[Transcribers' notes:
Spelling, hyphenation, punctuation, capitalization, and accentuation
vary throughout the text. They are retained as published; we have not
standardized them.
The oe ligature is rendered: [oe].
Letters with a macron are preceded by an equals sign, both inside of
square brackets, e.g. [=a].
Italics are rendered between underscores, e.g. _italics_.
Underlined text is rendered between equal signs, e.g. =underlined
text=.
Smallcap text is rendered in all caps, e.g. SMALLCAP TEXT.
Superscripts are preceded by the carat character, e.g. ov^r.
Horn notes are rendered:
[**white] denoting a long note, [**black] a short note,
[**white][**white] a note of two long syllables, etc.]
THE MASTER OF GAME
[Illustration: Fox hunting "above ground" with raches or running
hounds. (From MS. f. fr. 616 in the Bibliothéque Nationale, Paris.)]
THE MASTER OF GAME
BY EDWARD, SECOND DUKE OF
YORK: THE OLDEST ENGLISH
BOOK ON HUNTING: EDITED BY
WM. A. AND F. BAILLIE-GROHMAN
WITH A FOREWORD BY THEODORE
ROOSEVELT
[Illustration]
LONDON
CHATTO & WINDUS
MCMIX
_All rights reserved_
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
INTRODUCTION xi
FOREWORD TO THE FIRST EDITION xix
I. THE PROLOGUE 1
II. OF THE HARE AND OF HER NATURE 14
III. OF THE HART AND HIS NATURE 23
IV. OF THE BUCK AND OF HIS NATURE 38
V. OF THE ROE AND OF HIS NATURE 41
VI. OF THE WILD BOAR AND OF HIS NATURE 46
VII. OF THE WOLF AND OF HIS NATURE 54
VIII. OF THE FOX AND OF HIS NATURE 64
IX. OF THE GREY (BADGER) AND OF HIS NATURE 68
X. OF THE (WILD) CAT AND ITS NATURE 70
XI. THE OTTER AND HIS NATURE 72
XII. OF THE MANNER AND HABITS AND CONDITIONS OF HOUNDS 75
XIII. OF SICKNESSES OF HOUNDS AND OF THEIR CORRUPTIONS 85
XIV. OF RUNNING HOUNDS AND OF THEIR NATURE 105
XV. OF GREYHOUNDS AND OF THEIR NATURE 113
XVI. OF ALAUNTES AND OF THEIR NATURE 116
XVII. OF SPANIELS AND OF THEIR NATURE 119
XVIII. OF THE MASTIFF AND OF HIS NATURE 122
XIX. WHAT MANNER AND CONDITION A GOOD HUNTER SHOULD HAVE 123
XX. HOW THE KENNEL FOR THE HOUNDS AND THE COUPLES FOR THE RACHES AND
THE ROPES FOR THE LYMER SHOULD BE MADE 125
XXI. HOW THE HOUNDS SHOULD BE LED OUT TO SCOMBRE 127
XXII. HOW A HUNTER'S HORN SHOULD BE DRIVEN 128
XXIII. HOW A MAN SHOULD LEAD HIS GROOM IN QUEST FOR TO KNOW A HART BY
HIS TRACE 130
XXIV. HOW A MAN SHOULD KNOW A GREAT HART BY THE FUMES 133
XXV. HOW A MAN SHOULD KNOW A GREAT HART BY THE PLACE WHERE HE HATH
FRAYED HIS HEAD 135
XXVI. HOW THE ORDINANCE SHOULD BE MADE FOR THE HART HUNTING BY
STRENGTH AND HOW THE HART SHOULD BE HARBOURED 148
XXVII. HOW A HUNTER SHOULD GO IN QUEST BY THE SIGHT 152
XXVIII. HOW AN HUNTER SHOULD GO IN QUEST BETWEEN THE PLAINS AND THE
WOOD 154
XXIX. HOW A HUNTER SHOULD GO IN QUEST IN THE COPPICE AND THE YOUNG
WOOD 155
XXX. HOW AN HUNTER SHOULD GO IN QUEST IN GREAT COVERTS AND STRENGTHS
156
XXXI. HOW A HUNTER SHOULD QUEST IN CLEAR SPIRES AND HIGH WOOD 157
XXXII. HOW A GOOD HUNTER SHALL GO IN QUEST TO HEAR THE HARTS BELLOW
161
XXXIII. HOW THE ASSEMBLY THAT MEN CALL GATHERING SHOULD BE MADE BOTH
WINTER AND SUMMER AFTER THE GUISE OF BEYOND THE SEA 163
XXXIV. HOW THE HART SHOULD BE MOVED WITH THE LYMER AND RUN TO AND
SLAIN WITH STRENGTH 165
XXXV. HOW AN HUNTER SHOULD SEEK AND FIND THE HARE WITH RUNNING HOUNDS
AND SLAY HER WITH STRENGTH 181
XXXVI. OF THE ORDINANCE AND THE MANNER OF HUNTING WHEN THE KING WILL
HUNT IN FORESTS OR IN PARKS FOR THE HART WITH BOWS AND GREYHOUNDS AND
STABLE 188
APPENDIX 201
LIST OF SOME BOOKS CONSULTED AND ABBREVIATIONS USED IN TEXT 268
GLOSSARY 282
INDEX 299
ILLUSTRATIONS
FOX HUNTING "ABOVE GROUND" _Frontispiece_
GASTON PH[OE]BUS SURROUNDED BY HUNTSMEN AND HOUNDS _To face page_ 1
THE HARE AND HER LEVERETS " 14
HOW TO QUEST FOR THE HART IN WOODS " 22
BUCK-HUNTING WITH RUNNING HOUNDS " 38
ROEBUCK-HUNTING WITH GREYHOUNDS AND RUNNING HOUNDS " 44
BADGER-DRAWING " 68
OTTER-HUNTING " 72
HOW THE HOUNDS WERE LED OUT " 86
RACHES OR RUNNING HOUNDS IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY " 106
THE SMOOTH AND THE ROUGH-COATED GREYHOUNDS " 114
THE FIVE BREEDS OF HOUNDS DESCRIBED IN THE TEXT " 122
THE KENNEL AND KENNELMEN " 126
THE MASTER TEACHING HIS HUNTSMAN HOW TO QUEST FOR
THE HART WITH THE LIMER OR TRACKHOUND _To face page_ 130
HOW A GREAT HART IS TO BE KNOWN BY HIS "FUMES"
(EXCREMENTS) " 134
HOW THE HUNTER SHOULD VIEW THE HART " 152
HOW TO QUEST FOR THE HART IN COVERTS " 164
HARE-HUNTING WITH GREYHOUNDS AND RUNNING HOUNDS " 182
HARE-DRIVING WITH LOW BELLS " 184
