Read Ebook: Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood Historical Anecdotal Physiographical and Archaeological with Other Matter by Walter J Conway James Conway

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 1377 lines and 129178 words, and 28 pages

There are some rather curious facts in connection with the brown English partridge and the French variety. Though different in their habits, and, it is said, even hostile to each other, they yet, in some instances, consort. I once shot on the moor three brown and one red-leg, out of the same covey, all young birds. They had evidently been reared together in one brood, and the old birds were of the brown species. Mentioning this to a friend of large experience, he told me that he had known several instances where the eggs of the two kinds had been found laid in the same nest. The eggs are, of course, easily distinguishable, those of the common partridge being of a greenish drab colour, while those of the red-leg are of a dull, cream colour, covered with small brown spots. I have been informed by another authority that the eggs of the red-leg have also been found in the nest of an outlying pheasant. A curious provision of nature, conducing to the preservation of the species, may be here mentioned as interesting; the partridge, while sitting on her eggs, has no scent. On one occasion a man was consulting me about a tombstone at St. Andrew's Church, Woodhall. We walked into the churchyard together, and stood conversing opposite the grave in question. I was aware that a partridge was sitting on her nest concealed in the grass between that grave and the next, and therefore would not approach very near. Suddenly I perceived that he had a terrier with him, which was very busily hunting over the churchyard. I begged him to keep it in. He was rather indignant, and replied that it could do no harm in the churchyard. I remarked that he was not aware that within eight or ten feet of us a partridge was on her nest, and I did not wish her to be disturbed. He thereupon called in his dog, but that only brought his dog nearer to the nest, hunting the while; and the dog actually passed over the nest without scenting the bird. The eggs were hatched the next day, and that doubtless accounted for her sitting so closely. Whether or not from an instinctive consciousness of this safeguard is not for me to say, but the partridge is rather given to selecting her nesting place near a highway or a footpath. I have known several instances of this, and only last year I repeatedly saw both the parent birds sitting on their nest together, on a bank close to a public footpath which was daily traversed.

To show how closely a partridge will continue to sit, under very trying circumstances, I give here an anecdote of what occurred in a parish adjoining Woodhall Spa, as it was related to me by the chief witness, the Squire himself.

In a meadow adjoining Roughton Hall, a partridge made her nest in a slight depression of the surface. The meadow was, in due course, mown, the mower passing his scythe over her without injuring her, and unaware of her presence, the depression having still enough grass to conceal the nest. The field was afterwards "tedded," i.e., the grass was tossed about by a machine, which again passed over the nest, still leaving her unscathed and unmoved. In the process of "cocking," the field was next horse-raked, the rake passing over the nest, with the same result. One of the haymakers, however, nearly trod on the nest; this drove the bird off, behind him, so that he did not observe it. But a friend was near at hand. The squire, seeing the bird fly away, went to the spot, found the hidden nest, and counted in it the unusual number of 19 eggs . He at once removed to a distance all the hay lying near, to prevent her being disturbed again, and watched the result. Within a quarter of an hour the partridge quietly returned to her nest. Ten days later she successfully brought off a brood of seventeen, two bad eggs remaining in the nest. Of course, as the hatching time draws near, the mother, feeling the young lives under her, sits more persistently than at an earlier period; but surely this mother partridge exhibited a remarkable instance of fidelity to maternal instinct, after passing through no less than four trying ordeals.

Of wild pigeons we have three kinds: the common woodpigeon or ringdove, of which there are large flocks; the stockdoves, which go in pairs, and build their nest on a solitary stump or tree, or occasionally in a rabbit hole. The turtledove, though common in the south of England, is a migratory bird, and in these parts not a constant visitor. A "wave" of them spread over the Midland counties in 1895, and since that they have been seen in smaller numbers. The late Mr. J. Cordeaux, F.R.G.S., M.B.O.U., one of our greatest authorities, says that its note is lower and more of a querulous murmur than that of the ringdove. In size it is not much larger than a missel thrush.

The first of these pigeons is the bird named the "Culver," in old writings, as Spencer sings in romantic ditty:--

Like as the culver, on the bared bough, Sits mourning for the absence of her mate, And in her song breathes many a wistful vow For his return, who seems to linger late, So I, alone, now left disconsolate. Mourn to myself the absence of my love, And sitting here, all desolate, Seek with my plaints to match that mournful dove.

Of woodpeckers we have on the moor and in Bracken Wood at times, three kinds: the common green species which is generally plentiful; the lesser spotted , not seen every year, but occasionally; and, still less frequently seen, the larger spotted . Of the former of these spotted kinds, seeing three together, I shot one a few years ago; and the keeper shot another for me more recently, for our Naturalists' Museum at Lincoln.

