THE PHEASANT IN HISTORY 5 



Polydore Vergil (who was sent to England by 

 Pope Alexander VI.), after many years' residence in 

 this country, pubhshed a History of England in 1533. 

 We learn from this distinguished Italian that ' the 

 cheefe food of the Englishemen consisteth in flesh. 

 . . . They have an infinite nomber of birdes, as well 

 fostered in the howse as breeding in their woodds. 

 ... Of wilde burdes these are most delicate, 

 partiches, pheasaunts, quayles, owsels, thrusshes, and 

 larckes.' ' 



About a century later Gervase Markham passed 

 upon the pheasant the following encomium : ' In the 

 first rank I will place the Pheasant, as being indeed a 

 Byrd of singular beauty, excellent in the pleasure of 

 her flight, and as rare as any Byrd whatsoever that 

 flies, when she is in the dish, and well cookt by a 

 skilfull and an ingenious workman.' ^ 



Here it may be remarked that the pheasants 

 which crow to-day in our home coverts, while no 

 doubt remote descendants of those upon which the 

 enthusiastic fowler was pleased to pass the verdict just 

 recorded, are not, as a rule, thoroughbred. It would 

 be more accurate to say that they are the result of a 



' History of England, book i. p. 23. 



2 Htmget^s Prevention; or, the Art of Fowling, p. 199- 



