Entered, according to the act of Congress, in the year 1846, BY LEA & BLANCHARD, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. SHERMAN, PRINTER, ΤΟ FIELD MARSHAL HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE ALBERT OF SAXE-COBURG AND GOTHA, K.G. K.T. K.P. G.C.B. G.C.M.G. etc. etc, etc. SIR, The gracious permission to dedicate this edition to Your Royal Highness not only confers on me the greatest honour that can be granted to a British Sportsman; but also gives me the heartfelt pleasure, before I leave the field, of inscribing my humble production on Guns and Shooting to a distinguished patron of the one, and a noble example for the manly exercise of the other. I have the honour to be, SIR, Your Royal Highness's ever dutiful and obedient Servant, PETER HAWKER. ORIGINAL DEDICATION IN 1830. то HIS MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY WILLIAM THE FOURTH THIS ATTEMPT TO INSTRUCT THE RISING GENERATION IN AN ART FOR WHICH WE HAVE LONG BEEN THE FIRST NATION IN THE WORLD, AND AN EXERCISE ACKNOWLEDGED AS BEING CALCULATED TO INVIGORATE US FOR THE SERVICE OF OUR KING AND COUNTRY, ΤΟ COL. WADE HAMPTON, JR. OF LAKE WASHINGTON, MISS., FORMERLY OF COLUMBIA, S. C. SIR-I take the liberty of dedicating to you, as the most accomplished sportsman of my acquaintance, the first American edition of Col. Hawker's work on "Guns and Shooting." The high character of the book, its great reputation, both in this country and in England, and the number of editions through which it has passed, having attracted the attention of the American publishers, they confided to my care the task of adapting it to the wants of the American Sporting World. In fulfilment of this, it appeared to me that much of it was altogether unnecessary to sportsmen on this side of the Atlantic. You will see, therefore, that I have omitted many chapters contained in the original, which, being devoted to matters of a local character, could not be regarded as either useful or interesting to our countrymen generally. The space thus obtained I have filled up with a series of articles upon THE HUNTING AND SHOOTING OF NORTH AMERICA, from the pens of our most practical and scientific sportsmen. If you did not excel in all Field Sports, from deer and fox-hunting to quail-shooting and fly-fishing—indeed, if you were not "up to every thing in the ring," and "a trump" whenever coolness, sagacity, strength, or activity is required, I should hesitate in expressing the hope that this work may meet |