Of the "birds of prey," so called, the greatest part are extinct, or nearly so, too often from a mistaken belief in their destructiveness; whereas they are really useful allies of the farmer, if not also of the sportsman. In the cause of the latter, they, for the most part destroy the weakly members, so conducing towards keeping up a vigorous breed, and for the farmer they destroy smaller vermin, the mice which, but for them, would multiply until they become a plague. In the year 1890, a very large bird was reported as being seen about the woods near Woodhall, but I could not get a sight of it myself, nor could I get anyone else to give a description of it, except that it was very large. After a time it disappeared from Woodhall, and was reported as being seen for a time about Revesby, and on November 8th an eagle was shot by the son of a farmer residing at Tupholme Hall, in a wood at Southrey belonging to Mr. Vyner. It proved to be a male bird, in good condition, measuring 6ft. 7in. across the wings, and weighing 11lbs. I rode over to see it, but it had been sent to the taxidermist to be stuffed. It was a sea eagle . The kite used to be common 40 years ago; its presence being notified by our hens cackling, and ducks quacking, as they called together their broods, when they espied it soaring at a considerable height above. If a reckless chick, or duckling, neglected to take the warning, and seek shelter beneath the mother's wings, there was for a moment a rushing sound, a general confusion in the poultry yard, a half-smothered scream, and the kite flew away with a victim in its claws. I have seen this more than once myself. The kite is now quite extinct in this neighbourhood. The same may be said of the buzzard . Although their food was chiefly mice and small birds; perhaps occasionally game, but not generally; since, though a very fine bird in appearance, they were not rapid enough on the wing to overtake the partridge in full flight; yet the keepers waged war against them "to the knife." Many is the buzzard I have seen nailed up with the pole-cats and other vermin in the woods at Woodhall. But they are now seen no more, and a handsome and comparatively harmless ornament of our sylvan scenery is gone beyond recall.

The Hen-Harrier , a more active bird than the buzzard, is another of the "Ichabods." Its last known nesting place was on the top of "The Tower on the Moor," near Woodhall. As a boy, the writer has climbed that tower for the eggs, and he has now a very fine specimen of the old bird stuffed, measuring about 40 inches across, from tip to tip of the wings. These birds were wont to fly at higher game than the buzzard, and doubtless did at times destroy partridges; but they also fed largely on water-rats and frogs, and were not above gorging themselves on carrion. The female is larger than the male.

The beautiful little Merlin was also seen, though not common, twenty-five or thirty years ago. It was a very plucky little bird, and I have seen one strike down a partridge larger in bulk than itself. This is gone, never to return.

The Sparrow-Hawk survives, although in diminished numbers; and this indeed is the only one of the hawks against which "my voice should be for open war." It is very destructive and very daring in the pursuit of its quarry. A connection of my own was sitting in a room facing the garden at the Victoria Hotel, Woodhall, when a sparrow-hawk dashed after its prey, broke the glass of the window, and fell stunned on the floor of the room. The female in this kind also is larger than the mate. This bird will kill young ducks and chickens, and partridges, and even pheasants.

The Kestrel also still survives, and we do not grudge it a prolonged lease of life. It feeds chiefly upon mice and small birds, cockchafers, and other insects; is a graceful object as it hangs lightly hovering at a considerable height in the air; with its keen vision detects its small prey half hidden in the grass or stubble, and then with lightning rapidity, drops like a stone upon it, and bears it away. I have kept kestrels and sparrow-hawks and tamed them; and the former will become tractable and almost affectionate, but the latter is a winged Ishmaelite, and very treacherous, and if allowed a little liberty, it generally ends in his making his escape.

Owls are still, I am glad to say, plentiful. They are amongst the farmers' greatest feathered friends, killing enormous quantities of mice, which otherwise would damage his crops. We have three kinds on the moor or in the woods: 1st--the barn owl, or screech owl ; 2nd--the wood or brown owl ; 3rd--the horned-owl . The two last are very much alike in both size and colour, but the last has two tufts of feathers rising on each aide of the head, from which it gets its name of horned-owl. I have a note among my shooting records: "Dec. 5th, 1872, shot Bird Hag Wood, in Kirkstead, put up about a dozen owls." These would be the "horned" kind. Five were shot on that occasion, but as a rule they have been carefully spared, one only occasionally being killed as a specimen for stuffing. Within the nineties, being out with my gun, on the moor, when the ground was covered with snow, I passed by a solitary thick Scotch fir, when an owl flew out. I wanted a specimen for a friend who was staying with me, and I shot it. The report created quite a commotion within the tree, and some twenty owls were immediately flying about me. Not being likely to settle in the snow, and apparently dazed by the glare of the sun reflected from the snow, I left them as quickly as I could, to recover their composure, and return to the sheltered quarters in which they had congregated. Hunting, as they do, almost entirely by night, they have little opportunity of interfering with the game, nor is it their propensity to do so. There are three very ancient hollow oak trees in "The Arbours" Wood in Kirkstead. These are a favourite resort of the barn owl.

