of looking swans* over all parts of HaxeyCarrs, between Lammas and Michaelmas,—from the valuation of fisheries † in Doomsday at Owston, Haxey, and Epworth,-from the payment of anguillæ§ out of the copyhold fisheries, in the Level * The inquisition of "the bounder" of Hatfield Chase, taken in 1607, speaks of a special royalty of swans belonging to the King; and in the Swainmote Court of that Manor, many strict regulations were enforced for their preservation. The Islonians were not subject to the forest laws; but as all swans, the owners of which were not known, belonged to the King of his royal prerogative, and which right was of course vested in the Lord of the Manor, every stray swan was required to be brought to the Steward of the Manor Court, for which the bringer was to receive twelve-pence for his trouble. ↑ "At a time when the consumption of fish, owing to a religious rule which was seldom relaxed, was much greater than at present, the fisheries, whether on the coast or on the inland lakes, were an object of greater importance. On the Mere at Tudworth, there were twenty distinct fisheries at the time of the Conquest, each of which rendered a thousand eels, if by anguillæ is meant the eels only and not any of the smaller fry, to the Lord of Coningsbrough. I find at a later period fifty copyhold fisheries spoken of at Thorne, in which it may be presumed those of Tudworth were included. The monks of Roche, and even those of Lewes, in Sussex, kept their rule from these inexhaustible fisheries." Hunter's Hist. Deanery of Doncaster. § Our Saxon ancestors used anguillæ as abundantly as they did swine. Four thousand eels were a yearly present from the monks of Ramsay to those of Peterborough, We read of two places purchased for twenty-one pounds, wherein sixteen thousand of these fish were taken every year; and in one charter twenty fishermen are stated, who furnished, during the same period, sixty thousand eels to the monastery. Turn. Ang. Sax. vol. 2. There is a remarkable passage in Bede, in which he tells us that Wilfred, Bishop of Lindisferne, who lived in the eighth century, first taught our ancestors the means of taking pisces, fish, who before had been only able to take anguillæ, eels. The passage is this, "for though the sea and their rivers abounded with fish, they had no more skill in the art than to take eels. The servants of Wilfred threw into the sea nets made out of those by which they had obtained eels, and thus directed them to a new source of plenty." From this some learned men have been of opinion that the word anguillæ means all sorts of small fry, such as perch, dace, and other small fishes, and that the bishop taught them the art of taking salmon in the rivers and other large fishes on the coasts: and indeed, it seems extremely probable that whoever spread nets to take eels would take other small fish; though we must allow that when angling is resorted to, eels are taken much more easily than any thing else. To catch eels it is sufficient to tie any bait to a piece of string, and merely to throw it into the water, which might be done by the most barbarous people: the practice is quite common at the present day, and is termed bobbing. Persons bobbing for eels never take any thing else. Other fish, there being no hook, disgorge the bait, before they are drawn out of the water, which the eel is not able to do. I am of opinion that anguille means eels only; and that the bishop taught them by means of a more skilful apparatus to catch other sorts of fresh water fish. The servants of the bishop constructed nets made out of the rude lines and strings with which the natives caught eels. Level of theChase to the Lord of Coningsbrough, and from the award made by the Commissioners for settling the disputes between the natives and Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, of four hundred pounds to be paid by him for purchasing a stock of hemp, in order to employ the poor people of Haxey, Epworth, Owston, and Belton in making sacking, cloth, and cordage, as a compensation for their loss in fishing and fowling by the works of drainage*. In addition to that most truly graceful of all birds the swan, which graced these meres with their presence, there were cranes, storks, bitterns, herons, and several of the falcon tribe; curlews, judcocks, snipes, ruffs, and godwits; redshanks, plover, water-crakes, water-hens, and coots; various species both of wild geese and wild ducks, widgeons, and teal. Of these both the tame and wild swans, with the cranes and storks, have entirely disappeared. Bewick, who wrote about the year 1800, says, that swans without an owner were still common on the river Trent; but I cannot learn that there have been any in the recollection of any person now living, except a casual one, shot during the rigours of a very severe winter, which, no doubt, was an emigrant in search of food, from the more northern parts of Europe. The same events, however, which prolonged the generation of the ancient fowlers for a century, prolonged also the existence of the other species of these birds, which were the object of their pursuit. The egret and the night heron are, I believe, entirely extinct; but the common heron may still be seen standing motionless, near ditches and pools of water, exhibiting, says Buffon, "the picture of wretchedness, anxiety, and indigence." I am of opinion, however, that Buffon sometimes wrote strange nonsense; and that the wretchedness, anxiety, and indigence, of which he speaks, existed no where but in his own' imagination. The heron, I conceive, whilst watching on the edge of the water for passing fish, is a picture of ornithological perfection: his plumage lies close on his back in beautiful order, his eye is fixed on the water, and his position is so judiciously taken, that you feel convinced he will strike with success. I have had an opportunity of observing this by means of a very powerful telescope, from the drawing room windows of Walton Hall. * Prymne's MS. Account of the Drainage. In In the year 1817, I shot two bitterns on Burringham Moors, opposite Deddythorpe, and, on one occasion, saw a nest containing four eggs. This shy solitary bird is never seen on the wing in the day time, but sits commonly with the head erect, hid among the reeds and rushes of the marshes, where it always takes up its abode, and from whence it will not stir unless it is disturbed by the sportsman. The bittern always changes its haunts in the dusk of the evening, and then rising in a spiral direction, soars to a vast height. It flies in the same heavy manner as the heron, and might be mistaken for that bird, were it not for the singularly resounding cry which it utters from time to time, while on the wing; but this cry is feeble when compared to the hollow booming noise which it makes during the night time, in the breeding