CHAPTER IV 



LTHOUGH well placed in our cosy little 

 maisonette in South Audley Street, my 

 soul panted for more space and purer 

 air. A son had been born to me, and 

 I wanted him brought up amid the glories of Nature ; 

 moreover, I was keen on some real sport with horse 

 and hound, rod and gun. Pony racing and pigeon 

 shooting were all very well in their way. The latter 

 pastime (which has been falsely accused of posing as 

 a sport) aroused the competitive spirit which has, from 

 my earliest days, been one of my most marked charac- 

 teristics. I may have something to say about my 

 experiences in this connection later on. For the 

 moment I will content myself by boldly asserting that 

 all sport is cruel, and were pigeon shooting a sport, 

 which it is not^ it must be written down as no more cruel 

 than most gunning activities, and far less than some. 



Having seriously contracted this wander-lust I 

 began my search for a likely pitch, and found it in the 

 advertisement pages of our time-honoured Field : 



** A fine and ancient Abbey with kennels, stabling, 



22 bedrooms, standing in its own well-timbered 



grounds, with 1500 acres shooting and first-rate 



46 