The carrion crow still nests on the moor, although the eggs are taken every season. But the old birds are very wary, and manage to keep out of shot. The common rook, however, of late years, has got a bad name, as having taken up the marauding habits of the genuine crow. Owing to the improved cultivation of land, there is not now the supply of grubs on which the rook used to feed, and they have taken to hunting for the eggs of partridge and pheasant, and may be seen "quartering" the ground as methodically as a pointer or setter. They are strongly suspected of killing the young as well as rifling the nests of eggs, and the Scotch keepers complain of their depredations on the moors, among the young grouse.

A writer in the "Yorkshire Poet" says that black game are decreasing in the Border counties, as the rooks destroy the eggs.

This completes the list of the larger birds frequenting the neighbourhood. As I write this chapter, a letter from an old friend says that he well remembers the number of night-jars which were to be heard "churring" about Woodhall on a summer's evening. This bird , locally called fern-owl, comes to us about May. I have a note: "May 23rd, 1873, the first night-jar heard." During the daytime, the visitor, walking quietly through the woodland paths near the Victoria Hotel, may, if he has a keen eye, see the night-jar lying flat upon the branch of an oak, hardly indeed perceptible, owing to its colour being so near that of the brown bark. Then, towards evening, it may be seen taking its short and wonderfully rapid flights, and you may hear its bills snap together as it catches the moths and cockchafers on which it feeds. It breeds on the moor, the nest generally being laid on the ground among the bracken; whence its name of fern-owl. The old idea of its sucking the goat or cow, from the former of which it gets its classical name caprimulgus , is, of course, long since exploded. The churring note is seldom heard except when it is at rest on a branch of a tree.

The brilliant little Kingfisher , the most gay in colour of all our birds, may still sometimes be seen, darting about the only rivulet which we can boast of at Woodhall, and which rejoices in the unattractive name of "The Sewer," although its water, welling up at its source near Well Syke Wood, is beautifully clear and pure. The occurrence, however, of the bird here is rare. An old inhabitant of Kirkby assures me that it is not uncommon on the river Bain, in that parish; and of late years, partly through the writer's influence, it may be seen on the rivers Bain or Waring, in the heart of Horncastle, unmolested, and even fed, by the people.

The Grey Fly Catcher is fairly common on our lawns, where it will sit quietly on a garden seat, or roller, and thence take its short jerky flight after the flies. I have known it to nest year after year, at the Vicarage, in a hole in the wall, where an iron ventilator was broken.

The Wryneck is a somewhat uncommon bird at Woodhall, though a pretty one. For several years it also frequented the Vicarage garden, sometimes four or five of them, during the summer months. One year there were so many that I shot one and had it stuffed, and I found that at the same time a noble Marquis was having two stuffed, as being rather rare. It is called in some parts of the country the "weet" bird, from its peculiar note; other authorities say that the note is represented by the words, "Peel, peel," or "Peep-peep." I should myself say "Snipe, snipe" was nearer to the sound, and a writer compares it to the sound of Punch, in the old show of "Punch and Judy," which I think comes nearer to my own interpretation. The body of this bird is in colour a mixture of grey and brown, but its tail and wings are most beautifully marked with dark zig-zag bars, which make it very handsome. In size it is between the blackbird and the lark. Like the woodpecker, it has a very long tongue, which is covered with a glutinous matter, and which it inserts into the grass roots or tree bark, in search of its food.

I give here a list of birds which I have stuffed, all of which were killed in this neighbourhood:--Night-jar , wry neck , buff blackbird , razorbill , little auk , ruff , green sand piper , snipe , water rail , golden plover , woodcock , large spotted wood pecker , hawfinch , cuckoo , jay , French partridge , turtledove , horned owl , hen harrier , kestrel , peregrine falcon , piebald pheasant , buff pheasant, cormorant , jay , heron , horned owl .