NETTING HARES IN THEIR "MUSES" " 186
THE "UNDOING" OR GRALLOCHING OF THE HART: THE
MASTER INSTRUCTING HIS HUNTERS HOW IT IS DONE " 192
HART-HUNTING WITH GREYHOUNDS AND RACHES " 196
THE "CURÉE" OR REWARDING OF THE HOUNDS" " 198
SHOOTING HARES WITH BLUNT BOLTS " 220
INTRODUCTION
The "Master of Game" is the oldest as well as the most important work
on the chase in the English language that has come down to us from the
Middle Ages.
Written between the years 1406 and 1413 by Edward III.'s grandson
Edward, second Duke of York, our author will be known to every reader
of Shakespeare's "Richard II.," for he is no other than the arch
traitor Duke of Aumarle, previously Earl of Rutland, who, according to
some historians, after having been an accomplice in the murder of his
uncle Gloucester, carried in his own hand on a pole the head of his
brother-in-law. The student of history, on the other hand, cannot
forget that this turbulent Plantagenet was the gallant leader of
England's vanguard at Agincourt, where he was one of the great nobles
who purchased with their lives what was probably the most glorious
victory ever vouchsafed to English arms.
He tells us in his Prologue, in which he dedicates his "litel symple
book" to Henry, eldest son of his cousin Henry IV., "Kyng of Jngelond
and of Fraunce," that he is the Master of Game at the latter's court.
Let it at once be said that the greater part of the book before us is
not the original work of Edward of York, but a careful and almost
literal translation from what is indisputably the most famous hunting
book of all times, _i.e._ Count Gaston de Foix's _Livre de Chasse_,
or, as author and book are often called, _Gaston Ph[oe]bus_, so named
because the author, who was a kinsman of the Plantagenets, and who
reigned over two principalities in southern France and northern Spain,
was renowned for his manly beauty and golden hair. It is he of whom
Froissart has to tell us so much that is quaint and interesting in his
inimitable chronicle. _La Chasse_, as Gaston de Foix tells us in his
preface, was commenced on May 1, 1387, and as he came to his end on a
bear hunt not much more than four years later, it is very likely that
his youthful Plantagenet kinsman, our author, often met him during his
prolonged residence in Aquitaine, of which, later on, he became the
Governor.
Fortunately for us, the enforced leisure which the Duke of York
enjoyed while imprisoned in Pevensey Castle for his traitorous
connection with the plots of his sister to assassinate the King and to
carry off their two young kinsmen, the Mortimers, the elder of whom
was the heir presumptive to the throne, was of sufficient length to
permit him not only to translate _La Chasse_ but to add five original
chapters dealing with English hunting.
These chapters, as well as the numerous interpolations made by the
translator, are all of the first importance to the student of venery,
for they emphasise the changes--as yet but very trifling ones--that
had been introduced into Britain in the three hundred and two score
years that had intervened since the Conquest, when the French language
and French hunting customs became established on English soil. To
enable the reader to see at a glance which parts of the "Master of
Game" are original, these are printed in italics.
The text, of which a modern rendering is here given, is taken from the
best of the existing nineteen MSS. of the "Master of Game," viz. the
Cottonian MS. Vespasian B. XII., in the British Museum, dating from
about 1420. The quaint English of Chaucer's day, with its archaic
contractions, puzzling orthography, and long, obsolete technical terms
in this MS. are not always as easy to read as those who only wish to
get a general insight into the contents of the "Master of Game" might
wish. It was a difficult question to decide to what extent this text
should be modernised. If translated completely into twentieth century
English a great part of the charm and interest of the original would
be lost. For this reason many of the old terms of venery and the
construction of sentences have been retained where possible, so that
the general reader will be able to appreciate the "feeling" of the old
work without being unduly puzzled. In a few cases where, through the
omission of words, the sense was left undetermined, it has been made
clear after carefully consulting other English MSS. and the French
parent work.