season, from its swampy retreats. The moor buzzard still frequents the waste which surrounds Lindholme. I saw a nest in the summer of 1836 containing three young ones. This bird builds its nest a little above the surface of the ground; preys on rabbits, young wild ducks, and other water fowl; and is said to be the most voracious of its species. The gyr-falcon is also sometimes seen sailing over this and the adjacent wastes. Next to the eagle, this bird is the most formidable, the most active, and the most intrepid of all voracious birds; it boldly attacks the largest of the feathered race: the stork, the heron, and the crane are easy victims; it kills hares by darting directly upon them. The female, as in all other birds of prey, is much larger and stronger than the male. Those very curious and beautiful birds, the ruffs, are now seldom to be met with, as the warp is spread farther and wider over the surface of their ancient haunts. I saw three near Ferry Flash, in the year 1827; and the late Mr. Richard Empson, of Scotton, had a case containing eight beautifully stuffed specimens, which he had shot about that time in the same neighbourhood. They are called ruffs from the beautiful wide spreading variegated tufts of feathers, which grow out of their necks, and which is different in almost every bird; for Buffon tells us, that Klien compared above one hundred ruffs together, and found only two that were similar. This tuft, or ruff, a portion of which stands up like ears behind each eye, is in some black, in others black and yellow, and in others again white, rust colour, or barred with glossy violet, or black and white. As Soon after their arrival in the spring, they take up their abode in such marshy and fenny places as formerly abounded in the Commons of the Isle of Axholme; and each of the males, of which there appears to be a greater number than of females, immediately fixes upon a particular dry or grassy spot in the marsh, about which he runs round and round and round until it is trodden bare: to this naturalists think he wishes to invite the female, and waits in expectation of her taking joint possession of the selected place. As soon as a single female arrives, her feeble cry rouses all the males to war, for they instantly begin to fight, and she becomes the prize of the victor. Buffon says they not only contend with each other in single rencontre, but advance to combat in marshalled ranks: for this reason he has named the bird Le Combattant, and Linnæus Tringa Pugnax. Some naturalists, I believe, doubt the truth of this. All I can say is, that an old fowler, who I am sure never heard of Linnæus or Buffon, told me that these. birds form themselves into a circle, while two of them fight a pitched battle in the centre; during the engagement the rest keep running round. I went with him, in the year 1819, on Burringham Moors, to ascertain the fact, but was not able to approach sufficiently near to them; the birds being alarmed seemed to rise from a cluster, and took wing. I afterwards saw a dozen which the same person had taken in his snares or nets. He was intending to feed them with bread and milk in order to fatten them for the London market, where they are esteemed as a most delicious morsel. The pee-wit or bastard plover, still hovers around its accustomed haunts, uttering its loud and incessant cries, which it repeats without intermission whilst on the wing, sporting and frolicking in the air, or running along the ground, and springing and bounding with great agility from spot to spot. Snipes, though not in such numbers as formerly, still visit in the breeding season the moors and wet places which are yet unfrequented or inaccessible; and when the young birds are fledged, they delight to dabble in the soft mud on the land under process of warping, at which time they afford excellent diversion to the sportsman. One species of the snipe tribe used generally to be termed the moor lamb, from the bleating noise it makes, particularly in the breeding season, when hovering at an almost imperceptible height in the air. Flocks R Flocks of wild geese are frequently met with on the less cultivated parts of the low ground; and the different species of wild duck are now caught in that most efficient of all methods of taking them, the decoy. One of these engines of destruction is regularly worked during the season, about a mile from the town of Crowle. Beside the mallard and the common duck, I have seen specimens of the scaup duck, the shieldrake, the pin-tailed duck or sea pheasant, the swallow-tailed shieldrake, and the pockard, or great headed widgeon. The decoy has superseded all those ancient methods of taking water fowl which used to be resorted to by the old fowlers in this and other parts of Lincolnshire, such as lying in ambush, shooting, taking with baited hooks, wading in the water with the head covered in a perforated wooden vessel, and the stalking horse*,-all which methods were attended with much toil and fatigue, and were comparatively trifling in point of successt. Before *The stalking horse was trained to walk slowly along, with his head down to the ground, as if grazing, and the fowler armed with his long gun walked close to his shoulder, on the side farthest from the fowl. When he had thus approached sufficiently near, the fowling piece was laid across the horse's back, and discharged just as the bird rose upon the wing. A person using this method was generally termed a Gunner. The decoys now in use, or which were in use within the last ten years, are formed by digging or selecting a large pool of water situated in the midst of the solitary marsh. From the four corners of this pool tapering ditches are cut in a semicircular form, which are deep and wide near the water, but gradually become narrower at the end farthest from the pool. The fowlers term these ditches pipes, and place over them funnel nets, very high and wide at the entrance, but becoming smaller and smaller until they end in a sort of barrel net. Alongst both sides screens, formed of reeds, are set up in such a position as to prevent the possibility of the fowl seeing the decoy man, but at the same time allowing him the opportunity of shewing himself to them at any given moment. As the birds feed at night, all is prepared for this sport about sun-set. The decoy birds resort to their usual places of being fed, the mouth of the pipes, followed by the young wild fowl. The well trained dog, a small water spaniel, jumps through one opening in the screens, and returns through another, in such a manner as to lead the decoy ducks to believe they are about to be fed, and just sufficiently to let the wild ones catch a sight of him. Curiosity tempts the strangers to proceed up the ditches or pipes in company with their false friends, until the nets extend over their heads. As soon as this is |