210 A FEW WORDS ON FEN-LAND. 



a place is described as at the back of the " Pye-wype Inn,"*—" Pye-wype " 

 being the name for the Lapwing (^Vanellus cristatus), and in old household 

 books simply " Wype " f . 



In Norfolk we have "Bustard's lode" (Dugdale, on Imbanking, 

 p. 286). 



Thouo-h it would swell this article to an inconvenient length to notice 

 half the birds of Fen-land's former days, yet one (the most rare and curious) 

 must have a few words. I allude to Acrocephalus luscinioides, the Warbler of 

 the Italian Savi. 



Perhaps in the 4th edition of Yarrell (c/*. vol. i. pp. 391, 392) there is 

 no subject which has been more ably handled than that of this bird ; and 

 among the condensed information there given, as far as I am a judge, this is 

 the most interesting, viz. the evidence of Mr. Bond and Mr. John Brown, of 

 Cambridge : — 



" A large extent of fen in the neighbourhood " [«'. e. of Baitsbight, on the 

 river Cam, where Harvey, the lock-keeper, lived, a man I well remember when 

 at the University] " was overgrown with one of the social sedges, Cladium 

 mariscus, which, towards autumn, was regularly cut, and being made into 

 bundles was carried by water to Cambridge to serve as kindling for fires," — 

 in one case to load a gun, as stated of old Merry by Daniel. " The sedge- 

 cutters used commonly to find many old nests, of singular construction, in the 

 course of their work — nests which could not be assigned to any of the known 

 fen-birds ; and this fact was learned by Harvey, who dealt in various objects 

 of natural history. The people of the district were also aware of a reddish- 

 brown bird, having a peculiar song, often heard at night (not altogether 



* We have also " Pye-wype ferry " near Lincoln, " Crane End " near Freiston, and " Snipe- 

 bank," — and in Huntingdonshire : — " Gosling's Island," Whittlesea Mere, " Wild-goose leys " twicCj 

 near Great Stukeley and close to Buckden ; also " Hawke's-den leys," S. Neots. 



t In Sweden the bird is still called " Vipa " [cf. Harting's ' Ornithology of Shakespeare,' 

 p. 222). 