It seemed very desirable to elucidate the textual description of
hunting by the reproduction of good contemporary illuminations, but
unfortunately English art had not at that period reached the high
state of perfection which French art had attained. As a matter of
fact, only two of the nineteen English MSS. contain these pictorial
aids, and they are of very inferior artistic merit. The French MSS. of
_La Chasse_, on the other hand, are in several cases exquisitely
illuminated, and MS. f. fr. 616, which is the copy from which our
reproductions--much reduced in size, alas!--are made, is not only the
best of them, but is one of the most precious treasures of the
_Bibliothèque Nationale_ in Paris. These superb miniatures are
unquestionably some of the finest handiwork of French miniaturists at
a period when they occupied the first rank in the world of art.
The editors have added a short Appendix, elucidating ancient hunting
customs and terms of the chase. Ancient terms of venery often baffle
every attempt of the student who is not intimately acquainted with the
French and German literature of hunting. On one occasion I appealed in
vain to Professor Max Müller and to the learned Editor of the Oxford
Dictionary. "I regret to say that I know nothing about these words,"
wrote Dr. Murray; "terms of the chase are among the most difficult of
words, and their investigation demands a great deal of philological
and antiquarian research." There is little doubt that but for this
difficulty the "Master of Game" would long ago have emerged from its
seclusion of almost five hundred years. It is hoped that our notes
will assist the reader to enjoy this hitherto neglected classic of
English sport. Singularly enough, as one is almost ashamed to have to
acknowledge, foreign students, particularly Germans, have paid far
more attention to the "Master of Game" than English students have, and
there are few manuscripts of any importance about which English
writers have made so many mistakes. This is all the more curious
considering the precise information to the contrary so easily
accessible on the shelves of the British Museum. All English writers
with a single exception (Thomas Wright) who have dealt with our book
have attributed it persistently to a wrong man and a wrong period.
This has been going on for more than a century; for it was the
learned, but by no means always accurate, Joseph Strutt who first
thrust upon the world, in his often quoted "Sports and Pastimes of the
English People," certain misleading blunders concerning our work and
its author. Blaine, coming next, adding thereto, was followed little
more than a decade later by "Cecil," author of an equally much quoted
book, "Records of the Chase." In it, when speaking of the "Master of
Game," he says that he has "no doubt that it is the production of
Edmund de Langley," thus ascribing it to the father instead of to the
son. Following "Cecil's" untrustworthy lead, Jesse, Lord Wilton, Vero
Shaw, Dalziel, Wynn, the author of the chapter on old hunting in the
Badminton Library volume on Hunting, and many other writers copied
blindly these mistakes.
Five years ago the present editors published in a large folio volume
the first edition of the "Master of Game" in a limited and expensive
form. It contained side by side with the ancient text a modernised
version, extended biographical accounts of Edward of York and of
Gaston de Foix (both personalities of singular historical and human
interest), a detailed bibliography of the existing mediæval hunting
literature up to the end of the sixteenth century, a glossary, and a
very much longer appendix than it was possible to insert in the
present volume, which, in order to make it conform to the series of
which it forms part, had to be cut down to about one-sixth of the
first edition. A similar fate had to befall the illustrations, which
had to be reduced materially both in number and size. We would
therefore invite the reader whose interest in the subject may possibly
be aroused by the present pages, to glance at the perhaps
formidable-looking pages of the first edition, with its facsimile
photogravure reproductions of the best French and English
illuminations to be found in fifteenth century hunting literature.
In conclusion, I desire to repeat also in this place the expression of
my thanks to the authorities of the British Museum--to Dr. G. F.
Warner and Mr. I. H. Jeayes in particular--to the heads of the
Bodleian Library, the _Bibliothèque Nationale_, the Mazarin and the
Arsenal Libraries in Paris, the Duc d'Aumale's Library at Chantilly,
the _Bibliothèque Royale_ at Brussels, the _Königliche Bibliotheken_
in Munich and Dresden, the _Kaiserliche und Königliche Haus, Hof and
Staats Archiv_, and the _K. and K. Hof Bibliothek_ in Vienna, to Dr.
F. J. Furnivall, Mr. J. E. Harting, Mr. T. Fitzroy Fenwick of
Cheltenham, and to express my indebtedness to the late Sir Henry
Dryden, Bt., of Canons Ashby, for his kind assistance in my research
work.
To one person more than to any other my grateful acknowledgment is
due, namely to Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States,
who, notwithstanding the press of official duties, has found time to
write the interesting _Foreword_. A conscientious historian of his own
great country, as well as one of its keenest sportsmen, President
Roosevelt's qualifications for this kindly office may be described as
those of a modern Master of Game. No more competent writer could have
been selected to introduce to his countrymen a work that illustrates
the spirit which animated our common forbears five centuries ago,
their characteristic devotion to the chase, no less than their
intimate acquaintance with the habits and "nature" of the wild game
they pursued: all attributes worthy of some study by the reading
sportsmen of the twentieth century, who, as I show, have hitherto
neglected the study of English Venery. It was at first intended to
print this _Foreword_ only in the American Edition, but it soon became
evident that this would give to it an advantage which readers in this
country would have some reason to complain of, so it was inserted also
in the English Edition, and from it taken over into the present one.
[Illustration: Signature William A. Baillie-Grohman]
LONDON, _March 3, 1909_.
