128 CONCLUSION 



and is after all more in the nature of a shooting 

 exercise than sport. 



The dangers of a hand-to-hand fight with 

 the wild beast that our forebears knew and 

 practised is, alas ! owing to ever-increasing 

 civilisation, almost a thing of the past. Now- 

 adays the born sportsman must find his 

 compensation in the physical exertion of 

 stalking; the endurance of the hardships of 

 inclement elements ; the matching of his wits 

 with the hunted, and at the end of all in the 

 knowledge that a good shot has found its 

 billet. 



But it is surely not this fighting spirit alone 

 — if we can still call it by this name — which 

 draws us sportsmen into the open wild. The 

 great book of Nature opens itself willingly and 

 without your asking before the eyes of a true 

 hunter. In the glowing sunrise ; in the silence of 

 the mid-day hour, when tired Nature sleeps; 

 in the soft dusk of the evening, spreading its 

 peace over wood and dale ; in the wild, shriek- 

 ing mountain gales; in all these great glories 

 Nature speaks to us lonely hunters in ever- 



