THE PHEASANT IN HISTORY 17 



prior to the establishment of pheasants in some of 

 the border counties of England. In the year 1622 

 we learn that a ' phesson ' was sent to Lord William 

 Howard, of Naworth, by a special messenger all the 

 way from Yorkshire ; while an attempt to introduce 

 this game-bird into Westmoreland towards the end 

 of that century proved abortive, not on account of 

 the numerous hen harriers that then quartered the 

 northern moorlands, but because every man's hand 

 was against them ; 'the countrey people distroy'd 

 them before they increased to any considerable 

 replennishing number.' As lately as 1784, Clarke, a 

 local topographer, commented upon the absence of 

 pheasants from Cumberland ; but the fault was re- 

 paired a few years later by the exertions of Sir James 

 Graham, Lord Muncaster, and other county mag- 

 nates. And this recalls the fact that it was during 

 the later years of the eighteenth century that the old 

 race of pheasants, which had graced the banquets of 

 the Tudor sovereigns, began to mingle with the ring- 

 necked pheasant of Northern China, introduced 

 about that time. 



I have a fine print by C. Turner of a portrait of 

 a celebrated pointer, Sancho, which is represented 

 with a pheasant, and the bird is a ring-necked 

 bird, showing the white collar to be well developed. 



