sport Forty Years Ago and To-day 1 9 



The diary for 1800 is headed with the philosophical 

 resolution : — 



" Eesolved to live as jollily this New Year as my 

 purse and constitution will allow, without injuring them." 



He was an exceedingly good shot, and very fond of 

 it, and was the first landowner in his district to stop 

 trespassing in pursuit of game, thereby incurring, I am 

 afraid, much odium. No one then thought of stopping 

 any respectable person from shooting, and my father 

 used to relate that, when he was a young man, it was 

 the usual custom to pull up and have a shot at any 

 covey of partridges that might be observed, when driving 

 along the road, regardless of what property they were on. 

 Partridge shooting, of course, was then over pointers or 

 setters, and indeed there is no reason, certainly in the 

 north country, why they should not still be shot over 

 dogs, as far as the total of game killed duriug the season 

 is concerned. In the south of England it is undoubtedly 

 different, with the poor covert, large fields, and small 

 fences that are usually found there. In Yorkshire, how- 

 ever, there are plenty of hiding-places, with the high 

 turnips, rape, clover, thick hedges, and tangled ditches 

 that are everywhere to be found, except on the Wolds. 

 Once, when a boy, I accompanied my father and a cousin 

 out shooting, and we did not leave the house till 12.30 

 P.M. It was in September 1858, the year of the great 

 comet, and when the bag was counted in the evening, 

 besides hares and rabbits, the two guns had accounted for 

 thirty-three and a half brace of partridges. As far as 

 I can see, the conditions have not changed in the least 

 since then, excepting that they are noio more favourable 

 for tlw shooters. The fields are the same, and the hedges 



