CHAPTER III 



HISTORICAL 



Early records of partridge-shooting Great sportsmen 

 of the eighteenth century Matches England v. 

 Scotland in 1816, etc. Methods of other days. 



FOR some 3000 years, from the days of 

 Nineveh and Babylon, whose sculptured 

 stones bear figures of falconers with their 

 hawks on the wrist, down to our own 

 early Hanoverian times, hawking was the 

 one gentlemanly fashion of taking the 

 partridge. Ousted by the coming of the 

 'vile saltpetre,' haggards and eyasses, 

 sacres and sakerets, lannerets, tiercels, 

 falcons of the rock and falcons gentle, 

 with their lures, varvels, jesses and be- 

 wits, have all gone their way, and are 

 now to us only sounds without meaning, 

 though the intricate and comprehensive 



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