290 SHOOTING. 



sant with hawking as with angling, enumerates 

 twenty kinds of hawks then used, and adds that 

 there were others which he " forbore to mention." 

 He is learned in the phraseology of the day ; he 

 speaks of " their ayries, their mewings, rare order 

 of casting, and the renovation of their feathers ; 

 their reclaiming and dieting." Mews were places 

 where hawks were kept, as the Mews at Pimlico, 

 on the site of which, or near thereto, stands Buck- 

 ingham Palace. " The Park," (St. James's,) says 

 Mr. Evelyn,* "was at this time (A.D. 1664-65) 

 stored with numerous flocks of severall sorts of 

 ordinary and extraordinary wild fowle, breeding 

 about the decoy, which for being neare so greate a 

 city, and among such a concourse of souldiers and 

 people, is a singular and diverting thing." 



Hawking was once the occupation only of the 

 great ; it afterwards became a more general amuse- 

 ment. The large sums given for superior hawks, in 

 the days of the Plantagenets, Tudors, and Stuarts, 

 prove the high estimation in which the sport was 

 then held. The falcons of most repute were im- 

 ported from Iceland and other foreign countries, 

 the various native species being deemed of an in- 

 ferior description. 



Hunting and archery, which were then almost 

 synonymous terms, for the sport was somewhat 

 similar to deer-stalking, the rifle being now substi- 

 tuted for the bow, were in high reputation with 

 the Danish, Saxon, and Norman kings, whence 

 arose the forest laws. Wolves and boars, which 



* Diary of John Evelyn, Esq., vol. ii. p. 234. 



