FALLACIES AND FACTS. 213 



If an educated gentleman is a sportsman in every 

 degree, from tlie fisli to the bird and beast, that is 

 no reason why tlie more gentle sensibilities of his 

 natm-e should not be interested when violent excite- 

 ment is over, and every refined taste is free to 

 exercise its graceful power. All sport pursued 

 with a view to the death of any living thing may 

 be burdened with a charge of cruelty. So may the 

 trade of the butcher, when in cold blood he knocks 

 down a bound and unresisting ox, or sticks a 

 sheep or a pig ; but the butcher's trade is necessary 

 to the existence of man, and so are hunting, shoot- 

 ing, and fishing necessary to his welfare, to his 

 health, as well as to the manliness of his life. 

 Because there are people in the world who can 

 neither hunt, shoot, ride, nor fish, whose muscular 

 frames require no strong exercise, and who for that 

 reason, and from a squeamish inclination to fret 

 at the deeds of better men than themselves, make 

 an indiscriminate charge of cruelty against the 

 sportsman, — their doing so affords no real reason 

 why we, the sjDortsmen, should not be able to love 

 and cherish the animal and bird creation in our 

 hours of rest, and find some opportunity of being 

 kind to all. 



