Cock-Fighting
—Cock-fighting was a very general amusement up to the end of the last century. It entered into the occupations of the old and young. Schools had their cockfights. Travellers agreed with coachmen that they were to wait a night if there was a cock-fight in any town through which they passed. A battle between two cocks had five guineas staked upon it. Fifty guineas, about the year 1760, depended upon the main or odd battle. This made the decision of a “long-main” at cock-fighting an important matter. The church bells at times announced the winning of a “long-main.” Matches were sometimes so arranged as to last the week. When country gentlemen had sat long at table, and the conversation had turned upon the relative merits of their several birds, a cock-fight often resulted, as the birds in question were brought for the purpose into the dining-room.—Roberts, Social History of S. Counties of England, 1856, p. 421.
Formerly cock-fighting was practised on Shrove Tuesday to a very great extent; and in the time of King Henry VII. this diversion seems to have been practised within the precincts of the court. In a royal household account, occurs the following:—“March 2, 7 Hen. VII. Item, to Master Bray for rewards to them that brought Cokkes at Shrovetide, at Westmr. xxs.”
The earliest mention of cock-fighting in England is by FitzStephens, who died in 1191. He mentions it as one of the amusements of the Londoners, together with the game of foot-ball. He says; “Yearly at Shrove-tide the boys of every school bring fighting-cocks to their masters, and all the forenoon is spent at school, to see these cocks fight together. After dinner all the youth of the city goeth to play at the ball in the fields; the scholars of every study have their balls; the practisers also of the trades have everyone their ball in their hands. The ancienter sort, the fathers, and the wealthy citizens, come on horseback to see these youngsters contending at their sport, with whom, in a manner, they participate by motion; stirring their own natural heat in the view of the active youth, with whose mirth and liberty they seem to communicate.” Cock-fighting is now happily by law a misdemeanour, and punishable by penalty.