LEAVES FROM A GAME BOOK. 73 



CHAPTER IV. 



1882. 



I CANNOT pass on to the events of this year without 

 mentioning a matter not perhaps strictly connected with 

 sport, although it relates to shooting, and I will tell how 

 in June I won the Gun Club International Cup of £300, 

 with £250 in it and £200 in bets, the richest prize ever 

 shot for in England ; while, as nearly all the well-known 

 trap-shots toed the mark, the slice of luck that landed me 

 first past the post was indeed something to remember. 

 There were eighty-seven shooters at £5 each, and at the 

 end of the fourteenth round a tie was called between 

 Viscount Obert, Captain Frank Gist, each standing at 

 twenty-eight yards, and myself, at thirty. In shooting 

 off we each killed our next two birds, though one of mine 

 went off apparently unhurt, and only just as it reached 



