236

PLATE II.

HAWKING PARTY GOING OUT.

ENGRAVED BY E. HACKER, FROM A PAINTING BY H. SLOUS.

"Painted exact your form and mien,
Your hunting suit of Lincoln green,
That tassell'd horn so gaily guilt,

That fauchion's crooked blade and hilt,
That cap with Heron plumage trim,
And yon two hounds."

SCOTT.

"Hawking party going out." Now, we only put the question fairly to any man-What style of picture would he picture in his own fancy from such a title as this? A gentleman of the nineteenth century, in a green cut-away, leathers, and top-boots, about to assist a lady in a Bond-street-built habit to the back of a thorough-bred, rotten-row looking hack, held by a smart tiger with a cockade in his hat, while a keeper, in a velveteen jacket and cords, stands waiting for the word to move on with the falcons and setters. Would this, in his "mind's eye," constitute the hawking party? We think not. Would he not rather conjure up a glimpse of the olden time-a gallant of the days of good Queen Bess, with the Lady Alice at his side and a gentle page standing with black Sir Oliver and grey St. Nicholas at the portico-"To horse, to horse, fair gentlemen?" Would this be what he would expect and wish to see, or has Mr. Slous disappointed him either in his ideas of the matter or his manner of embodying them? Again may we say we think not. Had it struck us in time, we should certainly have assisted, as far as in us lay, in calling up the remembrance of "the days of old" by giving the argument in old English style and black letter, thus-

Hawking Partie going out.

There are many sports which once stood high among the recrea tions of an old English gentleman, now held but little more than in remembrance; though whether we have improved or profited in thus departing from the ways of our ancestors, must, as Sambo says, "be entirely de matter of opinion." There are undoubtedly no few which, from the gradual refinement, increasing intelligence, and proper direction of the public taste, would be witnessed with abhorrence and disgust; while the revival of others would awaken much of the chivalrous feeling of the olden time-a spirit which might add a piquancy to the entertainment that even that greatest of all attractions, absolute novelty, would fail to give it. We have long learnt to consider that a man needs not to have the gladiator exhibited in the

arena in a state of nudity, though still armed with a weapon fully sufficient for the destruction of his opponent, to call forth or strengthen his admiration of manly courage; we have at length suffered the torture of the bull, to be erased from the disgrace appertaining to sporting life; and towns no longer hold their rights as a body corporate by the exhibition of such brutality, neither do our citizens regard with anything but a feeling of pity and contempt the memory of the man who could wish to have his name immortalized by having it annually mentioned in connection with such a laudable instance of his generosity and anxious desire to promote the moral welfare of posterity. Willingly we allow the Spaniard to claim this as his national and favourite amusement, in which we confess ourselves unequal and no ways desirous to rival him. From the United Kingdom, too, we return to Greece the glories of the cockfight, as destitute of usefulness as it is of humanity," for we cannot approve, even in an ancient Briton, the continuance of a passion towards the many murders of a Welch main. These, with other grand features of "the pit," have long ceased to be recognised as part of the characteristics once deemed absolutely necessary for a sportsman, which he must engage in and patronize; they have sunk slowly, perhaps, but surely; and who is there, however great may be his fondness for "the light of other days," that can deny but it is much to the advantage of all classes of the community, when persons of influence no longer are found to encourage such exquisite cruelties-such horrible sacrifices, under the name of "British sports?"

On the other hand, would the courtly, costly pageant of a tourney debase the gentle youths of the nineteenth century, or would a repetition of that pastime planned and practised by "the Scottish chiefs," cause more injury to health, fame, or fortune, than a month at "Crockford's, or life in the west?" Again, would not the more general adoption of that sport, with a display of which the bold Robin Hood treated "the lion-hearted" under the greenwood tree, improve the appearance and carriage of our London beaux and rural swains? Or, last and best of all, why should the grand falconer be such but in name?-why should that high office be a sinecure? why, with so many modern innovations, so many new schemes for murdering "the birds of the air," should the falconer's vernacular be the next thing to double-Dutch? or, why are not all men taught to distinguish "a hawk from a hand-saw ?"

Falconry, though at present among the rarest, was once the most fashionable of all sports; and a cavalier of two or three centuries since, would as soon confess his ignorance of his own pedigree, or the use of the sword at his side, as of this hunting in the air; indeed the falcon was the most common sign in the insignia of rank, and, as a writer in the Penny Magazine well and truly observes, "a knight seldom stirred from his house without his falcon on his wrist, and his hound at his heels; and when his hunting and hawking were over for ever, if he did not die in the field of battle, one of the two animals was generally carved on his monument-the dog at his feet, or the falcon on his hand. At the first revival of

the art of painting in Italy and Germany, and for more than two centuries after, a portrait was seldom executed without the painters introducing in it a falcon or a hawk." But "the gentleman in black" cries" Hold! enough!" and though

"A falc'ner Henry is, when Emma hawks,

With her of tarsels and of lures he talks."

We have really said so much of Emma's mamma in propriâ personâ, that we must now leave the falconer to speak for himself.

THE LIFE OF A JOCKEY,

WITH ANECDOTES OF THE TURF.

BY LORD WILLIAM LENNOX.

[Continued from page 168.]
CHAPTER III.

Of arts, and arms, and love, let others sing;
Muse, trim thy wings, and celebrate the ring!
Not this the mystic ring which hoops together
Consenting souls in Hymen's sacred tether;
Nor this the fatal ring which long ago
Wreak'd Canna's vengeance on Rome's sternest foe
Nor yet the ring which fairest Julia gave-

The ring which made and keeps me still her slave.
What is this ring, then, prithee? there's the rub.
"Tis a community-republic-club!

A motley club, at present without rules,
Where wise men feed in public upon fools.

Go to Newmarket-there you'll hear them roar,
Like Cross's lions, fed at half-past four,
On shins of beef; but, unlike beasts of prey,
No food their ravenous appetites can stay.

There Satan, touting from behind his ditch,
Beholds the fools grow poor, and wise grow rich;
While Captain Armstrong rides the better horse,
And needy noblers chuckle o'er a cross;

Or, for a change, the knowing ones stand in
With some dark flier, meant at last to win.
There jockeys, trainers, lords, and legs, and boys,
And Cambridge flats, in villanous corduroys,
Join in one shout, which rends the piercing air-
The horse-the mare-a hundred-you've the mare!
A hundred on the horse-say, five to four
In ponies-fifties?-Done. Again?-No more."
Morning Post, Feb. 23, 1844.

VISCOUNT MAIDSTONE.

THE EVENT ALLUDED TO IN OUR LAST CHAPTER COMES OFF-A SLIGHT SKETCH OF CAPTAIN MOSS, ALIAS BENDIGO MOSES-THE CAPTAIN DONE TO A TINDER-SELLING PLATES A SUGGESTION TO