makes Solon speak of quail-fighting and cocking, but he is
evidently referring to a time later than that of Themistocles. From
Athens the sport spread throughout Greece, Asia Minor and Sicily, the
best cocks being bred in Alexandria, Delos, Rhodes and Tanagra. For a
long time the Romans affected to despise this "Greek diversion," but
ended by adopting it so enthusiastically that Columella (1st century
A.D.) complained that its devotees often spent their whole patrimony in
betting at the pit-side. The cocks were provided with iron spurs
(_tela_), as in the East, and were often dosed with stimulants to make
them fight more savagely.

From Rome cocking spread northwards, and, although opposed by the
Christian church, nevertheless became popular in Great Britain, the Low
Countries, Italy, Germany, Spain and her colonies. On account of adverse
legislation cocking has practically died out everywhere excepting in
Spain, countries of Spanish origin and the Orient, where it is still
legal and extremely popular. It was probably introduced into England by
the Romans before Caesar's time. William Fitz-Stephen first speaks of it
in the time of Henry II. as a sport for school-boys on holidays, and
particularly on Shrove Tuesday, the masters themselves directing the
fights, or mains, from which they derived a material advantage, as the
dead birds fell to them. It became very popular throughout England and
Wales, as well as in Scotland, where it was introduced in 1681.
Occasionally the authorities tried to repress it, especially Cromwell,
who put an almost complete stop to it for a brief period, but the
Restoration re-established it among the national-pastimes. Contemporary
apologists do not, in the 17th century, consider its cruelty at all, but
concern themselves solely with its justification as a source of
pleasure. "If Leviathan took his sport in the waters, how much more may
Man take his sport upon the land?" From the time of Henry VIII., who
added the famous Royal Cock-pit to his palace of Whitehall, cocking was
called the "royal diversion," and the Stuarts, particularly James I. and
Charles II., were among its most enthusiastic devotees, their example
being followed by the gentry down to the 19th century. Gervase Markham
in his _Pleasures of Princes_ (1614) wrote "Of the Choyce, Ordring,
Breeding and Dyeting of the fighting-Cocke for Battell," his quaint
directions being of the most explicit nature. When a cock is to be
trained f