The history and antiquities of Boston, and the villages of Skirbeck, Fishtoft, Freiston, Butterwick, Benington, Leverton, Leake, and Wrangle; comprising the hundred of Skirbeck, in the county of Lincoln. Including also a history of the East, West, and Wildmore fens, and copious notices of the Holland or Haut-Huntre fen ... sketches of the geology, natural history, botany, and agriculture of the district; a very extensive collection of archaisms and provincial words, local dialect, phrases, proverbs, omens, superstitions, etc. By Pishey Thompson. Illustrated with one hundred engravings.

676 NATURAL HISTORY.
been banished from their ancient home by the ruthless hand of man, and the
husbandman and the shepherd have usurped the places of the fowler and fisherman.
The decoys in the East Fen were formerly objects of great interest to
travellers, and productive of much profit to their proprietors. The fowls taken
were principally the wild-duck or mallard, the teal, and the red-headed widgeon
of RAY. A good account of these decoys, and of the means by which the birds
were secured, is given in OLDFIELD'S "History of Wainfleet." In one season, a
few years previous to the inclosure of the Fens, ten decoys, five of which were
in the parish of Friskney, furnished 31,200 ducks, widgeon, and teal for the
London market.' FULLER says, "Lincolnshire may be called the aviary of
England, for the wild-fowl therein: 3000 mallards have been taken at a
draught." A large tree, which formerly stood on the western border of the
parish of Leake, and nearly adjoining the highroad from Leverton, was, for a
very long time, the resort of a very considerable number of that comparatively
rare bird, the heron. They used to arrive in February to repair their nests;
they settled there in spring, raised their young, and left the place in the autumn.
The tree was literally covered with their nests; it was taken down about
twenty-five years ago. Mr. PENNANT says, that " it is a mistake to suppose that
there are two species of herons, the crested one being only the male of the
other." We well remember hearing that singular and solitary bird, the bittern,
which the country people used to call the butter-bump, uttering its melancholy
"booming' from the low reedy parts of the then uninclosed Ings, or open
meadows, of this neighbourhood. We do not know by what means this bird
produced the immense body of sound which it frequently uttered; but we believe
that the idea expressed by the author of the " Seasons," that it, "With bill
engulphed, shook the surrounding marsh," has more of poetry than truth in it.
The bird itself, however, has become a rara avis, and we might almost as soon
expect to find a bustard on Lincoln Heath, as a bittern in the Fen district of
Holland.2
The following curious document, which refers to the swannery formerly on
the Witham, appears to be closely connected with the natural history of the
district, especially as a note on the preceding page tells us that swans were not
uncommon in the neighbourhood about seventy years ago: —
" These ordinances were made 24th day of May, in the 15 year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King Henry the VIIIth (1524), by the Lord Sir C'tofer Wyllaby, Sir Edward
Dimock, Mr. Gooderycke, Robert Barret, Pryor of Bardney, Mr. Cheston, Mr. Pennington,
and other justices of peace, and commissioners, appointed by our Sovereign Lord the King,
for the confirmation and the preservation of his Highness' game of Swans and signets, of
his stream of Witham, within his county of Lincoln, with all other cryckes, or syckes, or
OLDFIELD'S Wainfleet, p. 180, and appendix, I may be thus ascertained.-PEcK's Desiderata Curp. 2. In these times a flock of wild ducks has been iosa, vol. ii. p. 13.
observed passing along from the north and north- In the PERCY Household Book, anno 1512, the
east into the East Fen, in a continuous stream, for lapwing was called a wype, and sold for Id. each.
eight hours together. This bird is now called a pye wype in Lincolnshire.
2 At the wedding-dinner of Gervas Clifton and Wipa is still its Swedish name. At this time
Mary Neville, the following articles and their prices knotts and dotterells also sold for ld. each. SeaOccur, A.D. 1530:- gulls, plovers, woodcocks, and red shankes for l'd.
12 swans, every swan 6s. each; pigeons, ternes, and "snipes," 3 for Id.
8 cranes, every crane 3s. 4d. Styntes (also called purres), 6 for Id. Ruffes and
16 hearon-sews, every one 12d. rees, and partridges, were 2d. each. Bitterns,
10 butters (bitterns), every one 14d. kyrlews and hecaron seweys, and peacocks (no pea2 goiles of sturgeon, 6s. each. hens to be bought), 12d. each. The bustard is
At the same dinner oxen were charged 30s. each, a mentioned, but no price fixed, being " but for my
calf, 3s., alamb, ls. 6d., a weather, 2s. 4d., chickens, lord's own mess at principal feastes, and none other
18d. the dozen, wheat, 18s. the quarter, malt, 14s. tyme, except my lord's commandment be otherthe quarter. The comparative value of the birds wyse."-Antiquarian Repertory, vol. iv. p. 311.