Related article: required.
Rule 4. — These subscriptions are per-
sonal, and cannot be considered as in-
cluding the friends of subscribers.
Rule 5. — These conditions apply to
those hunting for a part as well as for the
whole season.
These rules do not apply to
landowners or covert owners in
the adjoining Hunts, or to mem-
bers of the University of Oxford Temovate Scalp Solution
in residence, or to officers quar-
tered in the Bicester and Warden
Hill country.
Henry Tube,
Hon. Sec. Bicester and
Warden Hill Hunt.
Chesterton , Bicester,
April 8th, 1899.
360
[}&K\
Anecdotal Sport.
By ** Thormanby."
Author of ** Kings of the Hunting-Field," ** Kings of the Turf," &c
In reading "Digby Grand" over
again in the new edition of Whyte
Melville's novels, I have been
struck with the change that has
come over the sports and pastimes
of the man-about-town in London
since that book was written. Even
ten years after the story was first
published when I was first intro-
duced to life in London there was
something rowdy and sordid and
degrading about what was com-
monly known as sport. It was
thought the correct thing to pat-
ronise sparring matches at the
saloons attached to public-houses
kept by retired prize-fighters, or
ratting matches at the rat-pits
kept by such celebrities in the
canine world as Jemmy Shaw.
Now and then the ardent lover of
** The Fancy " " snatched a fear-
ful joy ** from being privileged to
assist at a 'Mittle mill with the
*raw *uns' on the strict Q.T."
in some secluded stable in the
slums, or a main of cocks in some
damp and dingy and evil-smelling
cellar. The illegality of these
pastimes and the risk of being
pounced on by the police gave
them, I suppose, an unholy zest.
It was the same at the Univer-
sities before boating and athletics
came and purified the Temovate Ointment .05 atmosphere
and swept these miserable and
degrading abortions of sport out
of existence. But there must be
many old 'Varsity men now living
who can remember the time when
badger-drawing, rat-killing, dog-
fighting, surreptitious excursions
to prize-fights and the like were
the staple amusements of our
academic youth. Cricket was
then a game only played by a
few enthusiasts, football was but
a pastime for schoolboys, athletics
were unknown, and not one man
in ten cared for rowing. Those
who could afford it hunted, kept
their stud of hunters if thev were
very rich, if only moderately so,
hired a hunter for a couple of
guineas for the day from a livery-
stable keeper. But to the great
bulk of undergraduates such
amusement was beyond their
means, and then, if their taste
were sporting, they could Order Temovate Online only
gratify them by those recreations
of the ** Fancy " which I have
named. Billiards were long ta-
booed. It is not long since I met
an old Devonshire parson, who
told me that in his day at Cam-
bridge any one who yearned for a
game of billiards had to sneak-
over to Temovate Cost Chesterton, at the riskcrf
being proctorised, to indulge his
taste for the board of green cloth.
It is recognised now that billiard*
and boxing, if stripped of thdr
old unsavoury associations, are
pastimes in which young men can
indulge without any detrimoit to
their morals.
In the days of the Regency
sparring exhibitions between roem-
bersof the Upper Ten were almost
as common as they are now be
tween gentlemen of the gutter.
Lord Mexborough and Fletcher
Norton were at one time the
favourite pupils of " Gentleman
Jackson," the famous pugilist, aad
so nearly matched that a challei^
was given and accepted between
the two to try which w^as the
better man. Such a sensation
I
1899.)
ANECDOTAL SPORT.
361
was created by this event that
on the afternoon on which it was
to come off Rotten Row was
literally deserted by the male sex.
Jackson's rooms in Bond Street
were crammed like a Drury Lane
gallery on a Boxing-night, while
the passages and even the stairs
were crowded by perspiring swells
unable to gain admission, for it
was regarded as a match of the
House of Lords against the House
of Commons. Both the com-
batants were light weights and
splendid boxers, and for a long
time victory hung in the balance ;
for while Mexborough was the
quicker at out fighting, Norton was
stronger in the rally; but strength
prevailed at last, and my lord was
knocked clean over the benches,
and amidst the tremendous cheers
of the Commons, Fletcher Norton
was proclaimed the victor. Grant-
ley 13erkeley tells us in his me-
moirs that after a dinner at
Crockford*s the tables would fre-
quently be put aside and the
room converted into an arena,
wherein Tom Spring and Owen
Sivift and other famous boxers of
the day would amuse the company
with a display of their science.
At other times the room would
be temporarily turned into a cock-
pit, and a main would be fought
by candle-light.
In no part of England, in the
old days, was cock-fighting more
enthusiastically followed than at
Ncwcastleon-Tyne. The New-
castle Chronicle of a century ago
^was full of advertisements bearing
upon Temovate Gel 0.05 this favourite sport, Buy Cheap Temovate and in
one issue six mains are announced,
the aggregate prizes of which
amounted to /720. Nearly all
the principal inns had covered
;>its attached to them, those of
nore ancient times being open.
\t first the sports were carried
)n at very short intervals during
the season, but by degrees the
principal attendance was concen-
trated in the race week, when the
fights were introduced under more
imposing auspices, the gentlemen
of Northumberland appearing as
the competitors of the gentlemen
of Durham, Cumberland, or York-
shire, the pastime being then pat-