FORMER NESTING OF THE SPOONBILL IN MIDDLESEX. 87 
kept from all good prospect by the thickness of the trees,” as 
she told her vice-chamberlain, who reported it to the Bishop.* 
As to the kind of trees in which the Herons and Spoonbills 
_ were building, it would seem, from a reference in the law report 
to ‘‘acorns” as profits arising from the trees reserved by the 
lease, that some of them at least were oaks. In 1793, amongst 
other fine old trees then standing, were several white oaks 8 ft. 
in girth and 70 ft. high, and some evergreen oaks 8 ft. in girth 
and 50 ft. high. But these may have been planted after Bishop 
Tunstall’s time ; perhaps by Bishop Grindall, who was a great 
botanist, and, according to Fuller, the first person who imported 
the tamarisk tree to this country about the year 1560.t+ 
How long the Herons and Spoonbills continued to frequent 
the park at Fulham, and build in the trees there, we have 
at present no evidence to show. From the decisive steps taken 
by Bishop Tunstall to protect them, we may reasonably assume 
that they continued there at all events until his translation to 
the See of Durham in 1530. Whether his successor, Bishop 
Stokesley, took the same amount of interest in them, and 
continued to afford them protection, I have not discovered; a 
search amongst contemporary records having up to the present 
time failed to throw more light on the subject. 
In the “ Privy Purse Expenses” of Henry VIII. there is an 
entry relating to the Spoonbill in the year following Bishop 
Tunstall’s departure, which reads as follows :— 
“1531. Itm the x daye of Novembr paied to a svnt of my lorde 
Cobham’s in rewarde for bringing of Shovelards to the 
King’s Grace - - - - - - = - - = iiijs. viijd.” 
But these birds probably came from Cobham Hall, near 
* Strype’s ‘ Life of Aylmer,’ p. 103. 
+ A century later, in Bishop Compton’s time (1673-1713), the gardens of 
Fulham Palace became quite celebrated by reason of the number of exotic 
shrubs and trees which that prelate imported and planted there. Ray has 
given some account of them in his ‘ History of Plants,’ published in 1688, 
and frequent allusion is made to them in Aiton’s ‘ Hortus Kewensis.’ In the 
‘Philosophical Transactions’ (vol. 47, p. 241), Sir William Watson has 
described the trees which he found growing there in June, 1751. The row 
of limes near the Porter’s Lodge, of great age, were probably, says Lyson 
(vol. ii. p. 352), planted by Bishop Compton about the year of the Revolution, 
when the fashion of planting avenues of limes was introduced from Holland. 
