34 EARLY ANNALS OF ORNITHOLOGY 
As an example of the violence of William’s temper, it is 
related by Dugdale that when Fitz-Osberne, the Steward of 
the Household, set before him the flesh of a Crane scarce half 
roasted, the King took such offence that he lifted up his fist 
and would have struck him fiercely, but that his dapifer Eudo 
warded off the blow.* 
Domesday Book.—In 1080 or 1085 William ordered the 
commencement of a General Survey of England—Liber 
Censualis Anglie—known as the Dome’s-day or Doom’s- 
day Book. This great document was intended to be a 
register whereby to determine the right in the tenure of 
estates, and for the proper making of it Commissioners 
were sent into every county and shire, except the four most 
northern ones. These Commissioners associated themselves 
with leading persons in each shire, and their duty was to 
elicit information on various points, including the number of 
“ Servi,” Freemen, and Tenants in each Manor, the number 
of oxen, swine and sheep, the quantity of wood, meadow 
and pasture, with particulars of any fish-ponds, or tiver 
fisheries ; even the eyries of Hawks were recorded, and the 
number of eels which a particular mill and its stream might 
afford to the proprietor. 
Sir Henry Ellis states that besides the New Forest, 
four other forests are noticed in the Domesday Survey, 
viz., Windsor Forest, Gravelinges in Wilts, Wimburne in 
Dorset, and Wychwood in Oxfordshire.t Silva and Nemus 
are the usual terms in the Survey for wood, and in a few 
entries Silvula. On account of the running and feeding of 
numerous herds of hogs, acorns and beechmast had a degree 
of importance of which we can form a very inadequate idea 
at this time.t These pigs were the sustenance on which the 
country folk principally depended, and which the King’s 
severity might cause them to lose. 
The eyries of Hawks in William’s time were thought of 
no small value, for it was these which principally contributed 
to the sport of falconry. The word “evrie or “aerie” is 
perhaps capable of two meanings. Sir Henry Ellis, in his 
* “ Baronage of England,” 1675, p. 109. 
+ ‘General Introduction to Domesday Book.’’ 1833, Vol. I., p. 103. 
t Tie., pp. 96, 97. 
