INTRODUCTION. xliii 



with the Eobin and Hedge-sparrow, the Chaffinch, 

 Greenfinch, and other sylvan forms, to give life and 

 animation to this strangely altered scene. The fir-belts 

 resound with the soft notes of the Turtle-Dove, and 

 throughout the coverts the beautiful Wood-pigeon now 

 outnumbers the hereditary Stock-Doves of the coast. 

 Game is reared in abundance, where, in former times, 

 the wild rabbit nibbled a bare subsistence, and the once 

 bleak home of the Lapwing and the Norfolk Plover affords 

 some of the the finest Partridge shooting in the whole 

 county. Indeed, as regards the more common species 

 comprised in the great Insessorial group, there are 

 probably none that might not now be procured in that 

 neighbourhood, where, less than a century ago, when rye 

 was the only cereal grown, the common House Sparrow 

 was comparatively scarce. That which the first Earl 

 of Leicester, however, had so well begun was destined 

 to arrive at the highest pitch of perfection through the 

 genius and energy of his great successor, till the name 

 of Coke as a master of the science, and of Holkham as 

 the school of agriculture, became as " familiar in our 

 ears as household words." 



Besides the enclosure and cultivation of heaths and 

 other waste grounds, much valuable land has been 

 reclaimed from the sea at Holkham,*' and adjoining 

 portions of the coast, both under the present and former 

 proprietors of the estate, and many hundreds of acres 

 secured from inundation are now richly productive ; 

 thus narrowing again the haunts of the wild-fowl and 

 waders, and extending the area of all granivorous 



* About the year 1659, John Coke, Esq., the then proprietor, and 

 fourth son of the famous Sir Edward Coke, enclosed from the sea 

 three hundred and fifty acres of salt marshes, and four hundred 

 acres more were embanked by his successor, the first Earl of 

 Leicester. [See Stacy's " History of Norfolk."] 



