I take a selection of my books, especially those with a Scottish or Borders local hunting, shooting or fishing theme.  I do some selling, some buying of books and some networking with customers old and new.

But this year I also met up with John Crofts who I don’t think I have seen for 54 years.  We were both in the British army in Germany after the war, he was on radar and guns, I was signals.  Our connection and happy memory is of the skiffle band in which we both played!  He was on the washboard I was on the guitar… and we earned more “skiffling” (in the officers’ club for example) than from our service salary which was just 18 shillings a week.

David Grayling and John Crofts

SO!  If you – or if you know of someone – who would want to purchase a tatty old book seller’s book selling business with a focus on big game hunting, natural history and country pursuits and specialising in rare and fine titles then please get in touch, I would be delighted to talk!  And as you can see, the business has a newly revamped and modernised website!

A quick update… my new website is under test for functionality.  So that’s good!  The books will still be found by searching author, title, keyword or category, but the RSS feed will be back with a well-maintained list of recent additions.  Needless to say it is taking longer than I anticipated, but like the tortoise,  we will get there with patience and a steady step.

In the tortoise and hare race of book selling  I try to  stay with the times, but I seem to have fallen foul of a major online bookshop…  By slipping below their “completion” rate my seller’s account has been suspended.  My assistant is on the case, negotiating and explaining why this has happened.  Customers buying books from me have come to expect a personal service; quite often delivery is made within a day or so of an order being placed depending on Royal Mail or courier.  It is equally possible to arrange delivery by agreement, on a day to suit the customer.  (Novel idea, I know!)  This quite often means SPEAKING to the customer, or at least an exchange of emails.  Having done this I regret that sometimes I do not update my sellers account.

So as a book seller to my friends in the hunting, shooting and fishing worlds in the UK and elsewhere I ask:  When buying a beautiful old book would you like personal service, or a bit of box-ticking?!  The message from this online company is clearly that Grayling “must try harder”!  The plan is that I shall continue to operate as I have always done and for my assistant to tick the appropriate boxes.  Will it impact on” customer experience”?  No!  I can’t stay grumpy for too long, the sun is out in Shap and I’ll be out on the glorious fells with my border terriers for my lunch break shortly…

The most important thing is that all my customers will be able to benefit from registering with the RSS feed, so that when I acquire a new (to me!) book it will appear on the list.  So whether your interest is in country pursuits or ornithology, natural history or big game hunting, please click on the RSS feed and keep in touch with my stock.  This does not mean I will give up on good old fashioned catalogues of course, so if you would rather have a booklet to leaf through please email or phone and I will add you to my mailing list.

You could also  enter “BB” in the search facility of my web site and see the range of his  sporting, children’s, countryside and nature writings that I have in stock – from The Idle Countryman for £15.00 to The Shooting Man’s Bedside Book for £165.00.

I’m not entirely sure where the time flies…  but it certainly does, what with snow, Christmas, chest infections and post strikes!

I am doing my best to keep up with the demands made by the World Wide Web on this Antiquarian Book Seller.  I have a web site, with e-commerce, which means I need to have any number of different ways for people to pay, which means any number of people take a slice.  And instead of working within a gentlemanly club (with the occasional rogue) of  other dealers in books, with an equal passion for beautiful books about country pursuits I am trying to carve a  living in competition with the likes of Amazon…  Sometimes I wish I were a pensioner by occupation rather than just age…

The time spent  managing modern book selling is eating into the time required to prepare my good old fashioned catalogues…  but I do have another one at the printers!

In spite of the modern pressures I can still ensure top quality books are being produced,  and The Shooting Times have written an article about my recent Crealock volume – for which, I am delighted to report there is still a discerning customer or two…

Shooting Times article about David Grayling's publication of Crealock's Stalking Sketches

One of these is a  copy of William Hewitson’s illustrated “Eggs of British Birds”.  It is a second edition dated 1846 but what makes this copy is so special that inaddition to the wonderful coloured illustrations of the eggs are the additional pictures.  In 1871 William Dickinson has added exquisite water colours of birds, and on a number of pages humerous vignettes.  It really is delightful…  but I suppose I must put it up for sale!

