Lord Bonkers' Diary: The outside risk of drowning

As I have been writing this column since before most of my readers were born, it seems allowable to repeat an old joke from time to time. Besides, the Rutland partridge is an important part of the county's upland fauna. Its numbers are believed to be kept in check by the descendants of escapees from the safari park that Lord Bonkers ran for many years until its sudden closure. ("I still maintain that those nuns were the authors of their own misfortune.")

Tuesday

The Glorious Twelfth? I don’t find it glorious at all. Shooting grouse is like shooting fish in a barrel, only without the outside risk of drowning. Give me instead the open moors of my native county and our own Rutland partridge. Fire on that doughty bird and it will take cover and fire back. Now that’s what I call good sport!

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West, 1906-10

Earlier this week....

• Their eyes hollow from think-tank reports and self-abuse