maturity of muscle and fatness. The improvement of the South Down breed began about the period of the American war, but it received its chief impulse with the commencement of the contest with the French Republic, and has continued progressive until the present time. Amongst the individuals most distinguished as the improvers of this breed was the late John Ellman. This gentleman began his important experiments about the year 1780, when he acquired possession of the farm of Glynde, near Lewes, in the county of Sussex. He remained in this farm more than fifty years, during which period he directed his attention, in an especial degree, to the improvement of the native sheep of the Downs. He pursued his system of progressive change with judgment, perseverance, and zeal; and he must be regarded as one of the most skilful and successful breeders whom this country has produced. He displayed none of the too narrow selfishness which, it is to be regretted, appeared in the proceedings of his distinguished contemporary, Mr. Bakewell. He freely communicated the details of his valuable practice, and showed himself to be entirely exempt from illiberal prejudices. He did not experience the necessity of creating, as it were, a breed, but was contented to adopt the basis which was afforded him in the one already naturalized in the Sussex Downs. He did not carry any of his principles of breeding to an extreme, but acted under the guidance of temperance and judgment. He sought for the properties of health and soundness of constitution, as well as for those of external form, and facility of fattening; and therefore he did not, like Bakewell, confine himself rigidly to the blood of his own stock, but resorted to others, that he might infuse fresh vigour into his flocks, and prevent them from becoming too delicate. His aim, in short, was the really useful; and, though he reaped the due reward of his enterprise and skill, it was never obtained by arts of any kind, by deception, or useless ostentation. His character throughout was one of sincerity and manly simplicity; and it is pleasing to add, that he closed a long and honourable life respected and regretted by all that came under the influence of his social virtues. He died in 1832, having entered into his eightieth year." WILD HOG. "The Wild Hog, Sus aper, is the inhabitant of the temperate and warmer parts of the Old Continent and its islands. His colour varies with age, and in some cases with climate, but it is usually a dusky brown, with black spots and streaks. His skin is covered with coarse hairs or bristles, but with a soft wool intermixed, and with coarser and longer bristles upon the neck and spine, which he erects when in anger. He is a very bold and powerful creature, and becomes more fierce and indocile with age. He feeds on herbs, and delights in roots, which his nice sense of smell and touch enables him to find beneath the surface. He feeds, too, on animal substances, as worms and larvæ, which he finds under ground, on the eggs of birds, and on the young of animals, which he comes upon in his progress, and even on snakes, which, though venomous, he attacks with impunity. He eats, too, of carrion, but very rarely, and perhaps only when pressed by hunger. Like other hoofed animals, he is unfitted to capture animals that secure themselves by flight. He dwells in moist and shady places, which he quits in search of food when the shades of evening fall, and he employs the night in search of food, grubbing up the ground in long ridges. He is swift of foot, keeping pace for a time with a horse at speed. His common pace is a walk or trot, though, when urged, he passes into the gallop. He readily descends steep places, notwithstanding his bulky form. He bites with prodigious force, and inflicts desperate wounds with his sharp and crooked tusks. He quickly bleeds to death, so that he is not so tenacious of life as the bear and some other animals. "The female carries her young for four months, or sixteen weeks. She produces a litter once in the year, and in much smaller numbers than when in the domestic state. She is rarely seen with the male but in the rutting season, which, in our latitudes, is in the months of December and January. She suckles her young for several months, and retains them for a yet longer time afterwards to protect them. When assailed, she defends her offspring with surprising courage, and the young reward her cares by a long attachment. She is often seen to be followed by several families, forming a troop formidable to their assailants, and destructive by their ravages to the vineyards and cultivated fields. When the young have acquired sufficient strength to protect themselves from their enemies, they generally assume the solitary habits of the race, and dwell apart in the recesses of the forest. The male is endowed with the singular instinct of seeking to destroy his own young at the birth, as if to prevent too great an increase of the numbers of his race. The female, conscious of the danger, seeks to conceal herself for a time after the young are born. "There is something noble in the courage of this powerful and solitary creature. All his strength seems to be given him for self-defence. He injures no one, unless when disturbed in his retreat, or in the search of the food which his nature leads him to seek. He does not court a combat with