SHOOTING 89 



before campaigns against ' the reign of the parson and 

 the landlord ' formed ' planks in the platform ' of a 

 party in the State. In some few cases, no doubt, pre- 

 servation was carried to excess, and disputes arose 

 between shooting and farming tenants ; but, as a rule, 

 liberal compensation was forthcoming, and the farmer 

 in the end suffered nothing. The days, however, when 



the 



Merry brown hares came leaping 

 Over the meadow and hill 



have passed away, probably for ever, on most Eng- 

 lish manors. Never, perhaps, will such days of sport 

 come again as were obtained in the ' sixties ' and 

 'seventies.' On December 22, 1865, Lord Londes- 

 borough with three other guns, shooting at Scoreby in 

 Yorkshire, killed 585 hares, besides a similar number 

 of pheasants. In 1864, five guns on the Selby estate 

 of the same ardent sportsman killed 531 on 

 November 11. On the Gedling estate of the late 

 Lord Chesterfield in Nottinghamshire, six guns on 

 November 30, 1869, bagged 781 hares, and on 

 December 3 of the same year no less than 823 fell to 

 the same number of guns. While in 1878, by six 

 guns shooting at Londesborough, 1,217 ^^'^^ killed in 

 three consecutive days in the month of November. 

 Norfolk has always been in the front where game 