In times gone by, never to return, the numbers and variety of wild fowls frequenting the Witham, with its "sykes and meres," was something extraordinary. Charles Kingsley doubtless wrote, if not of his own knowledge, yet, at furthest, at second hand, when he gave the following description: "Grand it was, while dark green alders and pale green reeds stretched for miles . . . where the coot clanked, and the bittern boomed, and the sedgebird, not content with its own sweet song, mocked the notes of all the birds around . . . far off upon the silver mere would rise a puff of smoke from a punt, invisible from its flatness. Then down the wind came the boom of the great stanchion-gun; and after that another sound, louder as it neared; a cry as of all the bells of Cambridge, and all the hounds of Cottesmore; and overhead rushed and whirled the skeins of terrified wildfowl, screaming, piping, clacking, croaking, filling the air with the hoarse rattle of their wings; while, clear above all, sounded the wild whistle of the curlew, and the trumpet note of the wild swan." "Prose Idylls," The Fens.

The living clouds on clouds arose, Infinite wing! Till all the plume-dart air And rude resounding shore was one wild cry.

Of the swans, we may observe that not only did this bird, in its wild state, frequent the Witham and the Fen waters, but the swannery was a valuable possession. The Abbots of Bardney and Kirkstead owned swanneries on the Witham. . The swans of various owners were distinguished by marks on the upper mandible, and there were no less than 97 different swan marks on the Witham. A rhyming list of the birds of the Witham is given in Drayton's Polyolbion , too long to quote here; suffice it to say that one parish alone, near Boston, some 60 years ago, sent 30,000 wild fowl in a year to London--. The bird's captured by net were dunlins, knots, ruffs, reeves, red-shanks, lapwings, golden plovers, curlews, godwits, etc. One fowler stated that he had so taken 24 dozen lapwings in one day, and four dozen and nine at one time.--Stevenson's "Birds of Norfolk," vol. i., p. 57. Other birds shot by the fowlers were mallard, teal, widgeon, whimbrells, grebes of several kinds, and the "yelping" avocet. A relative of the present writer owned a decoy, where some 20,000 wild ducks were taken, within his own recollection, in one season.

We now come to the last bird which I shall name in this somewhat lengthy list; a goddess among birds, as someone has almost literally called her, "oemula divini suavissima carminis ales"; and the old Scotch poet, William Drummond, of Hawthornden, says:--

Sweet artless songster! thou my mind dost raise To airs of spheres--yes, and to angels' lays.

while quaint old Isaac Walton says: "She breathes such sweet music from her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think that miracles are not yet ceased." The nightingale was first heard in my own garden, at the vicarage, Woodhall Spa, in the spring of 1876. Having heard it at Cambridge, in the South of England, and also in Italy, I immediately recognised the note, and at first was delighted at the arrival of this new visitor to Woodhall Spa, who did not come needing the water, and complaining of aches and pains, but to delight everyone with its rich flood of song. And having thus found its way here, it has further found the attractions of Woodhall so great that, although favouring no other place in the neighbourhood, it has continued its annual visits ever since, and has brought its kindred in increasing numbers. But, although charmed at first with its melody, the novelty wore off; and when, night after night, there were three or four of these birds waking the echoes beneath my bedroom window, trying in jealous rivalry each to outdo the other in compassing the whole gamut, "in the rich mazes of sound," my admiration considerably abated, and I became rather disposed to vote the performance a veritable surfeit of song, to the utter banishment of much-needed slumber. Before, however, I had arrived at this prosaic way of viewing the "Queen of Song," I composed in its honour the following lines, with which I shall close this chapter on the Birds of Woodhall:--

TO THE NIGHTINGALE. 2 a.m., April 27.

How from that tiny throat, Songster of night! Flows such a wealth of note, Full of delight; Trembling with resonance, Rapid and racy, Sinking in soft cadence, Gushing with ecstasy, Dying away, All in their turns; Plaintive and gay, Thrilling with tones aglow, Melting in murmurs low, Till one's heart burns?

No! not alone art thou; One there's above, e'en now, "Whose mercy's over all," "Who sees the sparrow fall;" "To Him the night is day," He hears thy matin lay, High o'er us all.

Through the hushed, slumb'ring air, Thy accents raise, For all his loving care Incense of praise; Thrilling with happiness, Full with content, Still asking His goodness, Prayer with praise blent.

Little thou mayest be, Yet art His care; He, too, has given thee Gifts rich and rare. Still, then, thy voice upraise, Still chant thy Maker's praise While we are rapt in sleep, Still thou thy vigil keep; Still let some earthly cry Go to our God on high; Humbly, yet fervently, piercingly call, Call for His watchfulness over us all.

