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Inftructions for Inexperienced Sportsmen.

braying, which will, very likely, I put the birds on the wing.

All I fhall fay on the article of fhot, is, that as you are uncertain what kind of game you may meet with, be prepared for all, by loading with a mixture of the different kinds, from Bristol-drop to faipe-fhot.

Never go out till the fun has been up fome time; this will give you an opportunity of eating a good breakfaft, and the dew being off the grafs, will prevent your catching cold in your feet.

As you are going to the ground where you expect to meet with game, you may exercife yourfelf by fhooting at crows, cats, or tame fowls; this will bring your hand in, and prevent your startling at the first report of your guna thing not unufual to young fportsmen. You may likewife train your dogs by fetting them at a flock of fheep or geefe in your way; and your water-fpaniels at any pond you may pafs, where there are a few tame ducks.

The moment you draw your trigger, be fure you fhut both your eyes; this will prevent the priming from hurting them, and you can open them time enough to fee where the game falls.

Always carry your piece full cocked, with the muzzle parallel with the horizon, you are then ready for any thing, and fhould you chance by this to lodge a few hot in your companion's breech or body, 'tis an accident so often happens to fportfmen, it will not be regarded.

Be fure to put powder enough in your gun; and let your wadding be of the strongest and thickeft paper you can get; this will prevent the fhot from mixing with it; nor be sparing of the latter, as from the quantity, you are lefs liable to mifs your object.

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Ram your fhot down for at leaft five minutes, your gun will make the better report, and the execution be more certain.

Always get the wind at your back, if poffible; it will hinder the fmoke from flying in your eyes, and if the weather be dry, the duft alfo.

Hammer your flint well with the back of your knife after every difcharge, this will give it a fine edge, and prevent your miffing

fire.

On coming to a bufh or copfe beat it with the muzzle of your gun, and fhout luftily, this will put your dogs in fpirits, and if there is any game, you will be fure to put it up.

On ftopping to rest yourself, always put the muzzle of your gun under one arm; it will ferve to fupport you, and prevent any wet or rain from getting down

the barrel.

After you have killed all you can, if you fhould refresh at a hedge-alehoufe, affume airs of confequence, curfe the practice, and offer a reward for the apprehenfion of poachers; threaten to difcharge your game-keeper, talk of intimacy with great and noble fportfmen, and this will make you appear fomebody, and the ignorant ruftics will perhaps fay you are a gemman.

When you return home let your game bag be full, if it is only grafs; plafh yourfelf as much as poffible, the dirtier you are, will prove yo have been indefatigable in your purfuit; and when you join your affociates, give an exaggerated account of your day's fport, and what great quantities of game you have diftributed to very particular friends on your way home.

T.

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To the EDITORS of the SPORTING &c. were abolished

MAGAZINE.

GENTLEMEN,

I modesty with which your cor CANNOT Lelp admiring the refpondent I. I. B. from the Turf Coffee house, apologises for gaming, in your magazine of laft month. If the modefty of this gentleman was not fufficiently manifefted in the defign of his undertaking, it has at least been well exempli

fied in the confidence with which he courts a controverfy.

Now, gentleman, I am not attempting to maintain that much may be advanced and forcibly urged in defence of gaming, but, I purpofe to fhew your

COR

RESPONDENT, that HE has not as yet, fufficiently defended it; but as he has not betrayed any great want of ingenuity, perhaps, in fome future attempt he may be more fuccefsful.

That a number of mechanics are employed in the conftruction of cards, dice, rackets, and other implements of gaming, is not to be denied; but will your CORRESPONDENT argue that they are thus ufefully employed?-I make little doubt, and he may poffibly make still lefs doubt, that there are a number of hands occupied

in the conftruction of that kind of dice known by the name of difpatches, as well as many other articles of knowing manufacture; and yet, I cannot eafily be perfuaded that if thefe mechanics were without employment, they would be likely in any other way to prove greater" pefts to fociety." The commerce and fair manufactures of this country are able to find employment for the whole extent of its population; and our profperity would not be injured if the trades of dicemakers, card-makers, coiners,

for ever,

without even the exception of another manufactory eftablished by an ingenious matron of the

name of PHILLIPS.

The revenue derived from the

duties upon cards, dice, &c. can never be a national object of any magnitude, much lefs can it be urged in a moral view as any The apology for ufing them. by fines inflicted for offences and revenue, alfo, gains fomething

breaches of the law, but no man ever thought pleading the advantage to the revenue apology for the practice.

