6 
Lost British Birds. 
gave protection to egg as well as to bird ; but in tbe case 
of this species, it was of no avail. It is not known when 
the crane ceased to breed in England, but it is certain that 
it continued to resort to our shores in considerable numbers 
down to nearly the end of the seventeenth century. 
Willoughby, in 1676 , says : “They come to us often in 
England, and in the fen counties, in Lincolnshire and Cam¬ 
bridgeshire, there are great flocks of them.” As to whether 
or no they bred at that time he says, “ I cannot certainly 
determine, either from my own knowledge or from the 
relation of any credible person.” 
At the present day the crane is a rare visitor—a lost 
wanderer from happier realms. The resonant, far-sounding 
cry of this noble bird—one of the most fascinating sounds of 
wild nature, especially when several individuals, as their 
custom is, unite their voices in a chorus—will probably never 
be heard again in England, except from captives in an en¬ 
closure. With the crane’s figure we are perhaps more 
familiar than with that of any other large species, and will 
be so as long as we continue to import decorative hangings, 
screens and pictures by the million from Japan. To that 
artistic people the crane is pre-eminent among birds for its 
beauty and stately grace as is the chrysanthemum among 
flowers. 
II. White Spoonbill —Platalea leucorodia. Of this 
strikingly handsome species, Sir Thomas Browne has the 
following notice in his Account of the Birds found in 
Norfolk: “ The Platea, or Shovelard, which build on the 
tops of high trees. They formerly built in the hernary at 
Claxton and Reedham, now at Trimley in Suffolk. They 
come in March, and are shot by fowlers, not for their meat, 
but for the handsomeness of the same ; remarkable in their 
white colour, copped crown, and spoon or spatule like bill.” 
The date of this record is 1678 , and shows that the 
passion for killing things, merely because they are beautiful 
when alive, is not a growth of the present time. Probably 