It is the inevitable, if regretful, duty of the recorder of the past to have to inscribe "Obiit" over the mention of many an individual who comes under his notice, and this applies to the four-footed animals, as well as to the birds and the wild flowers, of Woodhall. Of some of the most interesting, it must be said that they are gone, and their place knoweth them no more.

The first I may mention is the Badger. This animal used to be fairly common in these parts; whether it is now quite extinct is difficult to say, because its nocturnal habits, and very retiring disposition, prevent it coming much under the observation of man. It is supposed still to harbour in the rocks at Holbeck, some nine miles from Woodhall. A specimen was captured at Woodhall about the year 1885, frequenting some rabbit holes in a bank, at that time belonging to myself, and within 100 yards of the present blacksmith's shop on the Stixwould-road. Another was captured a few years before in the adjoining parish of Martin, which I have stuffed. At an earlier date one was taken by a man named Thomas Norris, at Well Syke Wood, some two miles from Woodhall Spa.

The next wild animal to be named as fairly common at Woodhall is the Fox. The locality, indeed, has been for many years a stronghold of Reynard, as was to be expected, in a district where the woods are so extensive, although by no means so extensive as they were within the writer's recollection. On one occasion, some 14 or 15 years ago, we had the Burton hounds, and the South Wold, over the same ground, in the same morning, within hearing, if not within sight, of each other. The Ostler Ground, especially from the thick and warm cover afforded by the heather, may be said to be a nursery for foxes for the supply of the neighbourhood. Not long ago there were six earths; and there are still three, which are carefully preserved; and the bark of the dog-fox or the answering scream of the vixen may be heard almost any night, in different directions, while out foraging. So thick is the cover, in parts, that the hounds frequently fail to penetrate it; and, after the pack have gone away without a find, I have almost trodden upon a fox, on one occasion upon a brace of them, still lying snugly among the "ling" in security. The fox does much less harm than is commonly supposed. It will not disturb other game if it can get rabbits, and it will not take rabbits if it can get rats. A very old sporting farmer has repeatedly assured me that although he had a rabbit warren near his farmstead, the rabbits were left undisturbed, and even his chickens were safe, so long as there were rats to be captured in his corn-stacks, or in the banks about his farm-buildings. The first fox which the writer ever saw, was brought by a Woodhall man, named Hare, to his father. It had been caught in a trap by the leg, and had attempted to bite its own foot off, in order to effect its escape. It was kept until the injured limb had recovered, and was then sent to his friend, the M.F.H. The writer's own recollections of fox-hunting go back to the days of the famous Jack Musters, the Squire of Colwick and Annesley, who married Mary Chaworth, the object of Lord Byron's passionate admiration. Sometime in the forties he hunted our own South Wold country. He was indeed "a character." Though said by the Prince Regent to be "the most perfect gentleman he had ever met," yet, in the hunting field, his language and his actions were most violent. The writer has still clearly impressed on his memory an occasion at Woodhall, when, as a boy of 12 years old, mounted on a small pony, and with the hounds running hard, he endeavoured to open a gate for the impatient M.F.H., and, on his not being able to accomplish this quickly enough, he was assailed with such a flood of invective, and torrent of oaths, that he was forced to withdraw from the attempt in confusion and bewilderment. But, if the sportsman who crossed his path was not spared by "Jack," as he was familiarly called, neither was any unfortunate hound which offended him. On one occasion, a young hound, at High-hall Wood, near Woodhall, was guilty of chasing a hare. The whole "field" was in consequence pulled up; one of the whips was ordered to bring the delinquent forward. The thong of his hunting crop was twisted round the hound's neck, and while he on foot held the poor brute in this way, the other whip dismounted and belaboured it with his whip until he was himself too exhausted to flog any more. The whole field were kept looking on at this display of wholesome discipline, and when it was over the hound was left lying on the ground, almost strangled and a mass of contused weals, to recover its consciousness and limp after the departing pack, as best it could. The painful impression made upon the young mind of one devoted to animals, and tender of their feelings, remains still as an unpleasant memory, from which it recoils.

At one of our meets, a fox was found in Bracken Wood, which, after giving us a good run round the neighbourhood, eventually took refuge in a cottage near High-hall Wood. Entering by the open door, it mounted the ladder which formed the staircase to the one bedroom above; there it crept under the bed. The hounds hunted all round the premises, but the door having been shut by the occupier, an aged, retired keeper, and there being a strong wind which blew the scent from the door, his retreat was not discovered. He remained in this place of concealment until the hounds had gone to a safe distance, and then, descending by the ladder, bolted out of the door and made off, verifying the adage of Erasmus ,

That same that runnith a awaie Againe maie fighte ane other daie.

