BENEFICIAL INFLUENCE ON HEALTH. HSl 



The huntsman, ever gay, robust, and bold. 



Defies tlie noocious vapour, and confides 



In this delightful exercise to raise 



His drooping head, and cheer his heart with joy." 



Certain is it, the rough sports of the country have 

 been known not only to cure diseases of long stand- 

 ing in the human frame ; but the exercise of hunt- 

 ing, with the temperance it enjoins^ absolutely steels 

 the constitution, as the poet expresses himself, 

 against the attacks of the most common of the dis- 

 eases peculiar to this variable climate. Its effect on 

 the mind, which he also alludes to, is of no less 

 value ; for, from the very exhilarating nature of 

 the amusement, it relieves it from dwelling upon 

 its anxieties, from which few persons are free ; and 

 it is one of the best cures for the heartache, or any 

 of those shocks which our flesh is heir to : — 



" Dona cano di\-um, l(Btas venantihus aiies, 

 Aiaspicio, Diana, tuo," 



sang the poet Gratius ; and Horace's description of 

 a sportsman's return to his family, after the toils 

 and perils of the day, is a true picture of a country 

 life, replete with every possible enjoyment. 



Objections have been made to encouraging youth 

 in a love of our national lield-sports, on the score 

 of their engrossing too much of their time and at- 

 tention, to the neglect of more necessary attain- 

 ments. '' It is true," says a Roman historian, 

 " the masters in every branch of learning, whom 

 the accomplished father of Commodus provided for 

 his son, were heard with inattention and disgust ; 

 whilst the lessons of the Parthian, or the Moor, in 



