CHAPTER XII 



SOME SPORTING WRITERS 



A REVIEW of the literature of the Chase has been 

 so well written in the first chapter of the Hunting 

 volume of the Badminton Library, that it could 

 hardly be improved. The author closes his retro- 

 spect with an appreciation of Beckford's Thoughts 

 on Hunting, and supposes his reader to be well 

 acquainted with such authors as Delme Radcliffe, 

 "Nimrod," "Scrutator," Surtees, and Whyte- 

 Melville. There are others besides these, however, 

 who deserve some mention, which will presently 

 be attempted, although this chapter does not pre- 

 tend by any means to be an exhaustive description 

 of a complete Fox-hunter's library. 



Books about Fox-hunting roughly fall into 

 four classes : Text-books, Hunt Histories, Fiction, 

 Poetry. Of the writers of Text-books, taken in 

 the sense of a text-book being a manual of in- 

 struction, Beckford is at the top of the class. 

 Country gentleman. Fox-hunter, scholar, linguist, 

 and wit, he has illuminated his Thoughts upon 



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