The well-known cunning of the fox is shewn in the following:--A favourite "find" for many yeans has been Thornton Wood, some three miles from Woodhall Spa; and a frequent line for the fox to take was from that covert to Holme Wood, near Scrivelsby. To accomplish this the Horncastle Canal and the small river Bain have to be crossed. The writer, as a boy, has swum the canal on his pony, at the tail of the pack; but usually riders have to make a detour by a bridge, between the first and second locks on the canal. During the intervals of ten minutes or a quarter of an hour required for this, the hounds are left to themselves. It happened on two or three occasions that in this interval the scent suddenly failed, and the fox was lost; casts were made up and down the river, but without success. On one occasion, a labourer, working in the grass field between the canal and the Bain, saw the fox cross the canal by the lock doors, over which there was a narrow plank-bridge for foot-passengers. It then made across the field for the Bain. He saw it pass out of sight down the banks of the river, close by a willow tree, overhanging the water; but it did not emerge on the other side. With the lack of quick wit, characteristic of the clod-hopper, it did not occur to him to mention this at the time. He told it, however, afterwards to his master, a hunting man; and, on a subsequent occasion, when the same incident occurred again, one of the whips dismounted and went into the water, and, poking about the roots of the willows, dislodged Reynard, concealed under the hollow bank, and immersed under water, except his nose and mouth, by which he was hanging suspended from a fang of the tree roots. Surely Reynard's clever ruse deserved a better fate than the death which speedily followed.

The following incident occurred under my own observation. I was out shooting in Woodhall. In a certain field I had put up a hare, which went away, without a shot. Passing, in due course, to the next field, I observed an object sitting, so far as I could make out, in a crouching position, in the middle of the field, and it looked in the distance like a man. I proceeded towards it, and soon perceived that it was a fox, sitting up on his hindquarters. At this moment a hare, presumably that which I had put up just before, entered the field and cantered leisurely in the direction of the fox. As sportsmen are aware, the hare, though able to see behind it, or on either side, does not, from the peculiar position of the eyes, see so well straight in front. In this case, the hare never perceived the fox until it was within a few feet of it; whereupon it stopped short, and the two sat up facing each other, evidently mutually fascinated, as the bird is said to be by the snake. They thus remained motionless, or powerless to move, for some minutes, until my nearer approach attracted their attention and broke the spell, whereupon they both bounded off in different directions. This, I am told by an authority, was a case of neurasthenia, or nerve-paralysis. A not quite similar occurrence was recorded some little time ago. A farmer saw a pheasant go to roost in a tree, standing alone in the field. Presently he saw a fox approach, go to the tree, and look up at the pheasant. After pausing for a moment, regarding the bird, he proceeded to run rapidly round the tree in a narrow circle. This he did for some time, continuing his circuit without intermission; when, to the farmer's astonishment, the pheasant fell from its roost, and before it reached the ground was seized by the fox, who went off with his prey to a neighbouring plantation. This would seem to have been a case of hypnotism, rather than neurasthenia. The bird was mesmerised, or made giddy, by the fox's circular motion, and literally fell into the operator's arms.--. The writer, when travelling in Germany, once met a German gentleman, who had visited country houses in England, and had conceived a great admiration for the English sport of fox-hunting. "Ah," he said, "we have nothing like it in Germany. It is a grand institution. It makes you good horsemen, good soldiers, good judges of country and distance." To those who would object to fox-hunting on the score of its cruelty, I would quote words used at a church congress, by Colonel Hornby, master of the Devon and Somerset Staghounds. Speaking on "The Ethics of Amusements," he said: "The exercise of hunting is productive of the most beneficial effects on both mind and body. There could be no hunting without suffering to the animal hunted, but this was greatly exaggerated. These animals were born to be hunted by other wild animals; we had destroyed the latter, and our hunting was more merciful. The pain inflicted was no equivalent to the pleasure afforded to hounds and horses, leaving men out of the question. The true lover of sport was a lover of mercy as well. Every sportsman, in the true sense of the word, did all in his power to lessen the suffering."--Quoted, "Guardian," Oct. 17, 1894, p. 1,620.

The days are gone by when gentlemen "of the cloth" were common in the hunting field. Yet I have known some of the hardest working clergymen, and the most sincere, earnest Christians, who saw no excessive cruelty in the chase. We have no "Jack Russels" among us now; the last of the type who lived in our neighbourhood found a dead fox in his pulpit, when he ascended it to preach his sermon one Sunday morning; and though he did not deliver a funeral oration over it, it was said that he buried it with as much loving reverence and genuine grief, as if it had been a Christian parishioner.

