WOODCOCK. 17 



ing particulars of some Woodcocks of very large size, with 

 permission to attach the statements to this history. 



Copy of a letter from Lady Peyton to Miss Hoste, 

 dated Uggeshall, December 25th, 1801. 



" MY DEAR Miss HOSTE, 



" The Woodcock which Mr. Hoste inquires after, 

 was found sitting on a very low branch of a fir-tree in the 

 long plantation at Narborough,* about eleven o'clock in the 

 morning, by James Crow the postilion, who was exercising 

 the coach-horses. He came back with the intelligence to 

 the house, and the keeper immediately went out and shot 

 the Woodcock. I saw it weighed both in scales and steel- 

 yards, as did Sir Henry, and a carpenter at work from 

 Swaffham ; and, wonderful as the weight may appear, it 

 was exactly twenty-seven ounces. I believe it was about 

 1775 or 1776. Some years before that, a Woodcock was 

 killed at Hadleigh, in Suffolk, which weighed twenty-four 



" Lady Peyton's brother, the late Lord Stradbroke, then 

 Sir John Rous, told me (Lord Braybrooke), he recollected 

 arriving at Downham, Sir Henry Peyton's residence, 

 twenty-four hours after the Woodcock was shot, and hear- 

 ing the particulars ; but the bird had been dressed. 



" Mr. Roger Wilbraham, a great sportsman, living at 

 Swaffham, not believing the account, summoned the car- 

 penter many years afterwards, who confirmed all the cir- 

 cumstances. 



" The Earl of Leicester also told me, that he, in com- 

 pany with Mr. Ralph Dutton, when they were young men, 

 followed a gigantic-looking Woodcock for some hours, near 

 Holkham, but could not get near him. 



* The snow was deep, and the bird was resting on the branch of a spruce- 

 fir, weighed down to the ground. 



VOL. III. C 