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as an

That gaming is a relaxation from bufinefs, I fhould readily allow, even if your CORRESPONDENT had stated it more strongly as a courfe of idlenefs; and when he mentions the falutary effects of tennis, cricket, and others," he would do well to diftinguifh bewhich do not properly belong to tween wholesome bodily exercises what in the ufual acceptation of the word is called gambling, and thofe fcenes of fedentary play, which fill the mind with tumults, fuming the body.-A man plays while they are gradually conagreeably at cricket, without ever will you find a perfon who fits thinking of a wager, but where down to play for nothing at hazard or at far..

duces a perfon into companies, I admit that gaming "intro

when no other mafter of the ceremonies would be found," and instead of a recommendation confider it as a great misfortune. I have myself feen a man hanging in chains, whom a very short time before I faw playing at a the indifcriminate admiffion to hazard-table; and were it not for places of this fort, the unhappy wretch alluded to, would not have

found

Singular Phænomenon of a Poney Mare.

241

found his way into my company, I hope you will foon hear from

and poffibly, would not have found his way into these chains.

Your correfpondent has furnifhed you with two inftances, in which gentlemen have derived folid advantages from their addrefs at play; but he must remember, that their addrefs was fhewn in the management of fome particular game, and that had they been abfoluely gamblers, those benefits would have been witheld from them in the first inftance, or loft to them in the fequel. But, fuppofing it had been otherwife, and that the parties mentioned were gamblers in the full fenfe of the word, a folitary exception here and there, fo far from difapproving that gaming is a destructive vice, will have the contrary effect, and prove the general rule.

I

the

What thofe games at cards are, which contribute more to pleafantry than wit and repartee, know not. There feldom has been, as far as my experience enables me to judge, a game played, in which the mirth was equally divided between lofers and the winners; and, as SWIFT would look for "the merrieft faces in mourning coaches," fo fhould I, if I wanted to contemplate the picture of anguifh, difappointment, and chagrin, be certain to find it at a gamingtable.

"Play," he fays, "is a profeffed enemy to inebriation and other debaucheries," Be it fo. But is the remedy much better than the disease? A man may remove the fmell of onions from his breath by eating a quantity of garlic.

I believe, gentlemen, your correfpondent is now fufficiently anfwered as to what he has yet alledged. But, as he has by no means exhaufted the subject, I

him again, and as I have a good deal of leifure on my hands, I fhall not only attend to what he writes, but also furnish you with an account, from my own perfonal experience, of fome of the viciffitudes in the life of

A BROKEN GAMESTER. King's-Bench Prifon, Aug. 11, 1794.

To the Editors of the Sporting Magazine.

GENTLEMEN,

HA

AVING read in your last number, an entertaining account of feveral mules, (the whole fpecies of which, have hitherto been confidered as bar

ren) having bred, I have taken the liberty of fending you the following account of the delivery of a mare, in hopes, that fome of your profeffional writers will oblige the public with their ideas upon what appears to me a moft fingular and wonderful phænomenon.

In the feafon of ninety-three, Bergem, who keeps a houfe, known by the sign of the Wrestlers, on Aldenham Common, Herts, had a poney-mare covered by a horfe of Ricketts Johnson, Efq. of Bushey, named Sceptre, and after having offered her the horfe at the regular periods, (which he refused to take) naturally fuppofed the held, and as ufual turned her upon the common to graze, among the herds of ponies, with which it abounds. A little while previous to the time he expected she would foal, he removed her for the convenience of pasture, &c. from the common, to a clofe adjoining his home, where the fhortly after dropped a foetus, (if I may ufe the expreffion) in the form of a foal, from the fmallness of which,

242

Infeription in the Grounds of R. Forrest, Esq.

it was apparent, fhe had not gone her full time, although more than eleven months were elapfed fince he was covered by Sceptre; it was alfo fo extremely weak and feeble, as not to give any hopes of its ever attaining maturity, and fo frightfully illformed, that Bergem, (from an idea it was not worthy any care or attention, and that as long as it lived, it would remain a horrid fright) was inclined and univerfally advised to destroy it. He however permitted it to continue with the mare, who, after an in terval of fourteen days, to the aftonishment of every one, produced a colt-foal of the most lively and promifing appearance, which, with the foetus, ftill fucks their dam.