FOREWORD
TO THE FIRST EDITION
During the century that has just closed Englishmen have stood foremost
in all branches of sport, at least so far as the chase has been
carried on by those who have not followed it as a profession. Here and
there in the world whole populations have remained hunters, to whom
the chase was part of their regular work--delightful and adventurous,
but still work. Such were the American backwoodsmen and their
successors of the great plains and the Rocky Mountains; such were the
South African Boers; and the mountaineers of Tyrol, if not coming
exactly within this class, yet treated the chase both as a sport and a
profession. But disregarding these wild and virile populations, and
considering only the hunter who hunts for the sake of the hunting, it
must be said of the Englishman that he stood pre-eminent throughout
the nineteenth century as a sportsman for sport's sake. Not only was
fox-hunting a national pastime, but in every quarter of the globe
Englishmen predominated among the adventurous spirits who combined the
chase of big game with bold exploration of the unknown. The icy polar
seas, the steaming equatorial forests, the waterless tropical deserts,
the vast plains of wind-rippled grass, the wooded northern wilderness,
the stupendous mountain masses of the Andes and the Himalayas--in
short, all regions, however frowning and desolate, were penetrated by
the restless English in their eager quest for big game. Not content
with the sport afforded by the rifle, whether ahorse or afoot, the
English in India developed the use of the spear and in Ceylon the use
of the knife as the legitimate weapons with which to assail the
dangerous quarry of the jungle and the plain. There were hunters of
other nationalities, of course--Americans, Germans, Frenchmen; but the
English were the most numerous of those whose exploits were best worth
recounting, and there was among them a larger proportion of men gifted
with the power of narration. Naturally under such circumstances a
library of nineteenth century hunting must be mainly one of English
authors.
All this was widely different in the preceding centuries. From the
Middle Ages to the period of the French Revolution hunting was carried
on with keener zest in continental Europe than in England; and the
literature of the chase was far richer in the French, and even in the
German, tongues than in the English.
The Romans, unlike the Greeks, and still more unlike those mighty
hunters of old, the Assyrians, cared little for the chase; but the
white-skinned, fair-haired, blue-eyed barbarians, who, out of the
wreck of the Roman Empire, carved the States from which sprang modern
Europe, were passionately devoted to hunting. Game of many kinds then
swarmed in the cold, wet forests which covered so large a portion of
Europe. The kings and nobles, and the freemen generally, of the
regions which now make France and Germany, followed not only the wolf,
boar, and stag--the last named the favourite quarry of the hunter of
the Middle Ages--but the bear, the bison--which still lingers in the
Caucasus and in one Lithuanian preserve of the Czar--and the aurochs,
the huge wild ox--the _Urus_ of Cæsar--which has now vanished from the
world. In the Nibelungen Lied, when Siegfried's feats of hunting are
described, it is specified that he slew both the bear and the elk, the
bison and the aurochs. One of the early Burgundian kings was killed
while hunting the bison; and Charlemagne was not only passionately
devoted to the chase of these huge wild cattle, but it is said prized
the prowess shown therein by one of his stalwart daughters.
By the fourteenth century, when the Count of Foix wrote, the aurochs
was practically or entirely extinct, and the bison had retreated
eastwards, where for more than three centuries it held its own in the
gloomy morasses of the plain south-east of the Baltic. In western
Europe the game was then the same in kind that it is now, although all
the larger species were very much more plentiful, the roebuck being
perhaps the only one of the wild animals that has since increased in
numbers. With a few exceptions, such as the Emperor Maximilian, the
kings and great lords of the Middle Ages were not particularly fond of
chamois and ibex hunting; it was reserved for Victor Emmanuel to be
the first sovereign with whom shooting the now almost vanished ibex
was a favourite pastime.
Eager though the early Norman and Plantagenet kings and nobles of
England were in the chase, especially of the red deer, in France and
Germany the passion for the sport was still greater. In the end, on
the Continent the chase became for the upper classes less a pleasure
than an obsession, and it was carried to a fantastic degree. Many of
them followed it with brutal indifference to the rights of the
peasantry and to the utter neglect of all the serious affairs of life.
During the disastrous period of the Thirty Years War, the Elector of
Saxony spent most of his time in slaughtering unheard-of numbers of
red deer; if he had devoted his days and his treasure to the urgent
contemporary problems of statecraft and warcraft he would have ranked
more nearly with Gustavus Adolphus and Wallenstein, and would have
stood better at the bar of history. Louis XVI. was also devoted to the
chase in its tamer forms, and was shooting at driven game when the
Paris mob swarmed out to take possession of his person. The great
lords, with whom love of hunting had become a disease, not merely made
of game-preserving a grievous burden for the people, but also followed
the chase in ways which made scant demands upon the hardier qualities
either of mind or of body. Such debased sport was contemptible then;
and it is contemptible now. Luxurious and effeminate artificiality,
and the absence of all demands for the hardy virtues, rob any pastime
of all title to regard. Shooting at driven game on occasions when the
day's sport includes elaborate feasts in tents on a store of good
things brought in waggons or on the backs of sumpter mules, while the
sport itself makes no demand upon the prowess of the so-called
sportsman, is but a dismal parody upon the stern hunting life in which
the man trusts to his own keen eye, stout thews, and heart of steel
for success and safety in the wild warfare waged against wild nature.
