106 FROM SPRING TO FALL. 



this country at a very early date is proved con- 

 clusively by ancient records. We have one to the 

 effect that the abbot of Amesbury obtained a licence 

 from Henry I. to kill pheasants A.D. noo. In the 

 year 1536 Henry VIII. issued a proclamation from 

 his palace at Westminster to preserve the pheasants 

 and other birds at Highgate and Hornsey Park. 

 Although not a native, the pheasant has become 

 thoroughly one of our own game-birds ; he is a 

 very beautiful but common object, met with, in fact, 

 everywhere. This is due in a great measure to the 

 protection given him. Where these birds are reared 

 in large numbers they are for a time almost as 

 familiar as farmyard poultry; but this soon wears 

 off, and their wild blood quickly asserts itself even 

 in captivity. When kept in large aviaries the wild 

 traits show nearly as much as when they are at 

 perfect liberty in the woods and about their 

 borders. 



The pheasant has had as much notice taken of 

 him as any game-bird in the United Kingdom, 

 and some of it not to his own benefit or the benefit 

 of those who preserved him. In the ' Comic 

 Annual ' for 1837 some lawless proceedings con- 



