CHAPTER LXXII 

 THE ZOOLOGY OF SPORT 



It is hardly necessary to remark that the literature of those 

 forms of "sport" which depend upon* the existence of wild 

 animals is very extensive, and includes accounts of experiences 

 and adventures in all parts of the world. Much of it is highly 

 technical, most of it is anecdotal, and but a small part is the 

 work of authors who represent the sportsman and naturalist 

 combined. To name a selection of books for the benefit of ex- 

 pert huntsmen and anglers is of course quite superfluous, but 

 general readers may profitably refer to the following works: 

 The volumes of The Badminton Library, F^lr and Feather Series, 

 and The American Sportsman's Library, Izaak Walton's Corn- 

 pleat Angler ; Selous' A Hunters Wanderings in Africa', Sir 

 Samuel Baker's Wild Beasts and their Ways and With Rifle 

 and Hound in Ceylon-, The Big Game of North America, English 

 Sport, Sport in Europe, and The Sports of the World, edited re- 

 spectively by G. O. Shields, Alfred E. T. Watson, and (the two 

 last) by F. G. Aflalo. 



We have already had occasion to notice (p. 208) that the 

 first stage in the evolution of civilization was represented by the 

 primeval hunter and fisherman, a stage still in evidence to-day 

 among various savage races. But our remote prehistoric ances- 

 tors, like modern savages, were " pot-hunters " rather than sports- 

 men, while the intimate knowledge they must have acquired of 

 the habits of wild animals imparted a certain flavour of the 

 field naturalist. Many primitive races have also had, and 

 some still have, to defend themselves and (in the pastoral and 

 agricultural stages) their domesticated animals from the attacks 

 of predaceous forms. Even when hunting and fishing were 

 necessary for existence, however, a good deal of pleasurable 

 excitement must have attached to the pursuit of wild animals, 



