GENTLEMEN GAMEKEEPERS. 43 



congenial employment, should take service as gamekeepers 

 — after the manner in which ladies were invited to become 

 ' helps.' The idea does not appear to have received much 

 practical support, nor does it seem feasible, looking at the 

 altered relations of society in these days. A gentleman 

 ' out of luck,' and with a taste for outdoor life and no 

 objection to work, could surely do far better in the 

 colonies, where he could shoot for his ' own hand,' and in 

 course of time achieve an independence, which he could 

 never hope to attain as a gamekeeper. 



In the olden times, no doubt, younger brothers did 

 become, in fact, gamekeepers, head grooms, huntsmen, etc., 

 to the head of the family. There was less of the sense of 

 servitude and loss of dignity when the feeling of clanship 

 was prevalent, when the great house was regarded as the 

 natural and proper resource of every cadet of the family. 

 But all this is changed. And for a man of education to 

 descend to trapping vermin, filling cartridges, and feeding 

 pheasants all his life, would be a palpable absurdity with 

 Australia open to him and the virgin soil of Central Africa 

 eager for tillage. 



Neither is every man's constitution capable of with- 

 standing the wear and tear of a keeper's life. I have deline- 

 ated the more favourable side already ; but it has its shadows. 

 Robust health, power of bearing fatigue, and above all of 

 sustaining constant exposure in our most variable climate, 

 are essential. No labourer is so exposed as the keeper : 



