236 THE LIFE OF A SPORTSMAN 



still less of spirituous liquors, or large quantities of wine, 

 which are all found detrimental both to health and 

 strength. 



" Then look at our own case. Within the last ten days, 

 you and I have hunted nine times, the distances to and* 

 from the places of meeting averaging twenty miles. Now, 

 adding thereunto the several fine runs we have seen, 

 during the late succession of good sport, we may safely 

 reckon upon having ridden fifty miles per day, putting 

 the extra exertion of riding over the country out of the 

 question. Have either of us, let me ask, felt the slightest 

 degree of fatigue from the doings of these ten days ? On 

 the contrary, have we not felt invigorated, and, in every 

 respect, in better health ? Have we not enjoyed our meals, 

 and our wine, and our beds, rising in the morning with a 

 freshness not perceptible at other periods of the year, 

 in the summer months especially, when our exertions 

 necessarily abate ? Rely upon it, then, my young friend," 

 added the Captain, with no slight emphasis, "manly 

 exercises of all sorts should be encouraged in the youth 

 of this country ; and although the practice of prize- 

 fighting cannot altogether be justified on moral grounds 

 inasmuch as the training two persons for the express 

 purpose of inflicting serious injury to each other, in cold 

 blood, at the hazard of sacrificing their lives, while thou- 

 sands of their fellow-men are looking on, for their amuse- 

 ment, is undoubtedly opposed to Christian feeling ; still, 

 up to the present time, considerably more good than evil 

 has arisen from it, in upholding the national character for 

 courage and fair play, and enabling Englishmen to boast, 

 not merely of their courage and fair play in their quarrels, 

 but that England is the only country under the sun, in which 

 the knife or the dagger is not used to avenge insults or in- 

 juries. There are, I am sorry to add, some signs of a 

 departure from the strictly honourable conduct hitherto 

 displayed in the British ring, the consequence of Jews 

 becoming prominent characters in it : should this become 

 manifest, it will lose the patronage of those highly re- 

 spectable persons who now support it so liberally many 

 of them on principle and I have no hesitation in saying, 

 that my support, earnest as it has hitherto been, will, in 

 that case, be withdrawn. But it is not only from the 

 practice of boxing that national advantages are derived : 

 the use of the cudgel and back-sword, or single-stick as 