Inftances of mares having twins, is, I believe, not uncommon, especially among the large cart breed, whom I have frequeatly witneffed working at the plough and harrow with them: in fhort, I remember, when a iad, going to Barnet fair with my father, where he purchased a cart. mare, who, at that time, fuckled two foals, both of whom he reared, but then, from the fimi. larity of their fize and make, it was evident they had been foaled fhortly after each other. Your inferting this in your Magazine, will, I hope, induce fome gentlemen converfant with the fubje&t, to inform the public, whether inftances of delivery after fo long an interval, often occur; and from what caufe, and which, or whether it is to be fuppofed both foals were got by Sceptre: my idea is, that the laft foal was got by him, and that the mare, after having been covered by him, was not (although the refufed him) fatisfied, and therefore was leaped by fome ftone poney on the

common, which having alfo got a foal, it delayed the delivery of the last beyond the ufual time. This is merely a conjecture of my own, which I have laid down in hopes that fome of your ingenious correfpondents will comment upon it, and favour the pub. lic with a more full and ample difcuffion of a circumftance fo truly furprifing.

Delrow,
Aug. 15, 1794.

Yours, &c.

A FARMER.

P. S. Sceptre is now the property of William Blycum, of Aldenham Common, and covers at one guinea a mare, and half a crown the groom. He is a beautiful bay horfe, upwards of fixteen hands high, of great strength and fymmetry, completely mafter of twenty ftone, and an uncom. mon good, temperate and fpeedy hunter.

To the Editors of the Sporting
Magazine,

GENTLEMEN,

F you have a corner to fpare in your agreeable Miscellany, the infertion of the following will oblige,

Aug, 20.

Yours, &c.

R. F.

INSCRIPTION on a STONE in the
GROUNDS of R. FORREST, Efq.
GREENHITHE, KENT.

Here is buried, a Horfe,
Called
JACK,
As

A Hunter and Roadster
Inferior to none in this Kingdom.
He died

Aug. 22, 1794,
Aged Thirty Years;
After

Twenty-two years faithful Service
To his Mafter.

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A Treatise on Farriery.

A TREATISE on FARRIERY, with
ANATOMICAL PLATES.
(Continued from page 196.)

THE

HE tongue confifts of mufcular fibres, which lie in different directions, and have different motions.

The tongue has feven pair of Mufcles, fome of which arife from the lower jaw, and fome from the os hyoides. One pair arifes from the temporal bones, and pulls the tongue backwards, being inferted in the fide of the tongue, and another proceeds from the lower jaw near the furthermoft grinders, and is inferted into the bridle of the tongue. When thefe act toge ther, the horfe is enabled to fwallow the aliment after it is chewed.

The head of the wind-pipe has fix pair of muscles, which help to open and fhut its valves when the air paffes and repaffes in breathing. It has likewife another pair which draw both fides of the ewer like griftle together, to prevent any hurtful matter from entering therein. The epiglottis, which ferves chiefly to open and fhut the wind-pipe, has very fmall mufcles. When thefe mufcles are affected by colds, or are inflamed, they render fwallowing difficult.

The head of the gullet or pharynx has mufcles which ferve to contract or open the upper orifice of the gullet; and there is likewife a kind of sphincter mufcle which ferves to contract it after feeding.

to

1

The ears of a horfe are very moveable, and are therefore turned different ways according the different directions of founds, especially when they are hot or fearful, The outward ear has four mufcles; one of ear has four mufcles; one of which lifts it up and points it

VOL. IV. No. XXIII,

243

forward; a fecond pulls it back-' wards; a third points it downwards; the fourth affifts the fecond, and pulls the ear backward, and downward towards the horfes neck. A quick motion of the ear is a fign of strong mufcles, and a good fpirit. The inward ear has two mufcles which belong to the organ of hearing.

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forward, backward, fideways, The head and neck are moved and fomewhat circular. perform which motions, there are eight pair of muscles proper to the head, and four pair common to the head and neck. Some of the proper muscles arife from the breaft-bone, collar-bone, and the vertebra or rack-bones of the neck, and are inferted into the

occipital or noll-bone, or into bones. Thofe that belong both the proceffes of the temporal to the head and neck, arife from the breast-bone, the fpines of the > rack-bones of the back, and are vertebræ of the cheft, and the inferted higher or lower into the of the neck. tranfverfe proceffes of the bones Thefe with the proceffes, make up the bulk of mufcular expanfions between the The expanfions are the interspinal the flesh lying on thofe parts. mufcles which affift in the motions of the vertebræ.

The back and loins have four The first pair are very long, for pair of muscles common to both bones and the os facrum to the they extend from the haunch temporal bones on each fide of the fpines as they país along. the neck, and are connected with They are a great fecurity to the back, and affift the other three all thefe mufcles act together, the pair in all their motions. When whole back is contracted; but when they act on one fide only, they bend the body on that fide.

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