28 In Memoriam : Sir Ralph Payne- Gallwey, Bart. 



History, Construction and Management.' As a wild-fowler, he 

 was pre-eminent, and upon his estate he constructed and 

 maintained one of the very few Yorkshire decoys. In col- 

 laboration with Lord Walsingham (another past President 

 of the Union) and Lord Lovat, he was responsible for two 

 volumes upon ' Shooting ' in ' The Badmington Library,' the 

 finest volumes of the series. Other works from his ready pen 

 were ' Letters to Young Shooters,' and ' High Pheasants in 

 Theory and Practice.' These volumes show not only his 

 keen interest in sport, but also what a close and accurate 

 ornithological observer he was. 



He was also a great authority upon Archery and a skilled 

 performer with the crossbow ; he held the record for long- 

 distance shooting with this weapon. As a result of his interest 

 in this sport, he published in 1903. an able volume upon ' The 

 Crossbow, Mediaeval and Modern, Military and Sporting.' 

 Another work showing the many-sided character of the man, 

 is ' Projectile-Throwing Weapons of the Ancients,' published 

 in 1906. He also invented many useful articles connected 

 with sport, some of which have- been further developed and 

 found of great use in the present war. 



He devoted considerable time at one period to Falconry, 

 and some of the members of the Union have pleasant recol- 

 lection of the exhibition of rook hawking he gave with his 

 Peregrines, when the Union visited him at his home during 

 his year of office. His consideration for others was well 

 illustrated upon that day. A visit had been paid by a number 

 of members present to Gormire Lake ; Sir Ralph drove there 

 in a Norwegian cariole, with his boy seated behind, when, 

 travelling down Sutton Bank at a good speed, the pony stum- 

 bled ; Sir Ralph performed two or three rapid somersaults 

 over the animal, followed by the boy. The first thoughts of 

 Sir Ralph when he had gathered himself together was of the 

 boy. ' Where is the boy ? ' ' Is he hurt ? ' Luckily, however, 

 none of them were any worse for the mishap. 



He published many interesting notes connected chiefly with 

 ornithology and sport in the pages of The Field, etc. His 

 interests were not, however, connected entirely with sport 

 and natural history, for Historical studies occupied some 

 considerable portion of his time ; two works, a result of his 

 versatile pen, which he published, may be mentioned, viz., 

 'History of the George worn by King Charles I. on the scaffold,' 

 and ' The Mystery of Maria Stella, Lady Newborough.' 



Nowhere will he be missed more than upon his own estates, 

 where the happiest relations have always existed between 

 the tenants and himself, and this appears to have been always 

 the case upon this estate where farms have been in the occu- 

 pation of successive tenants of the same families for two or 

 three hundred years. — R.F. 



Naturalist 