A meet of the foxhounds at that favourite tryst, the "Tower on the Moor," near to Woodhall Spa, presents a pretty and lively scene. Besides the red-coated sportsman, there are riders, with horses of every degree, from the barebacked, or rudely saddled "screw," to the 100 guinea or 200 guinea hunter; and from the "weedy" hack to the long, elastic-legged animal of racing blood. There are numerous vehicles, two-wheeled and four-wheeled, with their varied occupants, from the butcher's light cart to the phaeton or the drag. There are numbers on foot, of both sexes; some of the men, staid of mein and beyond middle life, have already walked their miles; townsmen, for once, breaking away from their trade, or their business, and bent once more on breathing the fresh air on the heather, and listening again to the "echoing horn," as it vibrates through the woods. There are ladies, on horseback, eager for the burst across country "in the first flight"; there are ladies on cycles, not yet arrived at the degree of perfection to enable the fair riders to take a "bee-line," but yet, from the speed attainable, able to make rapid detours, and if they study the wind, and are familiar with the "lay" of the country, likely to see almost as much of the sport as the best-mounted. All are bent on the healthy enjoyment of this thoroughly English pastime. Their thoughts might find echo in the old hunting song,

Tally-ho! Tally-ho! Let the foreigner know We are Englishmen: so, Tally-ho! Tally-ho!

The neighbourhood of Woodhall combines lands of a wild unreclaimed nature, such as the Ostler Ground and other moorlands, in the parishes of Thornton, Martin, Roughton, Kirkby and Tattershall, and closely contiguous, and even mixed up with these, lands which are in an advanced state of cultivation. I have already mentioned a tract of waste, boggy ground, lying between the Tower on the Moor and Bracken Wood, formerly the haunt of wild fowl, and still called "The Bogs Neuk." The origin of this ground was probably the following:--The old antiquary, Leland, writing of "The Tower," says, "one of the Cromwelles builded a pretty turret, caullid the Tower on the Moore, and thereby he made a faire greate pond or lake, bricked about. The lake is commonly called the Synkker." This "lake," and all trace of it, have entirely disappeared; but it is probable that the decay of its "bricked" walls, or of whatever the environment may really have been, led to the escape of the water, and the creation of the tract of swamp, which remained until recent years. Similarly the Ostler Ground was, within the writer's recollection, a much wilder tract, and its woods more extensive than at present. Some 300 acres of wood were destroyed by fire, through accident, about the year 1847. This happened at night, and, seen from a distance, it looked like a vast American prairie conflagration, the heavens being tinged with a lurid light far and wide. At that time the plantations opposite the Tower were of Scotch fir, so dense that the rays of the sun could scarcely penetrate. The roads, as I have previously stated, were little more than cart tracts, often shifting; and the whole tract was almost as little frequented, or disturbed, as if it had been in the heart of the Black Forest of Germany. In the centre of this wild were two or three fields belonging to another property, where roamed a herd of small, shaggy cattle, which, shut out as they were from the rest of the world, became almost wild; and when, on occasions, the foxhounds penetrated to their haunts, they frantically broke through all bounds, and for some days afterwards would be found scattered about the open country around. This tract of wood and moor has been for many years the prettiest bit of wild shooting anywhere in this neighbourhood for many miles round. There is not, at the present time, anything like the amount of game upon it which was to be found only a few years ago; drainage and several very dry seasons, as also two or three accidental fires, having killed much of the ling, and reduced very considerably the amount of cover. Still, to the genuine sportsman who thinks more of a varied bag than of the slaughter of numbers, it affords great attractions, and the writer has enjoyed many a happy day of healthy relaxation, with dog and gun, upon it. The variety of birds now, or formerly, to be seen, have been described already. The ground game upon it now, apart from the fox, are the hares and rabbits; of these I shall speak more at length presently. If the Moor ground has afforded fair sport of a wild and varied character, the shooting in the adjoining domain of Kirkstead, in hares and partridges, has been also much superior to the rest of the neighbourhood, with the one exception of Tattershall, which has been nearly as good. On one occasion, being one of a party of five, the writer was stationed at the north-east corner of "The Arbours Wood," in Kirkstead, to shoot the hares which passed that point, while the rest of the sportsmen walked the wood with the beaters. In the space of about one hour and a quarter, without moving from his position, he shot 56 hares. At one moment he had 16 hares lying dead before him; and he could have shot many more, but that, from the rapid firing, his gun barrels became, at times, so hot that he was afraid to load, and the hares were allowed to pass him, and escape unmolested.

