——:o:——
Pigeon Shooting at Hurlingham.
In this Sport every element of manly courage and skill is brought into play. The poor caged birds are generally so bewildered on being released that they can scarcely fly, and the skilled marksmen often wound them, so that they flutter about for hours with broken legs and wings. This affords excellent entertainment to the tender-hearted ladies of fashion who witness the sports, and bet on the results.
Occasionally a bird is killed at once, others escape from the grounds and are either captured, or tortured to death by that respectable class of the community which usually congregates around fairs, race meetings, and prize fights.
Altogether, Pigeon-shooting is the sport which, for the sake of our National reputation, should be encouraged.
When we have persuaded the Spaniards to abolish their Bull fights as cruel and unmanly, we may bring them to the innocent delights of battue shooting, hare coursing, fox hunting, or even to Pigeon Shooting, and so realise Poet Wordsworth’s noble ideal:—
“One lesson, Shepherd, let us two divide,
Taught by what nature shows and what conceals,
Never to blend our pleasure or our pride,
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels.”