48 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



Then followed numerous other provisions for the destruction 

 of the unfortunate " Choughs, Crows and Rooks," 



The inhabitants of every parish were bound for the next ten 

 years to provide and set nets in which to capture the birds, and 

 were made liable to a fine of ten shillings for every day such nets 

 should be wanting. A yearly meeting was to be convened of 

 tenants, who were to survey the buildings and trees in their 

 neighbourhood, and conclude by what means it would be easiest 

 to destroy the young broods of the year. Any parish not com- 

 plying with this regulation was to forfeit twenty shillings. By 

 another section power is given to any person " minding to destroy 

 the said Choughs, Croivs and Rooks,''' after request to the owner 

 or occupier of the land where they bred, to enter thereon and 

 carry them away " without let by the owner or occupier." The 

 word "Chough" in this Act refers, of course, I to the Jackdaw, 

 which in former years was very generally known by that name. 



By a later statute of Elizabeth, passed in 1566, and entitled 

 * An Act for the preservation of Grain/ the provisions of the 

 Act of 1533 as to the keeping of "crow nets" were revived, but 

 all the other branches of that Act repealed. By this statute 

 power was given to churchwardens to assess the farmers in their 

 respective parishes every year, and to expend the money thus 

 obtained in rewards to be paid for the destruction of certain birds 

 and animals supposed to be prejudicial to agricultural interests. 

 A long list of rewards is fixed for heads and eggs of various 

 " birds of destruction and noyful fowl," as, for instance, "for the 

 heads of three old crows, choughs, pies or rooks, or of six young 

 ones, or for six eggs, to be paid one penny." These rewards 

 were regularly paid long after the passing of this Act. 



In the old account books of the period are found entries 

 which show that in some quarters at least an attempt was made 

 to carry out the existing law. For example, in the Household Book 

 kept by the steward of Squire Kitson at Hengrave Hall, Co. Suf- 

 folk,* commencing 1st Oct. 1572, we find the following entry: — 



* Hengrave Hall, one of the finest Elizabethan buildings in this country, 

 which has a history that may be called national, and which has been 

 repeatedly illustrated in books and prints of architecture, has been sold, 

 with 4500 acres of land, to Mr. John Lysaght, an ironmaster of Bristol* — 

 The Athenceum, 7th Oct. 1893. 



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