PREFACE 



BY the ' Sport of our Ancestors ' is meant the sport of 

 Fox-hunting. Anything to do with Sport has always 

 been so popular in these islands that the word is 

 now used to dignify almost anything in the nature of a 

 competition, being applied to golf, football, lawn-tennis, 

 hockey, or battledore and shuttlecock. But perhaps a better 

 testimony to the supreme value of the idea of Sport in the 

 Englishman's mind is the natural way in which he designates 

 as a good sportsman any one whom he particularly wishes 

 to praise. No man can have greater honour in this country 

 than to be known as a good sportsman, or, in the vernacular 

 of those who are regardless of grammar, as a * Sport.' He 

 may achieve this reputation without ever having been on a 

 horse or handled a gun or a fishing-rod. But he must 

 possess a sense of humour and, above all, an ability to 

 take risks and to play for his side. These attributes, added, 

 of course, to a certain standard of kindliness and good conduct, 

 are what distinguish the good sportsman or ' Sport ' among 

 his fellows. 



But for the purpose of these papers the term Sport will 

 be only applied to field sports, meaning the pursuit of wild 



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