The art and practice of hawking - Modern Prepper

HISTORY AND LITERATURE 7
facile princeps. The late Rev. W. Willemot did some good work
with falcons at gulls before this branch of the sport was taken
up by Mr. St. Quintin ; and the late Mr. T. J.
Mann, of Hyde
Hall, Sawbridgeworth, was successful with rooks and partridges
in Cambridgeshire. Probably the most splendid establishment of
hawks in England during the last forty years was that of the
late Maharajah Dhuleep Singh at Elvedon. Falconry in India
has been extensively practised by many English officers
quartered in that part of the world, and notably by General
Griffiths, and more lately by Captain S. Biddulph, who has
probably killed a greater variety of wild quarry than any
European now living, and whose portraits of trained hawks are
above all praise. Colonel Delme Radcliffe, Colonel Brooksbank,
Colonel Watson, Captain Crabbe, the late Sir Henry
Boynton, Mr. A. W. Reed, Major Anne, and Mr. Arthur Newall,
are all enthusiastic and successful falconers. Colonel Ayshford
Sanford, Major C. W. Thompson, of the 7th Dragoon Guards,
and the writer of these pages, have had considerable success
with merlins.
In France, the names of MM. Barachin, Sourbets, Arbel, and
Belvallette for the short-winged hawks, and MM. Pichot and
Paul Gervais for other kinds, require honourable notice ;
and in
Russia that of the late M. Constantine Haller will always be
remembered. It is not many years since the latter originated
and carried into effect the scheme of an International Hawking
Congress, to be held near St. Petersburg. This was attended by
many Asiatic falconers, and one from England. But the impossibility
of finding suitable wild quarry in accessible places
sadly interfered with the success of the meeting ;
and the result
was not proportionate to the great trouble of organising it.
It will naturally be supposed that a sport so fashionable, so
prevalent, and so difficult as falconry, has been discussed at
length in many writings and in many languages. For the very
extensive literature treating of its art and practice in different
parts of the world, the reader is referred to Mr. Harting's Bibliotheca
Accipitraria, already mentioned, in which a full account is
given of no less than three hundred and seventy-eight works on
the subject. Of these, eighty-two are in English, and eighty-four
in French. The German publications number forty-six, the
Italian thirty-eight, the Japanese fourteen, and there are several
in Spanish, Russian, Latin, Greek, and Chinese.
The most notable works, besides those already mentioned,
are the Latin treatise written by the Emperor Frederick II. ; The
Boke of St. Albans, by Dame Juliana Berners, i486 ;
the volumes