Henry Astbury Leveson 

 "The Old Shekarry" 



THIRTY years ago there was no writer on sport in its 

 adventurous phases better known or more widely read 

 than " the Old Shekarry." The Times, in a critique of 

 one of his books, paid this high tribute to his literary 

 merits : " A sincere devotion to his art elevates Major 

 Leveson into a kind of troubadour of hunting crusades, 

 gives eloquence to his pictures of forest scenery, and 

 no mean grace to the improvised songs with which he 

 was wont to beguile the evening after a day's sport." 

 The Saturday Review, then a tremendous power in the 

 literary world, was equally eulogistic of his qualities 

 as a sportsman : " The Old Shekarry is essentially a 

 sportsman and not a butcher of game. His object has 

 not been to slaughter for the sake of slaughtering, but, 

 save in the case of animals hostile to man, such as tigers 

 and rogue elephants, to kill as much as necessary for 

 the supply of himself and his followers, and no more." 



There was hardly a spot on the habitable globe where 

 big game abounds in which Leveson had not pitched 

 his hunting-tent ; his books teem with thrilling stories 

 of daring adventures and hairbreadth escapes ; and yet 



