XXXV111 INTRODUCTION. 



and with Stock-doves, Gulls, and Sea-pies, served 

 as a convenient "quarry" for their noble neighbours. 

 It is much to be feared, too, that as a " fashionable 

 watering place," this locality, till lately but little 

 altered in its main features since the fowler and 

 falconer replenished the larder of the L'Estranges' 

 with the same species that are now most abundant 

 on the coast,* will be despoiled altogether of its former 

 attractions. 



The peculiarly flat shores of the Wash, and the 

 distance to which the tide recedes at low water, 

 exposes an immense tract of sands teeming with marine 

 life in the shape of worms and shell-fish, and covered 

 with little runs and pools of water. Beyond these, 

 extensive mussel-scalps, running far out into the 

 sea, afford a constant supply of food at all seasons 

 to both wading and swimming birds; and rough 

 marshes beyond the sand-hills, with small springs of 

 fresh water, are tempting resting places for the migra- 

 tory fowl, and are still the haunt of a few pairs of 

 Redshanks and Lapwings during the breeding season. 

 No sooner are the mussel-scalps exposedf in long 



* The birds mentioned most frequently in the "Household and 

 privy purse accounts" are Curlews, Spowes (Whimbrels), Plov's, 

 Eedeshancks, Knotts, Stynts, Sedotterels, Malards, and Telys. 



f On examining the largest of thase living breakwaters, which 

 extends in a circular form about half a mile, the whole mass will 

 be found composed entirely of myriads upon myriads of small mussels 

 from half an inch to an inch and a half in length, all firmly fixed in 

 the sand with their broadest ends uppermost, and bound and matted 

 together with their fibrous threads or " byssus." To tear up one is 

 to remove a score, and so much are they thus supported by each 

 other that even treading upon them seems of little consequence. 

 Buried in the soft sands they merely give way with a springy 

 sensation beneath the pressure of the feet, and even horses and 

 carts traverse them from end to end, and carry off tons of these 

 prolific molluscs, as manure for the land. Boundless, however, 



