Note 300 — APPENDIX.

We have the authority of the most ancient record of British field spoils, called Mayster of Game, (a curious manuscript in the British Museum,) for the general use of much of the classic furniture of the chase in France and England five centuries ago. Let the reader compare the following with the Greek and Latin Cynegetica:c. iii. fol. 21. “Of the Hare, and the methods of taking her. Men slee hares with greyhoundes and with rennynghoundes by strengthe, as in Engelond; but ellis where thei slee hem with smale pocketes and wt p^rsuetes and wt smale nettis, with hare pipes and with long nettis and with smale cordes that men casten where thei mak here brekyng of the smale twygges whan thei goon to hure pasture,” &c.—“Ofc. iv. fol. 25. the Herte. Men taken hem with houndis, with greyhoundis, with nettis, and with cordes, and with other harnays; with puttes and with shott, and with other gynnes, and with strengthe, as y shal say here after,” &c. Almost all the instruments of this royal armoury, the fruits of De Langley’s extensive experience at home and abroad, and as such recorded in his hunting manual, have their counterparts in the works of Xenophon, Gratius, Oppian, and Nemesian.