Peter Hawker

Instructions to Young Sportsmen in All that Relates to Guns and Shooting

1814. Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 11th edition, 1859.

I sent a dozen French ducks to the Regent's Park; and, three winters ago, I observed that they had there decoyed at least thirty wildfowl: wigeon - tufted ducks - and dunbirds. This was of course a great novelty in the very smoke of London. But on my return to town, after the following winter, I do not remember to have seen any. Perhaps the skating may have driven the wild birds off or perhaps the following winter was too severe for them to remain in fresh water

In his Preface the author tells us that 'the original edition, which led to the publication of the following pages, was hastily written, and printed in the year 1814, at the particular request of some sporting friends of the Author.' He had retired from the army the previous year after being severely wounded in one of the Peninsular War campaigns. A keen musician as well as a sportsman, he later studied harmony and composition at a London academy and wrote several pieces himself.

The only note I ever heard from the wild swan in winter is his well-known hoop. But, one summer's evening I was amused with watching and listening to a domesticated one, as he swam up and down the water in the Regent's Park. He turned [sic] up a sort of melody, made with two notes, C and the minor third (E flat), and kept working his head as if delighted with his own performance