;268 The Animal-Lore of Shakspeave s Time . 
Mr. Halting gives a long and animated description. 
Heron ^ rom Freeman and Salvin’s work on falconry, 
of the sport of Heron-hawking. It is some¬ 
what curious that Shakspeare, notwithstanding his evident 
love of hawking, and his intimate knowledge of the terms 
employed in this sport, should not once make mention of 
the heron by name, • except in the disputed “ handsaw ” 
passage. 
Bearing somewhat the same relation to the recreation 
of the nobles of the Tudor period as the fox does to the 
hunting squires of our own times, “ the heron so gaunt ” 
was of course carefully preserved, and with about the same 
amount of consideration for its personal feelings. A law 
was passed forbidding the capture of herons except by 
means of hawking, or with the long bow. 
There is much variety in the spelling of the name of 
this bird—harnsey, heronsewe, hornseu, hernshaw, hern, 
and heyronsewe, all being met with. 
The heron was esteemed a great delicacy, and stood at 
the head of the game course at every state banquet. 
The price of an egret, or dwarf heron, in the time of 
Edward I., was eighteen pence, the very highest as¬ 
sessed price of water fowl in those days. 
In the accounts of the great feasts of the Tudor period 
the word egret or egriite sometimes appears, and in the 
time of Henry IV. it is said that a thousand egrets were 
served up at a single entertainment. It has been sug¬ 
gested that lapwings were here intended, this name being- 
given to them from the aigrette, or tuft of feathers 
forming the crest, which this bird possesses. This is 
possible as far as this particular entry is considered, but 
in John Bussell’s Boke of Nurture, 1450, among the 
instructions as to how various dishes are served and 
seasoned, we find:— 
“ Sauce gamelyn to lieyron-sewe, egret, crane and plover, 
Also brewe, curlew, sugre and salt, with watere of the ryvere, 
