THE SHOOTING MAN'S BEDSIDE BOOK: COMPILED BY "BB".

(1948) 1996 second edition reprint. 8vo (160 x 240mm). Ppxii,212. B/w illustrations by D.J. Watkins-Pitchford, pale brown end-papers. Brown boards, spine titled in gilt.

An anthology of classic sport and natural history. This is a selection from the best of the original edition, for the first time in Britain in a larger format. "I have for many years felt the need of a Shooting Man's Bedside Book which contained, not technical instructions 'how to shoot' or 'how to breed' pheasants and manage a shoot, but which was largely composed of the best descriptive writing on the sport. What interests me (and I think I am an average person) are the actual experiences of shooting men in the field, as long as those accounts are realistic and couched in good English. ...Such have I tried to make this volume. But ...I have included a certain amount of useful information, shooting records, ballistics, etc., which are necessary and would be demanded if they were omitted. In any case they serve as pastry to what I hope will prove an interesting and palatable pie." B.B. includes a disproportionate amount of wildfowling, for its wildness sake, and, "It is also the most unpopular form of shooting, and I never cease to give thanks for this fact." The articles are divided so - boyhood memories - a mixed bag - some record bags of game - the great bustard - gun dogs - gamekeepers and poachers - deer stalking - wildfowling - 'let us be always out of doors'. Contributors include; 'BB', Richard Jefferies, W.H. Hudson, J.C. Tregarthen, H. Hesketh-Prichard, John Colquhoun, Charles St. John, Abel Chapman, Sir Hugh Gladstone, Llewellyn Powys, A. Stuart-Wortley, Eric Hosking, Patrick Chalmers, Hugh Wormald, C. McLean, J. Wentworth Day, R.D. Irwin, F. Newman, R. Deterding, J. Arthur Gibbs, Scrope, Noel Sedgwick, Lord Dorchester, H. Frank Wallace, J.G. Millais, Peter Scott, Colonel Peter Hawker, John Masefield, 'Paddy Flynn', C.T. Dalgetty, Negley Farson, Eric Parker, Gilbert White, Anon, Wilfred Scawen Blunt, Robert Louis Stevenson.