A sportsman's dinner. 239 



But, lest my theories be mistaken, I must say that I 

 hold cooking and ** creature comforts " as very secondary 

 indeed to sport. If all can be had, so much the better ; 

 and when I recommend the tyro to learn the art and 

 mysteries of the broiling iron, it is precisely on the 

 principle that the knowledge how to cook a dinner may, 

 at times, be as necessary for him as to know how to wash 

 a gun. No man, I presume, will do either, who can 

 manage to have them done by a deputy. But a sports- 

 man, a keen, straightforward sportsman, will, of necessity, 

 be often left dependent upon his own resources, and hence 

 he should be prepared for the contingency. It is the 

 abuse I cry out against. A man who on the mountains 

 counts the minutes until dinner-hour shall come, who 

 is seeking an appetite rather than amusement, and 

 instead ojf game is dreaming of gourmanderie — him I 

 totally reject, and implore to lay aside his gun for ever, 

 and exchange the powder-flask for the pepper-box. The 

 latter he will find more useful, and not half so dangerous. 

 It was clear from the very start that this was to be 

 among the wettest nights of the season. The Colonel 

 settled himself for a comfortable carouse ; the Priest 

 was not the man to desert his huon camarado ; and 

 Antony declared that there was good cause for a general 

 jollification, as he properly observed that " it was not 

 every day that Manus kills a bullock," by which old 

 saw, I presume, the defunct deer and ourselves are 

 typified. No wonder, then, that the revel commenced 

 with all the members of the body politic ; and whilst 

 the contents of the ** four-gallon keg " were invaded 

 in the kitchen, the wine circulated rapidly in the chamber 

 of state. In truth, during my short but chequered 

 life, civil and military, I never saw a party evince an 



