SPORT ANCIENT AND MODERN 



with the truest kind of hospitality, and have 

 given him all the help the farmer could give, 

 as to the best line to take and the best places 

 to meet with whatever he might be in search 

 of. Though a wanderer of this old world 

 fashion would, of course, be an impracticable 

 person now, the kindly feeling is still very 

 common, and in most places a considerate 

 landlord will find game and rabbits waiting for 

 him in ample abundance, and a cheery tenant 

 anxious to show them to him, and proud if the 

 bag taken off his farm is a good one. It goes 

 without saying that a greedy or a mean land- 

 lord's experience will be different, and a poor 

 one, who is forced to get as much rent as he 

 can and give as little as possible back, how- 

 ever personally amiable he may be, cannot 

 expect in this utilitarian age to have kept for 

 him what he can make no return for. There 

 is little doubt that in the not far distant future 

 good shooting will only be for those who can 

 afford to farm their own land and are able to 

 put up with the loss, be it small or great, 

 which must fall upon the shoulders of either 

 the man who owns, or the man who feeds, 

 game ; high farming and game in any quanti- 

 ties, with perhaps the exception of partridges 

 and grouse, are incompatible. 



The sporting feelings of the Cumberland 

 farmer are easily seen when the question is 

 the preservation of hares in a coursing district. 

 The tenant there extends a most kindly 

 toleration towards them, and though he may 

 fidget at the very considerable damage they 

 do if the meetings are held late in the season, 

 yet he will rarely h ustle them unfairly himself, 

 or allow any one else to do so if he can help it. 

 There is naturally plenty of petty poaching, 

 of snaring rabbits, a little netting of partridges 

 in some districts, killing of pheasants where 

 they are plentiful and not well looked after ; 

 but the organized raids so common in some 

 counties, the attacks on great preserves by 

 desperate men careless of life, are almost un- 

 known. Till the Ground Game Act was 

 passed hares, where the keepers were active, 

 often abounded and flourished exceedingly in 

 the closest neighbourhood of towns. Dent, 

 separated merely by a shallow river from a 

 thickly populated mining district, may be 

 given as one example, and Rheda in the same 

 district as another. 



On some large estates hares are numerous 

 still. At Netherby for example they are 

 very plentiful, but on many small holdings 

 they are practically extinct. After the 

 Ground Game Act came into force a fierce 

 attack was made on them generally through- 

 out the land, and farms which used to 

 give ten or twenty or more in a day knew 



them no more. But now something of 

 a reaction has set in, and their prospect 

 of survival is much better than it was. 

 The farmer, for one thing, has recognized 

 that by exterminating the animal he was 

 depriving himself of a very desirable addition 

 to his table, as well as of the interest of 

 securing it. 



In Cumberland, as in all parts of the king- 

 dom, the character of shooting and the way 

 it is carried on have, where it is followed on 

 any scale, entirely changed during the latter 

 part of the last century. On small properties 

 hunting the turnips and rough fields with a 

 pointer, and beating the hedgerows for a stray 

 pheasant with a spaniel or two, subjects 

 which have been so often picturesquely written 

 about and illustrated, are still the way in 

 which a small bag is made up and a great 

 deal of enjoyment gained, all the more enjoy- 

 ment perhaps since the sportsman is now clad 

 in tweed knickerbokers and cap instead of 

 tight breeches, top boots and a high hat. But 

 dogs are seldom seen on heather now ; driving 

 is not put off to the end of the season but 

 begins on the I2th, systematically and scien- 

 tifically carried out on large moors, on small 

 ones with two or three beaters and peat 

 hags and walls instead of butts. Partridges 

 are either driven or more generally walked 

 up, a long line of men, spaced with retrievers, 

 taking the place of the bag-carrying game- 

 keeper and his lads, and hurrying breathless 

 pointers and setters. And, wherever it can 

 be managed, pheasants are forced as high as 

 possible over the heads of men standing well 

 out from the cover, each armed with two 

 guns, and at times sorry they have not got 

 three. The object in cover shooting not 

 long ago was to kill as much game as possible ; 

 now it is to kill as much in the most sporting 

 possible way. 



But cover shooting has now to a great 

 extent become an artificial sport, and a large 

 stock of pheasants is only a question of more 

 or less suitable woods, and a willingness to pay 

 a considerable sum yearly in wages and food. 

 And it is evident that cover shooting will 

 become more artificial still, for wild duck are 

 reared now in some places, and even pigeons 

 and guinea fowl and bantams ; the death rate 

 amongst these birds is less than amongst phea- 

 sants, of which in many places the land is 

 ' sick ' and their food is cheaper. In suitable 

 places hand reared ducks fly well, and give 

 often high and sporting shots. It is a 

 drawback that they cannot be treated quite 

 naturally : if hundreds or thousands of birds 

 were put up together and heavily fired at 

 the greater number would escape. In places 



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