MR. W. G. CLARKE ON BRECKLAND CHARACTERISTICS. 55t> 
for his own.” Lord Cranborne, however, wonders “ that 
any churl should kill anything that might afford his majesty 
his only recreation.” This notice appears to have been 
somewhat ineffective, for in 1607 instructions were sent to 
Sir Nicholas Bacon, Sir W. Walgrave, and Sir Robert Drury 
to take measures for the preservation of the King’s game in 
the parts of Norfolk and Suffolk within twelve miles of 
Thetford, offenders to be brought before the King or the 
Privy Council. Three years later the Duke of Wurtemburg 
came to Thetford with the King, and they “coursed the hare 
flew a hawk, and caught dotterels,” and watched trained 
cormorants catch fish in the river. In 1611 Thomas Cockayne 
was appointed for life keeper of the game on the rivers at 
Thetford, and at Royston, and in 1014 John Coward and his son 
were appointed keepers of the stags and hawks about Thetford. 
A warrant was issued to Sir Thomas Germaine in 1626 to 
preserve King Charles the First’s game within five miles of 
Thetford, and on February 17th. 1636, Sir Lionel Tollemache 
was ordered to preserve the king’s game of “hare, pheasant, 
partridge, and other wild fowl ” in Thetford and Ipswich, and 
within 12 miles thereof. After this there is no evidence that 
Thetford was used as a hunting centre by royalty. For 
pheasants we must suppose that there was woodland of some 
kind, and trees in Fakenham Wood, and at. Shadwell and 
Merton probably furnish evidence of ancient forests within 
the area known as Breckland. 
Yet that most of this was then open country is proved by 
various witnesses. In Camden’s ‘ Britannia ’ (1586). Norfolk 
is described as “ almost all champion,” and the soil in the 
west as “ poor. lean, and sandy.” In the account of Norfolk 
which Sir Henry Spelman wrote for John Speed in 1627 he 
said : “ The Champion aboundeth with Corne, Sheepe and 
Conies, and herein the barren heaths (as the providence of 
our Ancestors hath of old disposed them) are very profitable. 
For on them principally lie our Fould courses These 
Heaths by the compasture of the sheep (which we call Tathe) 
are made so rich with corne, that when they fall to be sowne, 
they commonly match the fruitfullest grounds in other 
