SIXTEENTH CENTURY 129 
1540. Itm. in reward the viijth day of May to a ffelawe 
that brought a busterd from the parisshe prest of Burnham 
called Sir Raff, itij d. 
1543. [September 23] Itm. of Canseller’s killyng oon 
busterd & i11j cranes whereof 1ij Cranes [were] given oon to 
Sir Roger Townshend another to Sir Ric{hard] South and the 
thred to my lady Hastinges. 
1548. [September 16] Itm j bustarde. 
Of these entries, the fifth has the most importance for 
the naturalist, which chronicles the bringing of two young 
Bustards. Most likely they were chicks caught by hand, 
and not too easily, we may be sure, for they learn to 
run very quickly. As the Bustard only lays two or three 
eggs, two would be a clutch.* These youngsters came 
from Stannewyk, also spelled Stanneugh, now known as 
Stanhoe, about eight miles from Hunstanton: it is the 
same parish referred to in Richards’ “ History of Lynn”t} 
as a locality harbouring Bustards. It will be observed that 
one of the Bustards in the above list was killed in January, 
this was undoubtedly a migrant, which may have been 
driven from the continent by hard weather; two more 
were killed in April, one in May (near the sea), one in 
July and two in September. 
These dates are all plain, and quite coincide with what 
we have long known about the habits of the Bustard. 
It was evidently a species which, like the Norfolk Plover, 
summered in Norfolk and Suffolk, and went south with a host 
of other migrants about October. Any which in winter 
temporarily took the place of the breeding-race were not 
natives, but migrants from Europe. It is to be remarked that 
the first entry here quoted—that of April 1520—is really 
entitled to stand as the first record of this noble species in 
Britain, for the Northumberland Household Book, begun in 
1512, which has generally had that credit, is merely a statement 
of what birds were suitable for principal feasts at Wresil 
Castle, and does not give the actual captures of the Bustard, 
* Colonel Willoughby Verner tells me that in Spain Bustards will lay 
four eggs if undisturbed. 
+ Vol. I., p. 196. 