Neither of the two authors now under consideration comes in this
undesirable class. Both were mighty men with their hands, terrible in
battle, of imposing presence and turbulent spirit. Both were the
patrons of art and letters, and both were cultivated in the learning
of the day. For each of them the chase stood as a hardy and vigorous
pastime of the kind which makes a people great. The one was Count
Gaston de Foix, author of the most famous of mediæval hunting-books, a
mighty lord and mighty hunter, as well as statesman and warrior. The
other was Edward, second Duke of York, who at Agincourt "died
victorious." He translated into English a large portion of Gaston de
Foix's _La Chasse_, adding to it five original chapters. He called his
book "The Master of Game."
Gaston's book is better known as _Gaston Ph[oe]bus_, the nickname of
the author which Froissart has handed down. He treats not only of the
animals of France, but of the ibex, the chamois, and the reindeer,
which he hunted in foreign lands. "The Master of Game" is the oldest
book on hunting in the English language. The original chapters are
particularly interesting because of the light they throw upon English
hunting customs in the time of the Plantagenets. The book has never
hitherto been published. Nineteen ancient manuscript copies are known;
of the three best extant two are on the shelves of the Bloomsbury
treasure house, the other in the Bodleian Library. Like others of the
famous old authors on venery, both the Count of Foix and the Duke of
York show an astonishing familiarity with the habits, nature, and
chase of their quarry. Both men, like others of their kind among their
contemporaries, made of the chase not only an absorbing sport but
almost the sole occupation of their leisure hours. They passed their
days in the forest and were masters of woodcraft. Game abounded, and
not only the chase but the killing of the quarry was a matter of
intense excitement and an exacting test of personal prowess, for the
boar, or the bear, or hart at bay was slain at close quarters with the
spear or long knife.
"The Master of Game" is not only of interest to the sportsman, but
also to the naturalist, because of its quaint accounts of the "nature"
of the various animals; to the philologist because of the old English
hunting terms and the excellent translations of the chapters taken
from the French; and to the lover of art because of the beautiful
illustrations, with all their detail of costume, of hunting
accoutrements, and of ceremonies of "la grande venerie"--which are
here reproduced in facsimile from one of the best extant French
manuscripts of the early fifteenth century. The translator has left
out the chapters on trapping and snaring of wild beasts which were
contained in the original, the hunting with running hounds being the
typical and most esteemed form of the sport. Gaston Ph[oe]bus's _La
Chasse_ was written just over a century before the discovery of
America; "The Master of Game" some fifteen or twenty years later. The
former has been reprinted many times. Mr. Baillie-Grohman in
reproducing (for the first time) the latter in such beautiful form has
rendered a real service to all lovers of sport, of nature, and of
books--and no one can get the highest enjoyment out of sport unless he
can live over again in the library the keen pleasure he experienced in
the wilderness.
* * * * *
In modern life big-game hunting has assumed many widely varied forms.
There are still remote regions of the earth in which the traveller
must depend upon his prowess as a hunter for his subsistence, and here
and there the foremost settlers of new country still war against the
game as it has been warred against by their like since time primeval.
But over most of the earth such conditions have passed away for ever.
Even in Africa game preserving on a gigantic scale has begun. Such
game preserving may be of two kinds. In one the individual landed
proprietor, or a group of such individuals, erect and maintain a
private game preserve, the game being their property just as much as
domestic animals. Such preserves often fill a useful purpose, and if
managed intelligently and with a sense of public spirit and due
regard for the interests and feelings of others, may do much good,
even in the most democratic community. But wherever the population is
sufficiently advanced in intelligence and character, a far preferable
and more democratic way of preserving the game is by a system of
public preserves, of protected nurseries and breeding-grounds, while
the laws define the conditions under which all alike may shoot the
game and the restrictions under which all alike must enjoy the
privilege. It is in this way that the wild creatures of the forest and
the mountain can best and most permanently be preserved. Even in the
United States the enactment and observance of such laws has brought
about a marked increase in the game of certain localities, as, for
instance, New England, during the past thirty years; while in the
Yellowstone Park the elk, deer, antelope, and mountain sheep, and,
strangest of all, the bear, are not merely preserved in all their wild
freedom, but, by living unmolested, have grown to show a confidence in
man and a tameness in his presence such as elsewhere can be found only
in regions where he has been hitherto unknown.
The chase is the best of all national pastimes, and this none the less
because, like every other pastime, it is a mere source of weakness if
carried on in an unhealthy manner, or to an excessive degree, or under
over-artificial conditions. Every vigorous game, from football to
polo, if allowed to become more than a game, and if serious work is
sacrificed to its enjoyment, is of course noxious. From the days when
Trajan in his letters to Pliny spoke with such hearty contempt of the
Greek over-devotion to athletics, every keen thinker has realised that
vigorous sports are only good in their proper place. But in their
proper place they are very good indeed. The conditions of modern life
are highly artificial, and too often tend to a softening of fibre,
physical and moral. It is a good thing for a man to be forced to show
self-reliance, resourcefulness in emergency, willingness to endure
fatigue and hunger, and at need to face risk. Hunting is praiseworthy
very much in proportion as it tends to develop these qualities. Mr.
