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man may be on a shooting visit with a friend for a week, and be the 

 means of having more birds put into the creels than any of the party, 

 yet very likely he will not be given more than a few brace for himself or 

 to send his friends when he is taking his departure. All is sold that 

 is not actually required for the table of the host, or for a few presents. 



In some places in England after a big shoot a brace of pheasants and 

 a hare or two are sent to some tenants of the estate, and during the 

 partridge-shooting a few birds are given to those over whose farms they 

 were shot. Xo doubt these little compliments and attentions are duly 

 appreciated, but I take the liberty of stating that the practice should 

 be much more usual than it is among our shooting magnates, and, 

 moreover, that there should be a still more liberal distribution by 

 some of those who already adopt the proceeding. 



In fact, I don't think I am going too far when I say that, instead of 

 selling their game, the proprietors would serve the interests of sport very 

 much better if they distributed the greater portion, after supplying 

 themselves and their friends, among those who preserved it and the 

 foxes. Of course some game should be sent to market for the use of 

 those who neither shoot nor preserve, but there is no need whatever 

 for such quantities as are sent at present. Besides, those who sustain the 

 sports of our country are more deserving of consideration in this matter 

 than are the townspeople and others. 



In the case of a man, or number of men, who pay a high rent for a 

 shooting, jDerhaps only for the one season or vv'here they may have no 

 connection with the take other than the shooting, it is quite a different 

 matter. They have every right to sell the game so as, to some extent, 

 recoup themselves their great expenditure of money. 



Large territorial landlords have no such excuse. Their incomes do 

 not require to be supplemented by money got for cheir game, which is, as 

 a rule, preserved for them by their own tenant farmers. A great deal of 

 damage is done to crops by game, as recompense for which, and as 

 a reward for the preservation as well as to encourage it in future, the 

 greater part of the dead game should be distributed among the farmers. 

 Again, most of our great landowners are foxhunters. With the 

 assistance of the farmers in preserving foxes, and with their permission 

 to ride over their grounds, foxhunting can alone be carried on. There- 

 fore, to the farmers every recompense, every indulgence, and every 

 compliment should be paid. To send as a present to their wives all 

 over a foxhunting country two or three times a year a basket contain- 

 ing a few brace of birds and some bares, with their landlord's com- 

 pliments, would, I am sure, have a most marked and beneficial effect 

 upon our foxhunting. 



Of course, the general public must have a chance of buying a bit of 

 game during the season. Tha,t can be afforded them in abundance by 

 what is sold off the rented moors and manors, supplemented as it 

 no doubt would be by that taken unlawfully, and for the sole purpose 

 of sale, 

 H.RH. the Prince of Wales, than whom there is not a better sports- 



