218 ANATIDJl. 



(1496), it was ordered that stealing or taking a Swan's egg 

 should have a year's imprisonment, and make fine at the 

 king's will. Stealing, setting nets or snares for, or driving 

 Grey or White Swans, was punished still more severely. 



The king had formerly a swanherd (Magister deductus 

 cygnoruvi), not only on the Thames, but in several other 

 parts of the kingdom. We find persons exercising the 

 office of " Master of the King's Swans," sometimes called 

 the swanship, within the counties of Huntingdon, Cam- 

 bridge, Northampton, and Lincoln. Richard Cecil, the 

 father of Lord Burleigh, was bailiff of Whittlesey Mere, 

 and had the custody of the Swans in the time of Henry 

 the Eighth. Anciently the crown had an extensive swan- 

 nery annexed to the royal palace or manor of Clarendon 

 in Wiltshire. It had also a swannery in the Isle of Purbeck. 



In Archaeologia, or miscellaneous tracts relating to anti- 

 quity, published by the Society of Antiquaries of London, 

 vol. xvi. 1812, ordinances respecting Swans on the river 

 Witham, in the county of Lincoln ; together with an 

 original roll of ninety-seven swan-marks, appertaining to 

 the proprietors on the said stream, were communicated 

 by the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks, Bart., K.B., P.R.S., 

 and F.S.A. 



" These are the ordinances made the 24th day of May, 

 1524, in the fifteenth year of the reign of our Sovereign 

 Lord King Henry the Eighth, by the Lord Sir Christopher 

 Willuby, Sir Edward Dimock, and others, Justices of 

 Peace and Commissioners, appointed by our Sovereign 

 Lord the King, for the confirmation and preservation of 

 His Highness Game of Swans, and Signets, of his stream of 

 Witham, within his county of Lincoln, &c., from a Breges, 

 called Boston Breges, unto the head of the said stream.". 



A true copy of the Parchment Roll being too long, a 

 few only of the particulars are here inserted. 



