PREFACE.
Towhat trifles do some men owe a perpetuation of their "famous memory." There is Nimrod, for instance, not but what he may have had other andgreatermerits, yet he is best known as a "mighty hunter," and one who "woreboots;" now, allowing the relation to be true, and that hedidhunt, and hedidwear boots, is there anything extraordinary attaching to either, unless indeed, it could be proved that he hadwooden legs, or that he was capable of sitting on the backs of two or more animals at one time; and if such were not the case, the simple fact of itself was never worth recording; as well may it be said, a thousand years hence, that LLOYDwas a great Hatmaker, and lived in a great City.
But possibly the hunting system of thisold gentlemandiffered materially from the pastime of our modernTally-ho's, and instead of running afterhares,snipes, andconies, Nimrod's sport was on thefield of battle; in whose days the most rational idea is, that all wasgamewhich caused pursuits, and all pursuitshunting: If it were not so, and his majesty's capability only extended to theridingupon ahorse's back, there is not a butcher's boy, in any country village betweenBerwickandSt. Ives, that would not have ridden Nimrod'srumpoff. But it may be asked by those whose inclinations and patience shall lead them to hunt through the following pages, whether this is what it professes to be, aPreface, which is supposed to explain, or prepare the mind for something to come; the answer to which is as follows: A horse that will notgowithout another being led before him, is not worthriding, and if what is herein written requires a Preface to render itintelligible, it is not worth thereading.
May, 1819.