—-—-— Velut si Revera pugnent, feriant, vitentq; moventes Arma viri. _Horat. lib. 2. Stat, 7._
_Their Cockings also are attended with variety of Martial Aires, and loud_ Bellonian Notes, _with preparatory Sounds of War, which first usher in the Cocks unarmed into the Pit, where both they and the Weapons with which they are to fight, are exposed to the view of all the Spectators that are present, after which they are taken up, and immediately heeled, and then set down to Fight._
_For when a Cock of the Game is first brought into the Pit, to be shown, he only makes a Flourish, and takes a lofty turn, or two. But when he is heeled, and put in for the Battle, they then compose their Bodies according to the rules of Art, for the better warding of themselves, and the readier wounding of their Adversaries. And this the late King_ Christian _the First, of_ Denmark, _was pleased to take Notice of at public Cocking, where he professed that the Royal Sport, so sweetly Sung by the_ Mantuan _Swan, upon_ Ascanius _Son to_ Æneas, _who first brought it out of_ Troy, _was only an imitation of Cock-Fighting.—Thus the Poet._
Hunc morem, cursus, atq; hæc certamina primus Ascanius, longam muris cum cingeret Albam, Rotulit & priscos docuit celebrare Latinos.
See here, _says the King_, how the Cocks Advance now one against another, sometimes retiring, sometimes pursuing, sometimes in one Form, and sometimes in another, what variety of Strokes, what Diversity of Fight is here shown in this one Battle; were I to lead an Army against the Grand Infidel of _Constantinople_, I would chuse none but Cockers for my Commanders; nor should any common Soldiers be utterly Ignorant of this useful Exercise of Cocking.
_So great an Esteem had his Majesty the late King of_ Denmark _for Cocking. And that famed Hero, the young_ Swedeland _King, at the Head of a Handful of Men, cuts through the frozen_ Muscovites, _and makes the Haughty_ Czar, _amidst his mighty Numbers tremble, and beg for Peace, resolving never hereafter to draw his Cimiter against a professed Cocker, as his_ Swedeish _Majesty is notoriously known to be, and has been from his very Cradle almost._
_And the great Hector of_ Europe, _the most Christian King_, Lewis _the Fourteenth of_ France, _is said to complain of nothing so much as the want of Cocking in his Country, where the Climate is such, that a Cock of the Game cannot bear the serenity, or rather the over Sharpness of the Air, which penetrates the otherwise hardy Bodies of these Martial Birds, to such a degree, that in a few days time they become so dull, heavy, and heartless, that they have no mind to Fight, and quickly after fall into some incurable Disease, such as the_ Black-Sickness, _the_ Roop-evil, _and the like, of which they soon die._