rode astride upon the saddle ; but this inde- 

 corous custom, it is presumed, was never general, nor had it 

 been long followed even by heroines who were addicted to 

 the chase. An author of the seventeenth century remarks, 

 that " the ladies of Bury, in Suffolk, that used hawking and 

 hunting, were once in gi^eat vein of wearing breeches.'' And 

 we know that Queen Elizabeth was passionately fond of the 

 chase, and often indulged in it, even up to her seventy- 

 seventh year. 



In the middle ages the Scottish monarchs hunted in the 

 Highlands, sometimes in a state of Eastern magnificence. 

 For the reception of James V., the queen, his mother, and 

 the ambassador from the pope, the Earl of Athol constructed 

 a palace of green timber, interwoven with boughs, moated 

 around, and provided with turrets, portcullis, and draw- 

 bridge, and furnished within mth whatever was suitable for 

 a royal abode. The hunting continued for three days, during 

 which, independent of roes, wolves, and foxes, six hundred 

 deer were captured — an incredible number, unless we sup- 

 pose that a large district was surrounded, and the game 

 drawn into a narrow circle to be slain, without fatigue, bj 

 the king and his retinue. On their departure the Earl set 

 tire to the palace, an honour that excited the ambassador's 



