95 



result that between 300 and 400 of the best 

 birds in England were brought in to Melton, 

 that a selection might be made. The opening 

 chapters of Silk and Scarlet, by The Druid 

 (H. H. Dixon), bear witness to the prevalence 

 of cocking in Leicestershire 



A feature in the method of reporting cock- 

 fights during George Ill's reign and later 

 deserves a word of notice ; instead of heading 

 the record of battles and byes with the names 

 of the owners, those of the feeders were in- 

 serted 



To take a comparatively late example, when 

 Lancashire fought Cheshire at the Liverpool 

 Race Meeting in July, 1836, Hines, feeder for 

 the former county, was credited with 27 battles 

 and 1 2 byes, while Woodcock, feeder for 

 Cheshire, was credited with 1 2 battles and 8 

 byes 



The practice demonstrates the great im- 

 portance which attached to the work of the 

 feeder when the treatment of game-fowl became 

 fully understood. Tom Hines, mentioned 

 above, was a Birmingham man, famed as a 

 feeder and cock setter. During the last fifty 

 or sixty years of legal cocking the feeder 

 appears to have made over the duty of " setting 

 to " the cocks in the pit to a colleague or helper 