enemies that thirst for his blood, but for the most seeks to secure himself by betaking himself to the nearest covert. If attacked by savage dogs, he sullenly retreats, turning often upon them, and driving them back by his formidable tusks. When wearied and tormented, and forced at length to fight for his life, he turns on his persecuters, and aims at vengeance. If struck by the spear or ball of his pursuers, he has been known to disregard all his other enemies, and single out his destroyer. When pursued by dogs, he rushes fiercely upon the foremost and strongest, maiming and killing numbers of the pack in an incredibly short time. In like manner, he dashes upon the foremost horseman, overthrowing the horse and rider in a moment. "The hunting of the wild hog has been from early times a sylvan sport, familiar to the people of Asia and Europe. The classic writers of Greece and Rome abound with allusions to the chase of this dangerous creature. Homer, the magic of whose genius carries us back through thirty centuries to the homes and feelings of the rustic warriors of his country, refers to the grisly tenant of the woods in a multitude of passages that live in the memory of every scholar. Later writers inform us, that the practice was to hunt him with large dogs, to encounter him with spears or javelins, and sometimes, it would seem, to drive him into nets or pallisades, in the manner pursued in Europe until our own times. During the middle ages, we have numerous accounts of the hunting of the wild boar. In England, the rude Anglo-Saxons brought to their new country the fondness for this sport which they had acquired in their native forests; and our chroniclers and early writers describe the arms employed, which seem to have been chiefly the boar-spear, and powerful dogs trained to the chase. The animals, however, became gradually thinned in numbers by the persecution to which they were subjected; and the Norman invaders endeavoured to protect them, by their numerous forest laws, against the encroachments of the people. A law of William I. enacts, that any one found guilty of killing a wild boar shall have his eyes put out, and other savage enactments are 'on record for preserving this and other beasts of venery. The wild hogs continued for some centuries after the Norman conquest to linger in the woods of Scotland and England, and many places in both kingdoms retain names derived from reminiscences connected with their existence, and the heraldic devices of illustrious families record the valour used in their destruction. Fitzstephen, who wrote in the latter part of the twelfth century, in the reign of Henry II., informs us, that wild boars abounded, together with wolves, wild bulls, and other game, in the great forests surrounding London; and we learn from the Scottish writers their existence in the woods of Caledon. The precise period of their disappearance in Britain has not been determined. Charles I. endeavoured to restore the race in the New Forest, but all the animals he turned loose for this purpose, were destroyed during the civil wars. The "But the forests of other countries of Europe, as of Russia, Poland, Germany, and Spain, yet contain the wild hog, along with his perpetual enemy, the wolf. He is killed by fire-arms, or destroyed by the ancient methods of the boar-spear, and pursuit of hounds. Germans, in an especial degree, have retained their fondness for this exercise; but it is solely the occupation of the lords of the soil, whose rights of chase are guarded by rigorous laws. Sometimes the animals are butchered in great numbers together; they are driven into enclosed spaces in the woods, by surrounding their places of retreat, when, as they issue forth, terrified by shouts and clamour, they are killed by fire-arms and spears. "But the most animating accounts we possess of the modern hunting of the wild boar, are from our countrymen in the East, where the gallantry and address of the youthful hunters, console us for the shedding of the blood of animals so unoffending, and so brave in their own defence. The hogs inhabit the thick jungles of the country, which men and horses cannot penetrate; but often they quit these impenetrable coverts, either driven by the periodical firing of the jungle-grass, or proceeding in search of food, into the plantations of sugar-canes, and the fields of rice, or of rhur (a kind of legume, growing from four to six feet high), which are often of great extent, or into the patches of long grasses, several feet high, which are found in these countries of rich vegetation." These extracts will be continued. THE GROWTH OF SALMON IN FRESH WATER. By William Yarrell, F.L.S., &c. &c., with Six Coloured Illustrations. London: Van Voorst, Paternoster-row. THE "Counterfeit presentments" here afforded of the queen of fishes, might draw water from mouths that fortunate experience hath made familiar with the flavour of a jowl and lobster sauce (some people prefer the accompaniment of capers, we like either, or both). It was our intention to have transferred to our pages the author's opinions upon that much mooted inquiry, the breed, seed, and generation of salmon; but we were choked off by the opening paragraph, containing the "delicate investigation" of Mr. John Shaw, of Drumlanrig, Dumfrieshire. However, to the curious in fish we recommend Mr. Yarrell's treatise; if it only promote the growth of salmon in our waters, and our bills of fare, surely it will be admitted that the Vice President of the Zoological Society "has done the state some service." FINE ARTS. THE MELTON HUNT. Painted by Francis Grant, Esq., S.A., and Engraved in the first style of Mezzotinto, by Mr. Humphrys. London Graves and Co., Pall Mall. 1841. 