I40 THE EXETER ROAD 



vault at Amport, for fear the bailiffs sliould seize the 

 body for debt. 



There are, for good or ill, no such sportsmen 

 nowadays as there were in the times before railways 

 came and brought more competition into existence, 

 makino- life a business and a strus^o-le, instead of the 

 light-hearted and irresponsible game that the sporting 

 squires at least found it. Noble sportsmen do not 

 nowadays, when detained by stress of weather in a 

 country inn, while away the tedium of the afternoon 

 by backing the raindrops racing down the window- 

 panes and betting fortunes on the result. No, that 

 very real bogey, ' agricultural depression,' has stopped 

 that kind of full-blooded prank, and the titled in 

 these progressive times find their account on the 

 ' front page ' of company -promoters' swindles instead. 

 They barter good names for gold, and lick the boots 

 of wealth V roo-ues, instead of kickinsj their bodies. 

 Where their fathers scorned to go the sons delight 

 to be. Would the fathers have done the like had 

 ' agricultural depression ' come earlier ? 



The noblemen and the sporting squires of old lived 

 in one mad whirl of excitement. Thev o-ambled on 

 every incident in their lives, and sometimes even on 

 their death-beds ; like the old gamester who, when 

 the doctor told him he would be dead the next 

 morning, offered to bet him that he would not I We 

 are not told whether or not the medical man backed 

 his professional opinion. 



One of the most illuminatins; side-lisfhts on these 

 truly Corinthian folk is the story which tells how 

 Lord Albert Conyngham and that classic sportsman, 