Baillie-Grohman, to whom most English-speaking lovers of sport owe
their chief knowledge of the feats in bygone time of the great hunters
of continental Europe, has himself followed in its most manly forms
this, the manliest of sports. He has hunted the bear, the wapiti, and
the mountain ram in the wildest regions of the Rockies, and, also by
fair stalking, the chamois and the red deer in the Alps. Whoever
habitually follows mountain game in such fashion must necessarily
develop qualities which it is a good thing for any nation to see
brought out in its sons. Such sport is as far removed as possible from
that in which the main object is to make huge bags at small cost of
effort, and with the maximum of ease, no good quality save
marksmanship being required. Laying stress upon the mere quantity of
game killed, and the publication of the record of slaughter, are sure
signs of unhealthy decadence in sportsmanship. As far as possible the
true hunter, the true lover of big game and of life in the wilderness,
must be ever ready to show his own power to shift for himself. The
greater his dependence upon others for his sport the less he deserves
to take high rank in the brotherhood of rifle, horse, and hound. There
was a very attractive side to the hunting of the great mediæval lords,
carried on with an elaborate equipment and stately ceremonial,
especially as there was an element of danger in coming to close
quarters with the quarry at bay; but after all, no form of hunting has
ever surpassed in attractiveness the life of the wilderness wanderer
of our own time--the man who with simple equipment, and trusting to
his own qualities of head, heart, and hand, has penetrated to the
uttermost regions of the earth, and single-handed slain alike the
wariest and the grimmest of the creatures of the waste.
THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
THE WHITE HOUSE,
_February 15, 1904_.
[Illustration: _GASTON PH[OE]BUS_ SURROUNDED BY HUNTSMEN AND HOUNDS
(From MS. f. fr. 616, _Bib. Nat._, Paris)]
THE MASTER OF GAME
CHAPTER I
THE PROLOGUE
_To the honour and reverence of you my right worshipful and dread Lord
Henry by the grace of God eldest son and heir unto the high excellent
and Christian Prince Henry IV. by the aforesaid grace King of England
and of France, Prince of Wales, Duke of Guienne of Lancaster and of
Cornwall, and Earl of Chester._
_I your own in every humble wise have me ventured to make this little
simple book which I recommend and submit to your noble and wise
correction, which book if it pleaseth your aforesaid Lordship shall be
named and called MASTER OF GAME. And for this cause: for the matter
that this book treateth of what in every season of the year is most
durable, and to my thinking to every gentle heart most disportful of
all games, that is to say hunting. For though it be that hawking with
gentle hounds and hawks for the heron and the river be noble and
commendable, it lasteth seldom at the most more than half a year. For
though men find from May unto Lammas_ (August 1st) _game enough to
hawk at, no one will find hawks to hawk with.[1] But as of hunting
there is no season of all the year, that game may not be found in
every good country, also hounds ready to chase it. And since this book
shall be all of hunting, which is so noble a game, and lasting through
all the year of divers beasts that grow according to the season for
the gladdening of man, I think I may well call it MASTER OF GAME._
_And though it be so my dear Lord, that many could better have meddled
with this matter and also more ably than I, yet there be two things
that have principally emboldened and caused me to take this work in
hand. The first is trust of your noble correction, to which as before
is said, I submit this little and simple book. The second is that
though I be unworthy, I am Master of this Game with that noble prince
your Father our all dear sovereign and liege Lord aforesaid. And as I
would not that his hunters nor yours that now be or that should come
hereafter did not know the perfection of this art, I shall leave for
these this simple memorial, for as Chaucer saith in his prologue of
"The 25[2] Good Women": "By writing have men mind of things passed,
for writing is the key of all good remembrance."_
[1] As the hawks would be mewing and unfit to fly.
[2] The Shirley MS. in the British Museum has "XV."
And first I will begin by describing the nature of the hare,[3]
secondly of the nature of the hart, thirdly of the buck and of his
nature, fourthly of the roe and of his nature, fifthly of the wild
boar and of his nature, sixthly of the wolf and of his nature,
seventhly of the fox and of his nature, eighthly of the badger and of
his nature, ninthly of the cat and of his nature, tenthly of the
marten and his nature, eleventhly of the otter and of his nature. Now
have I rehearsed how I will in this little book describe the nature of
these aforesaid beasts of venery and of chace, and therefore will I
name the hounds the which I will describe hereafter, both of their
nature and conditions. And first I will begin with raches (running
hounds)[4] and their nature, and then greyhounds and their nature, and
then alaunts and their nature, and then spaniels and their nature, and
then mastiffs that men call curs and their nature, and then of small
curs that come to be terriers and their nature, and then I shall
devise and tell the sicknesses of hounds and their diseases. And
furthermore I will describe what qualities and manners a good hunter
should have, and of what parts he should be, and after that I will
describe the manner and shape of the kennel, and how it should be
environed and arrayed. Also I will describe of what fashion a hunter's
horn should be driven, and how the couplings should be made for the
raches and of what length. Furthermore I will prove by sundry reasons
in this little prologue, that the life of no man that useth gentle
game and disport be less displeasable unto God than the life of a
perfect and skilful hunter, or from which more good cometh. The first
reason is that hunting causeth a man to eschew the seven deadly sins.