66 We have received a proof before letters of this splendid work, so long and so anxiously looked for it is the third historical sporting picture for which we are indebted to the genius of Mr. Grant, each a performance that does honour alike to the artist and his country. On the appearance of the "Meet of Her Majesty's Staghounds," and "The Melton Breakfast," we spoke of them both as chefs-d'œuvres of their class. The success of the first was, probably, greater than had ever before attached to any publication of its kind: in the ratio that the taste for fox-hunting excels that for the chase of the stag, we prognosticate "The Melton Hunt" will exceed the "Meet of the Royal Hounds" in éclat and popularity. In our number for July last, we gave an etching from the Melton Hunt, together with a brief sketch of its dramatis persona, which now form a pamphlet presented with each copy of the engraving. Our opinion of the general character of the work, and the master who achieved it, cannot be better expressed than in the words we applied to it at that time. The day is long passed when any lover of the fine arts, more especially of that department of them which relates to sporting, needs information upon the style, keeping, or execution of Mr. Grant's pictures. It has been well said of him, that he has very far surpassed all his predecessors in elevating a branch of the arts heretofore considered so minor, as to be consigned, almost exclusively, to inferior artists. During the century and a half in which hunting has been pursued as the peculiar sport of this land, no pictorial biography of the chase (if the term may be permitted) was essayed, till the appearance of this gentleman's 'Meet of Her Majesty's Staghounds, on Ascot Heath;' then followed The Melton Breakfast,' and now we have 'The Melton Hunt,' works that shall secure for the artist, fame, so long as taste and genius are held in estimation, or one lover of the good old English sport of fox-hunting shall be found among us." The nature of the engraving (which Mr. Humphrys has performed with a skill and talent every way worthy the master he followed) is a combination of the "line" and mezzotint style, admirably calculated to give effect to all the delicate beauties of the original. The portraits are living likenesses, and distinguished by that minuteness of characteristic keeping which forms so great a charm in all Mr. Grant's pictures. 385 TURF REGISTER. It is not thought convenient to give the details of the running at the Minor Meetings. CANTERBURY RACES. Stewards: H. Wilson, and C. M. Lushington, Esqs. THURSDAY, August 5th.-The East Kent Stakes of 5 gs. each, with 50 sovs. added; three-yearolds, 6 st. 7 lb.; four, 8 st. 3lb.; five, 8 st. 101b.; six and aged, 9 st.; mares and geldings allowed 3 lb.; horses having won once this year to carry 3 lb.; twice, 5 lb. extra, matches excepted; the winner to be sold for £300, &c.; heats, two miles (four subscribers). Mr. Hornsby's b. m. Revoke, by Camel, five years old, 8 st. 7 lb. (Hornsby) Mr. Sherard's br. c. The Major, by The Colonel, four years old, 8 st. 3 lb. 4 1 1 3 3 dr. The Barham Downs Plate of £50; weights and conditions the same as for the Sweepstakes, except that the winner was to be sold for 150 sovs., &c.; heats, two miles. Mr. Balchin's b. m. Slang, by Young Grimaldi, aged, 9 st. (Balchin) Hon. J. Sandiland's b. m. Moleskin, four years old, 8 st. 5 lb. 2 dr. The Hunters' Plate of fifty sovs., for horses that have hunted in the county of Kent during the last season, not being thorough-bred, 12 st. each; heats, two miles. Mr. Bushell's gr. g. Staring Bob, aged Mr. Barling's bk. g. Provender, five years old, half-bred, by Young Soothsayer 5 dr. FRIDAY.-The Queen's Plate of 100 gs.; three-year-olds, 8 st. 2 lb.; four, 9 st. 6 lb.; five, 10 st.; six and aged, 10 st. 3 lb.; heats, two miles. The City Plate of £50; for three-year-olds, 7 st. 1 lb. ; four, 8 st. 3 lb. ; five, 8 st. 10 lb.; six, 9st.; and aged, 9 st. 3 lb.; mares and geldings allowed 3 lb.; the winner of a Plate or Sweepstakes this year, 3 lb.; of two, 5 lb.; of three, 7 lb. extra; the winner to be sold for £123 if demanded, &c.; heats, two miles. Mr. Dockeray's b. h. Lyster, by Rowton, five years old, 8 st. 10 lb. (Butler) Lord Sondes's br. c. Lampos, three years old, 7 st. 1 lb. Mr. Hodges's gr. g. The Chelsea Snob, half-bred, three years old, 6 st. 12 lb. 3 dr. The Yeomanry Plate of £25, for horses ridden by the Non-commissioned Officers and Privates of the East Kent Yeomanry in the present year; to be ridden by persons belonging to the Corps; the Round Course, a mile and distance; 12 st. each. Stewards: T. W. Giffard, Esq., and J. Bowes, Esq., M.P. MONDAY, August 9th.-The Trial Stakes of 10 sovs. each, with 20 added; three-year-olds, 7 st. 3lb.; four, 8 st. 7 lb.; five, 9 st. 1lb.; six and aged, 9 st. 5 lb.; mares and geldings allowed 3 lb.; once round and a distance, mile and a quarter (six subscribers). Mr. Heseltine's b. m. The Shadow, by The Saddler, five years old (Heseltine) |