Fishing and shooting were, of course, as popular as now. Of the former we have had little to learn since Isaac Walton’s time, and the illustration shows us that the “Contemplative Man,” in the early part of this century, knew how to combine his “Recreation” with the charms of female society.
AFTER A DAY’S SHOOTING—1809.
Shooting, like hunting, was a totally different thing, in the first ten years of the century, to what it is now. There were no battues, no hot, and elaborate, luncheons, no being posted in “warm corners,” no army of beaters, no breech-loaders, and two attendants to load for you, and, at the end of a day’s sport, no waggon-loads of slain to be sent off to market to help pay, in some part, the expenses of breeding, and keeping, such a head of game. Then, a man went out, preferably with a friend or two, soon after an early breakfast, accompanied by Don and Ponto, who were his constant companions in his walks, and whose education he had personally superintended; to watch their intelligent movements was in itself one of the pleasures of the day. When a covey rose, not a shot was wasted, if possible, for, by the time the gun was reloaded, the birds would be far off. A bit of bread and cheese, as luncheon, at the nearest farmhouse, or the village pub.; if the former, a brace of birds, or a hare left, with a kindly message. Enough game to carry home, without being tired, plenty for the larder, and some for friends; then dinner, some punch—and Betty would come with the chamber candle and warming-pan, to find the party asleep and quite ready for bed.
The Guns, with which our grandfathers shot, were vastly inferior to our modern breechloader; the workmanship was good, but the flint-lock, with its tardy firing, and the very weak powder then in use, did not render the “birding gun” a very efficient weapon.
COCK SHOOTING WITH SPANIELS—1804.
Thornhill, who wrote the Shooting Directory in 1804, is as great an authority on the subject of guns as any of his contemporaries; and he had quite sense enough to see that the old-fashioned long barrel of four feet, or more, carried no further than one of three feet, and he counselled the musket length of two feet ten inches, as the standard length for fowling-piece barrels, and preferred one that carried its shot close, to one that scattered. The method of proving “that a barrel will not burst, was to get a ball to fit the exact bore, and put the exact weight of the ball in powder, with which load, and fire it off by a train; if it does not burst, you need be under no apprehension. This is called Tower-proof; or put in double the quantity of powder and shot.”
He recommends as a proper charge for a fowling-piece of ordinary calibre, a drachm and a quarter, or a drachm and a half, of good powder, and an ounce, or an ounce and a quarter, of shot; and, when treating on the subject of recoil, he gives one or two anecdotes of overloading. “The overloading of the piece is the reason of the recoil; respecting sportsmen who are in the habit of overloading with shot, such are properly ridiculed in a treatise published some time since, entitled, ‘Cautions to Young Sportsmen,’ in which we find an advertisement levelled at some persons who were going to a Pigeon Shooting Match at Ballingbear-Warren House. It was as follows: ‘Take notice, that no person will be allowed to load with more than four ounces of shot.’ A gamekeeper to whom this author mentioned the story, told him he thought it a pretty fair allowance, and, on being told what charge and weight of shot he generally used, replied, he divided a pound into five charges.... A friend of the gentleman who relates this story, seeing his keeper equipped for a pigeon match, had the curiosity to examine his charge, and, after trying it with his rammer, expressed his surprise at finding it rather less than usual. ‘Oh, sir,’ replied the keeper, ‘I have only put in the powder yet;’ and, on putting in the shot, the charge, altogether, was eleven fingers. The reason he assigned was ‘that he always liked to give his piece a belly full.’”
The Percussion Cap, which was destined to make such a revolution in small arms, was patented April 11, 1807, by the inventor, the Rev. A. J. Forsyth, of Belhelvie, Aberdeenshire. It soon came into use, for we find an advertisement in the Morning Post, December 23, 1808: “To Sportsmen. The Patent Gun-lock invented by Mr. Forsyth is to be had at No. 10, Piccadilly, near the Haymarket. Those who may be unacquainted with the excellence of this Invention are informed that the inflammation is produced without the assistance of flint, and is much more rapid than in the common way. The Lock is so constructed as to render it completely impervious to water, or damp of any kind, and may, in fact, be fired under water.”