Secondly men are better when riding, more just and more understanding,
and more alert and more at ease and more undertaking, and better
knowing of all countries and all passages; in short and long all good
customs and manners cometh thereof, and the health of man and of his
soul. For he that fleeth the seven deadly sins as we believe, he shall
be saved, therefore a good hunter shall be saved, and in this world
have joy enough and of gladness and of solace, so that he keep himself
from two things. One is that he leave not the knowledge nor the
service of God, from whom all good cometh, for his hunting. The second
that he lose not the service of his master for his hunting, nor his
own duties which might profit him most. Now shall I prove how a hunter
may not fall into any of the seven deadly sins. When a man is idle and
reckless without work, and be not occupied in doing some thing, he
abides in his bed or in his chamber, a thing which draweth men to
imaginations of fleshly lust and pleasure. For such men have no wish
but always to abide in one place, and think in pride, or in avarice,
or in wrath, or in sloth, or in gluttony, or in lechery, or in envy.
For the imagination of men rather turns to evil than to good, for the
three enemies which mankind hath, are the devil, the world and the
flesh, and this is proved enough.
[3] Gaston de Foix has a different sequence, putting the hart first
and the hare sixth, and having four animals more, namely, the
reindeer, the chamois (including ibex), the bear and the rabbit, while
the "Master of Game" has one animal, the Marten, of which Gaston de
Foix does not speak.
[4] Gaston de Foix follows a different sequence, commencing with
alaunts, then greyhounds, raches, spaniels, and says "fifthly I will
speak of all kinds of mongrel dogs, such as come from mastiffs and
alaunts, from greyhounds and running hounds, and other such."
Nevertheless there be many other reasons which are too long to tell,
and also every man that hath good reason knoweth well that idleness is
the foundation of all evil imaginations. Now shall I prove how
imagination is lord and master of all works, good or evil, that man's
body or his limbs do. You know well, good or evil works small or great
never were done but that beforehand they were imagined or thought of.
Now shall you prove how imagination is the mistress of all deeds, for
imagination biddeth a man do good or evil works, whichever it be, as
before is said. And if a man notwithstanding that he were wise should
imagine always that he were a fool, or that he hath other sickness, it
would be so, for since he would think steadfastly that he were a fool,
he would do foolish deeds as his imagination would command, and he
would believe it steadfastly. Wherefore methinks I have proved enough
of imagination, notwithstanding that there be many other reasons the
which I leave to avoid long writing. Every man that hath good sense
knoweth well that this is the truth.
Now I will prove how a good hunter may not be idle, and in dreaming
may not have any evil imaginations nor afterwards any evil works. For
the day before he goes out to his office, the night before he shall
lay him down in his bed, and shall not think but for to sleep, and do
his office well and busily, as a good hunter should. And he shall have
nothing to do, but think about all that which he has been ordered to
do. And he is not idle, for he has enough to do to think about rising
early and to do his office without thinking of sins or of evil deeds.
And early in the dawning of the day he must be up for to go unto his
quest, _that in English is called searching_, well and busily, for as
I shall say more explicitly hereafter, when I shall speak of how men
shall quest and search to harbour the hart. And in so doing he shall
not be idle, for he is always busy. And when he shall come again to
the assembly or meet, then he hath most to do, for he must order his
finders and relays for to move the hart, and uncouple his hounds. With
that he cannot be idle, for he need think of nothing but to do his
office, and when he hath uncoupled, yet is he less idle, and he should
think less of any sins, for he hath enough to do to ride _or to foot
it well_ with his hounds and to be always near them and to hue or rout
well, and blow well, and to look whereafter he hunteth, and which
hounds are _vanchasers and parfiters_,[5] and redress and bring his
hounds on the right line again when they are at fault[6] or hunting
rascal.[7] And when the hart is dead or what other chase he was
hunting, then is he less idle, for he hath enough to do to think how
to undo the hart in his manner and to raise that which appertaineth[8]
to him, and well to do his curée.[9] And he should look how many of
his hounds are missing of those that he brought to the wood in the
morning, and he should search for them, and couple them up. And when
he has come home, should he less think to do evil, for he hath enough
to do to think of his supper, and to ease himself and his horse, and
to sleep, and to take his rest, for he is weary, and to dry himself of
the dew or peradventure of the rain. And therefore I say that all the
time of the hunter is without idleness and without evil thoughts, and
without evil works of sin, for as I have said idleness is the
foundation of all vices and sins. And the hunter may not be idle if he
would fill his office aright, and also he can have no other thoughts,
for he has enough to do to think and imagine of his office, the which
is no little charge, for whoso will do it well and busily, especially
if they love hounds and their office.
[5] The hounds that came in the first relay (van) and those in the
subsequent relays. See Appendix: Relays.
[6] Diverted or off the line.
[7] Chasing small or lean deer. See Appendix: Hart.
[8] To take those parts of the deer which fell to him by custom.
[9] Curée: The ceremony of giving the hounds their reward on the skin
of the animal they have chased. See Appendix: Curée.
Wherefore I say that such an hunter is not idle, he can have no evil
thoughts, nor can he do evil works, wherefore he must go into
paradise.[10] For by many other reasons which are too long to write
can I prove these things, but it sufficeth that every man that hath
good sense knoweth well that I speak the real truth.
[10] Gaston de Foix in the French parent work puts it even more
forcefully; he says: "tout droit en paradis." See Lavallée's ed. 1854.
