Presents to the Judges. 
171 
ground' are continually intermingled, it is plain that formerly the 
Norfolk fens must have offered the fairest retreat of water birds. It is 
singular how universal has been the omission of this district amongst 
older writers on natural history. ” 
This author notices the preference our forefathers 
appear to have had for water over land birds as delicacies 
for the table. 
“ On the occasion of any festival,” he says (p. 67), “ the 
inhabitants of the marsh are found in the place of honour, and 
land birds are quite neglected. The same preference for fen birds, 
the waders especially, pervades the whole of the ‘L’Estrange’ house¬ 
keeping. Knotts and plovers, with the curlews, appear most prized ; 
a redshank is about one fourth the value of a plover; teal occur only 
twice, and the ruff is not mentioned. Pheasants and partridges appear 
several times, but only two or three at the most. The sea-pye (oyster- 
catcher) is in the list, and another mysterious fowl called a popeler, 
which is inserted in company with herons.” 
In an account of tbe expenses of the Judges of Assize, 
going the Western aud Oxford Circuits, between the years 
1596 and 1601, reprinted in the fourth volume of the 
Camden Miscellany, 1857, mention is made of a variety of 
birds which were sent as presents to the judges by the 
sheriffs of the different towns. In the introduction to the 
reprint we find a list of the various contributions :— 
“We do not now dress the bustard, one of which was given at 
Salisbury in 1600; or the heron; or the heronshawes, which came in 
at Salisbury, Dorchester, Exeter, and Launceston; the curlew, or the 
gull, or the puffin, which was a rarity met with in Cornwall alone; or 
the kite, cooked at Exeter. The peacock was once dressed at Chard ; 
the swan at Winchester, Salisbury, Andover, Taunton, and two cygnets 
at Oxford. Turkeys, then a rare bird, were presented on the earliest 
circuit in Cornwall; the heath-poults, now seldom met with in the 
west, were sent as presents at Salisbury, Dorchester, and Stafford ; and 
the heath-cock at Launceston. Pheasants, of which there were not 
many, and partridges, which were abundant, were killed on both 
Circuits in the months of June and July, and also in February. 
Quails, now very scarce, formed a portion of the presents in each of 
