166 EARLY ANNALS OF ORNITHOLOGY 
When Cranes were thus breeding in the fens of Cambridge- 
shire, there can be little doubt that some also mated in the 
marshes surrounding what are now known as the Broads 
of Norfolk, as well as in the tract near Lynn which was called 
Marshland, and in the fens of South Lincolnshire. Proof 
of the first supposition regarding the Broads has been 
discovered by Mr. J. C. Tingey in the Chamberlain’s accounts 
of Norwich, where he has found an entry of a payment in 
June, 1542, to one Notyngham of Hickling of five shillings 
for a young Crane, and fourpence for the carriage of it to 
Norwich.* As to what parts of England were inhabited by 
Cranes besides Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Lincolnshire, we 
have unfortunately little information, but from the habits of 
the bird it must have been strictly dependent on fen country. 
As regards Wales, there is the evidence of George Owen of 
Henlys ¢ that the Crane was a breeder in Pembrokeshire 
in the sixteenth century, and that it was also common there 
long before that time is made tolerably certain by old laws in 
the possession of the Welsh school.t 
As early as the time of King John the Crane was a 
favourite quarry for the Falcons of royalty, and there seems 
to have been no difficulty in coming across them. When the 
King had no inclination to go sporting, safe-conducts were 
granted at Westminster to fowlers to proceed to divers parts 
of the kingdom for the purpose of catching Cranes and other 
birds,§ and in this way the palace was supplied with what 
was then considered to be game of prime quality. Very 
likely Herons were sometimes made to do duty for Cranes, 
yet it cannot be doubted that Cranes were still tolerably 
* See 'T. Southwell ‘‘ On the Breeding of the Crane in East Anglia ’”’ 
(‘ Norwich Naturalists’ Trans.,’’ VII., p. 168). 
j See Owen’s “ Description of Pembrokeshire ’’ in the ‘‘ Cymmrodorion 
Record Series ’’ (1892, No. 1, p. 131), edited by Mr. Henry Owen of Poyston, 
from which considerable extracts were given in the ‘‘ Zoologist *’ (1895, p. 245). 
There is at least one modern occurrence of the Crane in Wales, and that 
was also in Pembrokeshire, April 28th, 1893, but the notification of two 
in Car liganshire in May, 1696 (‘‘ The Philosophical Transactions,” V., p. 33), 
must be dismissed as doubtful. 
+ The Master of the Hawks was to be honoured with three presents the 
dav his Hawk kills one of these three birds: a Bittern, a Crane, or a Heron. 
“The Ancient Laws of Cambria,’’ translated by William Probert, 1823 
(p. 109). 
§ “ Calendar of Patent Rolls, 33, Edward I.’’ (pt. L., p. 321). 
o) 
