author
R. H. (Robert Howlett)
Best known today for lively early sporting manuals, this little-known English writer left behind practical books on angling, hunting, and other gentlemanly pastimes. His work offers a small but vivid window into recreation in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.
3 Audiobooks
The School of Recreation (1684 edition) Or, The Gentlemans Tutor, to those Most Ingenious Exercises of Hunting, Racing, Hawking, Riding, Cock-fighting, Fowling, Fishing
by R. H. (Robert Howlett)
The School of Recreation (1696 edition) Or a Guide to the Most Ingenious Exercises of Hunting, Riding, Racing, Fireworks, Military Discipline, the Science of Defence
by R. H. (Robert Howlett)
The Royal Pastime of Cock-fighting The art of breeding, feeding, fighting, and curing cocks of the game
by R. H. (Robert Howlett)
About the author
Robert Howlett, often listed simply as R. H., is an English author associated with a handful of practical guides on field sports and leisure pursuits. Project Gutenberg identifies him as active 1684–1709, and the surviving books linked to his name include The School of Recreation, The Royal Pastime of Cock-fighting, and The Anglers Sure Guide.
His best-known work, The School of Recreation, gathers advice on activities such as hunting, racing, hawking, riding, fowling, and fishing. Rather than writing literary fiction, he seems to have focused on useful, hands-on instruction for readers interested in the skills and habits of country life and sport.
Very little confirmed biographical detail appears to survive beyond his name and period of activity. That makes his books the clearest record of who he was: a practical writer whose works preserve the tastes, hobbies, and sporting culture of his time.