in them; and therefore rather suppose that they were parts of a willow or alder, or some such aquatic tree.*

This lonely domain is a very agreeable haunt for many sorts of wild fowls, which not only frequent it in the winter, but breed there in the summer; such as lapwings, snipes, wild-ducks, and, as I have discovered within these few years, teals. Partridges in vast plenty are bred in good seasons on the verge of this forest, into which they love to make excursions; and in particular, in the dry summer of 1740 and 1741, and some years after, they swarmed to such a degree, that parties of unreasonable sportsmen killed twenty and sometimes thirty brace in a day.

But there was a nobler species of game in this forest, now extinct, which I have heard old people say abounded much before shooting flying became so common, and that was the heath-cock, or black game. When I was a little boy, I recollect one coming now and then to my father's table. The last pack remembered was killed about thirty-five years ago; and within these ten years one solitary grey hen was sprung by some beagles in beating for a hare. The sportsman cried out, "A hen

The remains of trees are found in most of the marshes in Great Britain; but the mosses in the north of England, and all those of Scotland, contain trees often of immense size. These are generally oak, birch, different willows, or alder, and the Scotch fir, pinus sylvestris. Being imbedded to considerable depths, they are sometimes in a perfect state, and completely saturated with the soil in which they lie. In the Highlands, the Scotch fir abounds, and retains so much resin as to be used for lights during winter, for which purpose it is dug out, dried, and split into narrow lengths.-W. J.

pheasant!" but a gentleman present, who had of ten seen black game in the north of England, as sured me that it was a grey hen.*

Nor does the loss of our black game prove the only gap in the Fauna Selborniensis; for another beautiful link in the chain of beings is wanting-J mean the red deer, which toward the beginning of this century amounted to about five hundred head, and made a stately appearance. There is an old keeper, now alive, named Adams, whose great grandfather (mentioned in a perambulation taken in 1635), grandfather, father, and self, enjoyed the head keepership of Wolmer forest in succession for more than an hundred years. This person assures me, that his father has often told him that Queen Anne, as she was journeying on the Portsmouth road, did not think the forest of Wolmer beneath her royal regard. For she came out of the great

Black game have increased greatly in the southern counties of Scotland and north of England within the last few years. It is a pretty general opinion, though an er roneous one, that they drive away the red grouse; the two species require very different kinds of cover, and will never interfere. It is to be regretted that some of our extensive and wealthy northern proprietors do not attempt the introduction of the wood grouse; extensive pine or birch forests, with quiet, would be all the requisites; and the birds themselves, or their young, could be very easily obtained; and at a trifling expense. In a late number of Mr J. Wilson's Zoological Illustrations, there is an excellent plate of the tetrao urophasianus of North America, a very handsome species, which, with some others lately discovered by Mr Douglas, might be introduced into this country, and form a fine addition to our feathered game. The little American partridge, the ortyx borealis of naturalists, has been in troduced, and is now plentiful, in some counties in England.-W. J.

road at Lippock, which is just by, and, reposing berself on a bank smoothed for that purpose, lying about half a mile to the east of Wolmer Pond, and still called Queen's Bank, saw with great complacency and satisfaction the whole herd of red deer brought by the keepers along the vale before her, consisting then of about five hundred head. A sight this, worthy the attention of the greatest sovereign! But he farther adds, that, by means of the Waltham blacks, or, to use his own expression, as soon as they began blacking, they were reduced to about fifty head, and so continued decreasing till the time of the late Duke of Cumberland. It is now more than thirty years ago that his highness sent down an huntsman, and six yeoman prickers, in scarlet jackets laced with gold, attended by the stag-hounds; ordering them to take every deer in this forest alive, and to convey them in carts to Windsor. In the course of the summer they caught every stag, some of which showed extraordinary diversion; but in the following winter, when the hinds were also carried off, such fine chases were exhibited as served the country people for matter of talk and wonder for years afterwards. I saw myself one of the yeomen prickers single out a stag from the herd, and must confess that it was the most curious feat of activity I ever beheld, superior to any thing in Mr Astley's ridingschool. The exertions made by the horse and deer much exceeded all my expectations; though the former greatly excelled the latter in speed. When the devoted deer was separated from his companions, they gave him, by their watches, law, as they called it, for twenty minutes; when, sound

22 FOREST OF WOLMER-DEER-STEALERS.

ing their horns, the stop-dogs were permitted to pursue, and a most gallant scene ensued.

VII.

THOUGH large herds of deer do much harm to the neighbourhood, yet the injury to the morals of the people is of more moment than the loss of their crops. The temptation is irresistible; for most men are sportsmen by constitution: and there is such an inherent spirit for hunting in human nature, as scarce any inhibitions can restrain. Hence, towards the beginning of this century, all this country was wild about deer-stealing. Unless he was a hunter, as they affected to call themselves, no young person was allowed to be pos sessed of manhood or gallantry. The Waltham blacks at length committed such enormities, that government was forced to interfere with that severe and sanguinary act called the Black act,* which now comprehends more felonies than any law that ever was framed before. And, therefore, a late bishop of Winchester, when urged to re-stock Walthamchase,† refused, from a motive worthy of a prelate, replying, that " It had done mischief enough already."

Our old race of deer-stealers are hardly extinct yet. It was but a little while ago that, over their ale, they used to recount the exploits of their youth; such as watching the pregnant hind to her lair, and, when the calf was dropped, paring its

Statute 9, Geo. I. c. 22.

+ This chase remains unstocked to this day; the bishop was Dr Hoadley.

feet with a penknife to the quick to prevent its escape, till it was large and fat enough to be killed; the shooting at one of their neighbours with a bullet in a turnip-field by moonshine, mistaking him for a deer; and the losing a dog in the following extraordinary manner :-Some fellows, suspecting that a calf new-fallen was deposited in a certain spot of thick fern, went with a lurcher to surprise it; when the parent-hind rushed out of the brake, and, taking a vast spring with all her feet close together, pitched upon the neck of the dog, and broke it short in two.

Another temptation to idleness and sporting, was a number of rabbits, which possessed all the hillocks and dry places; but these being inconvenient to the huntsmen, on account of their burrows, when they came to take away the deer, they permitted the country people to destroy them all.

Such forests and wastes, when their allurements to irregularities are removed, are of considerable service to neighbourhoods that verge upon them, by furnishing them with peat and turf for their firing; with fuel for the burning their lime; and with ashes for their grasses; and by maintaining their geese and their stock of young cattle at little

or no expense.

The manor farm of the parish of Greatham has an admitted claim, I see, (by an old record taken from the Tower of London,) of turning all live stock on the forest, at proper seasons, bidentibus exceptis.* The reason, I presume, why sheep+

For this privilege the owner of that estate used to pay to the king annually seven bushels of oats.

In the Holt, where a full stock of fallow-deer has been kept up till lately, no sheep are admitted to this day.