224 
BRITISH BIRDS* 
bled from all parts to fee the fport. Dr .Plo% ^ 
in his natural Hiftory of Staffordfhire, publiflied in 
16865 gives the above particulars, and fays that in 
this manner as many have been caught in one 
morning as, v/hen fold at five fhillings, per dozen, 
(the ufual price at that time) produced the fum of 
twelve pounds ten Ihillings ; .and that in the feveral 
drifts on the few fucceeding days of this fport, they 
have been taken in fome years in fuch abundance, 
that their value, according to the above rate, was 
from thirty to fixty pounds — a gre^t fum in thofe 
days. Thefe were the See-Gulles of which we read 
as being fo plentifully provided at the great feafls of 
the ancient nobility and bifhops of this realm. Al- 
though the flefh of thefe birds is not now efteemed 
a dainty, and they are feldom fought after as an 
^ Dr Plot defcribes them as coming annually to certain 
pools in the eftate of the right worfhipful Sir Charles Skrym- 
flier, Knight, to build and breed, and to no other eftate but 
that of this family, in or near the county, to which they have 
belonged ultra hominum memorlam, and never moved from it, 
though they have changed their ftation often.” What the 
Doctor relates of the attachment of thefe birds to the head of 
that family, of their removal to another fpot immediately on 
his death, and of their returning again with the fame predilec- 
tion to his heir, is curious enough, although bordering very 
much upon the marvellous.- — Willoughby gives nearly the fame 
account in his excellent ornithology, publilhed in 1678, and 
computes the fale of the birds to amount to twenty-five pounds- 
per annum. 