We occasionally find on the Ostler Ground an unusual hybrid between hare and rabbit, a notice of which may be of some interest to the naturalist. As its occurrence has led to a good deal of correspondence, I will give here a summary of the observations made upon it as they were stated by me at a meeting of the Lincolnshire Naturalists' Union. Among other persons who made enquiry about it was Mr. Walter Heape, of Cambridge, who has made the subject of hybrids a special study. He asked my reasons for supposing the animal to be such a cross. My reply was as follows:--

The animal is the size of a hare.

Its fur is the rabbit grey.

The head is the shorter, and the ears the more pricked and shorter, of the rabbit.

One which I shot at, and missed in the ling, bolted straight for a hole, as though accustomed to it, and I never knew a hare to go to ground in that ready way.

A tradition has long attached to the Moor that the hare and rabbit do occasionally inter-breed.

Mr. Heape replied:--"I am aware that many naturalists deny that hares and rabbits will breed together. I am not, however, myself of that opinion, but I never had satisfactory proof of such a cross occurring." Further enquiry led to the following facts:--In the year 1773 the Abbe Domenico Gagliari got two litters from a female hare by a male rabbit. Richard Thursfield also got hybrid's of these two species. M. Roux, in 1847, established a breed of "Leporides" in Angonleme, where he bred largely hybrids of hares and rabbits, and these hybrids were fertile with both parent species and among themselves. Baron de Gleichen states that at Hoching, Canton de la Prusse, Polonaise, hybrids of hare , and rabbits are generally known. He says, however, that M. Brocca, the French savant, states that there are anatomical differences between hare and rabbit which make it, antecedently, improbable that they should inter-breed. I have myself shot three of these hybrids on the Ostler Ground, and have one of them stuffed. In the year 1897 Sir Henry Hawley shot a similar specimen in Haltham Wood, some five miles from Woodhall; more recently , the Rev. C. E. Chapman, then rector of Scrivelsby, shot another in New York Fen; one was occasionally seen on the Ostler Ground in 1898, and one was mentioned in "Land and Water," March 5, 1892, as having been shot on the Moors, at Parkend, in Northumberland. I may add that a cross between a rabbit and guinea pig is in the possession of a person at Horncastle; and I have lately heard of a cross between black game and the capercailzie in Scotland. But the following somewhat analogous cases have created special interest. Professor Ewart, of Edinburgh, has bred a cross between a male Berchell's zebra and a mare pony, of the Isle of Rum breed, half wild, lent for the experiment by Lord Arthur Cecil. The pony was jet black; the foal resulting, except over the hind quarters, had as many stripes as the zebra sire, the stripes being fawn colour, with background nearly black. In form it closely resembled a well-bred foal. As another interesting case of a similar kind, Lord Morton has bred a cross between a male quagga and a nearly pure-bred Arab mare; and Lord Tankerville has, more than once, bred a cross between the famous wild Chillingham bull and a shorthorn cow.

An interesting variety of the hare is also found in Woodhall and the neighbourhood. This is the albino or white hare. Some 30 or more years ago one was frequently seen in the parishes of Langton and Woodhall, and eventually was shot in Thimbleby. They were then, so far as the writer knows, in abeyance for some years. But within the last decade heredity has asserted itself, and they have reappeared in increased numbers, and would doubtless become an established variety if allowed to multiply. In September, 1894, one of the Woodhall tenants killed, in the harvest field, a three-quarter-grown white leveret. In 1896 the writer presented to the Natural History Museum, at Lincoln, a fine albino specimen, also shot in Woodhall, with two small white leverets, accidentally killed in the harvest field at Langton. Since then, attention having been drawn to their existence, a number of instances occurring in the neighbourhood have been recorded. One was shot at Ranby as far back as Oct. 19, 1860; two were seen in Clayworth in 1896; one was shot in Baumber, Sept. 17, 1896; one shot at Thorpe Tilney, in Timberland parish, with slight tinge of brown on the ears, October, 1897; one shot in Timberland in 1895; one being seen still at large in Thorne Tilney in May, 1898; one shot in Branston, September, 1895, half grown; two shot at Bracebridge in 1893 or 1894; one shot in Wispington in 1896. On one occasion, when shooting in Kirkstead, the writer shot a couple of hares with white face and forelegs, one of which he has stuffed.

I have known a hare, when hard pressed by the harriers, enter a tunnel under a field gateway; but here instinct rather fails her; for, too often, it is only avoiding one mode of death by courting another. If there is water in the ditch, running through the tunnel, the obstruction caused by her body makes the water rise, and she is drowned; or, if she stays any time in the tunnel, her cramped limbs get so stiff after her exertions, that she cannot get out.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet