Colonel Peter Hawker 



I TAKE off my hat, metaphorically, to Colonel Peter 

 Hawker as one of the very best sportsmen that ever 

 lived. Neither in my reading nor in my experience 

 have I met with any man who followed sport for its 

 own sake with more genuine enthusiasm. Nothing 

 daunted him in his pursuit of it. He faced cold, 

 hunger, hardship of every kind with really heroic 

 fortitude and cheerfulness. As long as he was able 

 to stand, or even hobble on crutches, he would not 

 let either the pain of old Peninsular wounds or the 

 constant attacks of fever and rheumatism to which 

 he was subject keep him indoors when there was 

 shooting to be had. 



His favourite form of the sport was wild-fowl shoot- 

 ing, than which there is no severer test of a man's 

 sportsmanship. For, to succeed in that difficult and 

 arduous but most fascinating pursuit, there is required 

 an amount of endurance, hardihood, and patience, a 

 contempt for discomfort, and a capability of standing 

 exposure and fatigue which you will find in none but 

 the most thorough-going enthusiast. To those, how- 