The huntsman turned to the cover-side,
The soft horn sang, the pack swung wide,
Trying the hollies, trying the ride…

I have, during my twenty years as a tatty old bookseller, had the opportunity of acquiring and reading a remarkable assortment of sporting literature — a constant flow of literary entertain¬ment, ranging from the mireful and tawdry to sparkling dia¬monds fit for a queen. Some of these gems are known to hunting men and scholars alike, such as Siegfried Sassoon’s “Memoirs of a Foxhunting Man”, and Masefield’s “Reynard the Fox”; both being regarded as fine examples of our literary heritage. Any hunting chap who has not read these should be drawn and quartered, without the  inaugural hanging. He should also endeavour to read such classics as Buchanan-Jar¬dine’s “Hounds of the World,” Beckford’s “Thoughts on Hunt¬ing”, and possibly Somerville’s “The Chace”, all worthy and informative works.

Half familiar, and none the same,
Sons and daughters,
Kin by name,
With Rally & Ringwoods ancient line
That hunted the Forest in thirty-nine:
Suddenly, sometimes, as bubbles rise,
Dexter & Daystar, old and wise,
Would look again from the puppies’ eyes…

One of the pleasures of the chase is the unexpected, unpre¬dicted event which sometimes enhances an otherwise average day or season. Most of us will readily agree, however, that a lifetime of sport will afford no more than a handful of fine jewels in  the crown. I don’t mean the “red letter days” which appear sporadically throughout one’s sporting life; but the days which, however dark the memories fade, remain locked for eternity in one’s heart. Thus it is with my twenty seasons of book-hunting that I encountered my first diamond – no more than a couple of years ago…

And the hare came down on the road alone
Ears well forward and pace sedate,
Never changing his easy gait,
The little jack hare came softly down,
Steadily running the tarmac crown…

‘The Hunting of the Hare” by Steven Bracher. I read, re-read, and continue to read this gem again, again.., and never do I fail to glean intense pleasure and emotion from this narrative poem. It is set in the New Forest, Christmas Eve in 1945, after the long hard years of war; it flows like the finest Chinese silk, generating emotions that only true lovers of rural days and ways can experience. It surely is the most beautiful hunting poem I have ever had the privilege to read, comparing more than favourably with Masefield’s “Reynard the Fox.”

Who and where was Steven Bracher? I wanted to trace him, if only to express my thanks for the pleasure he has afforded. I also considered that, as I had taken eighteen years to find a copy, it must be scarce; probably rare. This being the case, it was worthy of wider readership — a new edition. I resolved to find him. I first contacted the Masters of the New Forest Beagles, but failed totally in my quest. I then obtained the names and addresses of all Brachers in the two directories covering the New Forest area, and wrote to one and all.

Although several were kind enough to reply — I again drew blank. What next? Last resort was a letter to “Hounds Magazine” and “Horse & Hound”.

By Linwood Cottage the music quickened,
Under the oaks where the hollies thickened,
Quickened and died,  and silence stood
As a wave-crest taut in the silent wood:
Hung and toppled: and headlong breaking,
As the crest of a wave when the tide is making,
Down in the forest, tumbling, crying,
Like a jostle of bells the hounds were flying,
Fading and falling, rising and dying,
Drowned and lost in the shadowed seas
Fainter and further under the trees…

EUREKA! At last, I had him! A reply from Wiltshire. Steven Bracher is a pen-name; the author was alive and thriving, and I have permission to go ahead with a new edition. That fine artist – Tim Scott-Bolton – has agreed to illustrate it with pencil sketches (the first issue is not illustrated), and I have a few extra verses from the author. The venture is under¬way and it will mark my twenty years as a sporting bookseller, fifty years of  hunting with the Bleasdale, and the Centenary of our Association of Masters of  Harriers & Beagles.

The daylight faded. The dusk came on,
The woods were dim, and the light was gone.
Faintly and far a horn was crying,
Rising and sinking, rising, dying:
All the griefs of earth were there,
Calling down the evening air,
And like an echo through it ran,
The tragic transience of man,
The mists came up as the daylight passed:
Two men came over the hill at last.
“A pound to a penny,” said one, “He’s down
Here in the heather on Pilmore crown.”
But the light was gone, and the scent was bad.
“‘Twas a stout old hare, and I’m just as glad,
That we left him after the run we had…”
…The voices faded, they sank the hill.
An owl called softly, the air struck chill,
The hare lay close and the moor was still

DAVID A H GRAYLING

(An article originally in “Hounds” magazine Summer 1997)