ALKEA'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 



to my friend's residence, my appreciation of the 

 present stiiie was increased, and the desire of adding 

 them to my little gathering kept pace with this grow- 

 ing admiration. 



This acquisitive proclivity was strengthened later 

 on, when the late proprietor, on the occasion of my 

 assisting in forming an extensive Sporting Exhibition, 

 was so obliging as to lend the Aiken series of illus- 

 trations to Mytton's Memoirs ; and further study of 

 the attractive points of these designs whetted my 

 appetite afresh. On the decease of this worthy 

 sporting amateur his collection was sold for the 

 facility of realising his estate for distribution, and by 

 purchase, the coveted Aiken series was added to my 

 sporting treasures of the pictorial order. From the 

 first there was the temptation to reproduce these 

 artistic curiosities by those literal facsimile processes 

 of recent development ; but for many years both the 

 drawings and the theory of their ultimate reproduc- 

 tion were left to slumber, while other productions 

 were occupying the writer's efforts. Finally my good 

 friends Messrs. Downey and Co. recognised the un- 

 common merits of the complete series, and to their 

 enterprise the present volume owes its appearance. 



It is the first instance of a sporting work being 



