28 INTRODUCTORY. 



parks, nor hares, which were I conclude also game. But 

 y other kind of winged fowl, which we should call game, 

 iptured and sold, as well as a host of wild birds, which 

 do not seem at present to come into the market. Thus in 

 one month, November, of one year (1622) I find woodcocks, 

 plover, green, grey and bastard, larks, snipe, fieldfares, 

 blackbirds, hadicocks, besides rabbits. In the summer, quails 

 and pigeons are common. At Winchester the fellows buy 

 all such birds, and widgeon, teal, wild ducks, pheasants, and 

 partridges in abundance. 



Among the numerous works which were published by 

 Gervase Markham, on whose contributions to agriculture I 

 shall have to comment presently, is one entitled Hunger's 

 Prevention, or the Whole Art of Fowling (1621). The author 

 dwells on every known mode of capturing .wild fowl, but 

 never hints that the pursuit was the exclusive pleasure or 

 privilege of the landlord or wealthy owner. Now if it be 

 the case that a large tract of country was open to all 

 comers, in which they could decoy or shoot birds, it is 

 obvious that one ought to take these bye-products of industry 

 into account in estimating the condition of the people. It 

 was not till I came across the domestic accounts of nobles 

 and rich corporations that I found out how notably this 

 occupation of fowling was stimulated by the expenditure of 

 such persons. Their supplies did not come from their own 

 servants, as the price proves. 



Among the accounts which have contributed to the facts 

 of these volumes is that of Mr. Master, a landowner at Votes 

 Court, near Chislehurst, in Kent. Master inherited some city- 

 won wealth, was a minor for some time, had been brought up 

 in Puritan habits, was sent to Cambridge, where his account 

 gives some curious details of academical life, and finally 

 settled on his patrimonial estate. His property seems to 

 have been worth, during the Civil War and the early years 

 of the Restoration, from 300 to 400 a year, and the par- 

 ticulars of his domestic life show how a man could live in ease, 