Now shall I prove how hunters live in this world more joyfully than
any other men. For when the hunter riseth in the morning, and he sees
a sweet and fair morn and clear weather and bright, and he heareth
the song of the small birds, the which sing so sweetly with great
melody and full of love, each in it's own language in the best wise
that it can according that it learneth of it's own kind. And when the
sun is arisen, he shall see fresh dew upon the small twigs and
grasses, and the sun by his virtue shall make them shine. And that is
great joy and liking to the hunter's heart. After when he shall go to
his quest or searching, he shall see or meet anon with the hart
without great seeking, and shall harbour[11] him well and readily
within a little compass. It is great joy and liking to the hunter. And
after when he shall come to the assembly or gathering, and he shall
report before the Lord and his company that which he hath seen with
his eyes, or by scantilon (measure) of the trace (slot) which he ought
always of right to take, or by the fumes[12] (excrements) that he
shall put in his horn or in his lap. And every man shall say: Lo, here
is a great hart and a deer of high meating or pasturing; go we and
move him; the which things I shall declare hereafter, then can one say
that the hunter has great joy. When he beginneth to hunt and he hath
hunted but a little and he shall hear or see the hart start before him
and shall well know that it is the right one, and his hounds that
shall this day be finders, shall come to the lair (bed), or to the
fues (track), and shall there be uncoupled without any be left
coupled, and they shall all run well and hunt, then hath the hunter
great joy and great pleasure. Afterwards he leapeth on horseback, _if
he be of that estate, and else on foot_ with great haste to follow his
hounds. And in case peradventure the hounds shall have gone far from
where he uncoupled, he seeketh some advantage to get in front of his
hounds. And then shall he see the hart pass before him, and shall
holloa and rout mightily, and he shall see which hound come in the
van-chase, and in the middle, and which are parfitours,[13] according
to the order in which they shall come. And when all the hounds have
passed before him then shall he ride after them and shall rout and
blow as loud as he may with great joy and great pleasure, and I assure
you he thinketh of no other sin or of no other evil. And when the hart
be overcome and shall be at bay he shall have pleasure. And after,
when the hart is spayed[14] and dead, he undoeth him and maketh his
curée and enquireth or rewardeth his hounds, and so he shall have
great pleasure, and when he cometh home he cometh joyfully, for his
lord hath given him to drink of his good wine at the curée, and when
he has come home he shall doff his clothes and his shoes and his hose,
and he shall wash his thighs and his legs, and peradventure all his
body. And in the meanwhile he shall order well his supper, with
_wortes_ (roots) _and of the neck_ of the hart and of other good
meats, and good wine _or ale_. And when he hath well eaten and drunk
he shall be glad and well, and well at his ease. And then shall he
take the air in the evening of the night, for the great heat that he
hath had. And then he shall go and drink and lie in his bed in fair
fresh clothes, and shall sleep well and steadfastly all the night
without any evil thoughts of any sins, wherefore I say that hunters go
into Paradise when they die, and live in this world more joyfully than
any other men. Yet I will prove to you how hunters live longer than
any other men, for as Hippocras the doctor telleth: "full repletion of
meat slayeth more men than any sword or knife." They eat and drink
less than any other men of this world, for in the morning at the
assembly they eat a little, and if they eat well at supper, they will
by the morning have corrected their nature, for then they have eaten
but little, and their nature will not be prevented from doing her
digestion, whereby no wicked humours or superfluities may be
engendered. And always, when a man is sick, men diet him and give him
to drink water made of sugar and tysane and of such things for two or
three days to put down evil humours and his superfluities, and also
make him void (purge). But for a hunter one need not do so, for he may
have no repletion on account of the little meat, and by the travail
that he hath. And, supposing that which can not be, and that he were
full of wicked humours, yet men know well that the best way to
terminate sickness that can be is to sweat. And when the hunters do
their office on horseback or on foot they sweat often, then if they
have any evil in them, it must (come) away in the sweating; so that he
keep from cold after the heat. Therefore it seemeth to me I have
proved enough. Leeches ordain for a sick man little meat and sweating
for the terminating and healing of all things. And since hunters eat
little and sweat always, they should live long and in health. Men
desire in this world to live long in health and in joy, and after
death the health of the soul. And hunters have all these things.
Therefore be ye all hunters and ye shall do as wise men. Wherefore I
counsel to all manner of folk of what estate or condition that they
be, that they love hounds and hunting and the pleasure of hunting
beasts of one kind or another, or hawking. For to be idle and to have
no pleasure in either hounds or hawks is no good token. _For as saith
in his book Ph[oe]bus the Earl of Foix that noble hunter_, he saw
never a good man that had not pleasure in some of these things, were
he ever so great and rich. For if he had need to go to war he would
not know what war is, for he would not be accustomed to travail, and
so another man would have to do that which he should. For men say in
old saws: "The lord is worth what his lands are worth."[15] _And also
he saith in the aforesaid book_, that he never saw a man that loved
the work and pleasure of hounds and hawks, that had not many good
qualities in him; for that comes to him of great nobleness and
gentleness of heart of whatever estate the man may be, whether he be a
great lord, or a little one, or a poor man or a rich one.
[11] Trace the deer to its lair.
[12] See Appendix: Excrements.
[13] See Appendix: Relays.
[14] Despatched with a sword or knife. See Appendix: Spay.
[15] Gaston de Foix says: "Tant vaut seigneur tant vaut sa gent et sa
terre," p. 9.