Durham for these years are several entries of ments made for bringing in Wild Boars; thus:

1531. 28. Marcii. Et Christifero Richardson, I aper, 6s. 8d. 1533. Et in uno apro empto de Thoma Cottysfurth, 68.

pay

Et in uno apro empto de Thoma Chepman, 118. The price doubtless varying with the size and condition of the animal.

When Henry VIII. visited Wulf hall, Savernake, the residence of the Seymours, in 1539 and 1543, there were Wild Boars in the adjoining forest, as we learn from the "Household Book" of Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, some extracts of which have been printed in the Wiltshire Archæological Magazine for June, 1875 (pp. (pp. 171-177).* The following

entries occur:

"Paid to Morse and Grammatts for helpyng to take the

wylde swyne in the forest.

And for 8 hempen halters to bynd their legs.
And for drink for them that helped to take them

Again:

To Edmund Coke and Wm. Morse and others for
sekyng wilde swyne in the forest 2 days

To Thomas Christopher for his costes when he caryed
the two wilde bores to the Court to my Lord
att Wynsor, All-hallowen even

In 1617, it was still to be found in Lancashire; for when James I. in that year visited Sir Richard Hoghton, at Hoghton Tower, near Whalley, one of the dishes with which the royal banquet was more than once supplied was "Wild-boar pye.'

* An interesting article on Savernake Forest, by the Rev. Canon Jackson, will be found in the same Magazine for August, 1880 (pp. 26-44).

Nicholls, "Progresses, &c., of James I.," vol. iii. p. 402.

In the same year the King hunted the Boar at Windsor. Adam Newton, in a letter to Sir Thomas Puckering, Bart., dated Deptford, Sept. 28, 1617, writes: "I was at Hampton Court on Sunday last, where the Court was indeed very full; King, Queen and Prince all residing there for the time. The King and Prince, after their coming from Theobalds this day se'nnight, went to Windsor to the hunting of the Wild Boar, and came back on Saturday."*

In Westmoreland the last Wild Boar is said to have been killed near Staveley by a man named Gilpin,† the country round being at that time all forest and fell. Close to the spot indicated is an inn, still called "Wild Boar Inn," while the bridge over the beck is known as "Gilpin's Bridge." A tradition of the former existence of the Wild Boar in this neighbourhood is still current, but no date can now be assigned for the destruction of the last of its race. It is referred to approximately as "about 200 years ago," which carries us back to the reign of Charles II., and this is the latest date at which I have been able to find any mention of this animal in a wild state in England. An old "Account Book of the Steward of the Manor of Chartley: Præses. Com. Ferrers," contains the following entry :

"1683.-Feb. Pd. the cooper for a paile for ye wild swine...... O-2.0" This shows that the Wild Boar was not extinct in

"The Court and Times of James I.," vol. ii. p. 34.

It appears by an Inquisition 20 Eliz., that in this year William Gilpin held the manor of Over Staveley (see Nicholson, "Hist. and Antiq. Westm. and Cumberl.," vol. i. p. 139).

England so early as has been supposed-that is, previously to Charles I.'s attempt to reintroduce it into the New Forest.

Of the few English writers who have described the hunting of the Wild Boar as formerly practised in England, George Turbervile, a gentleman of Dorset

TRACKING A WILD BOAR. SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

shire, has furnished the best account in his "Booke of Hunting," published in 1575, a second edition of which appeared in 1611. In this work, which is now very rare, and of which we possess an imperfect copy, a long account is given of the "Wyld Bore" and its ways. Although it ought not," he

says, "to be counted among the beasts of venery which are chaseable with hounds, for he is the proper prey of a mastiffe and such like dogs, for as much as he is a heavy beast and of great force, trusting and asseying himselfe in his tuskes and his strength, and therefore will not so lightly flee nor make chase before hounds. So that you cannot (by hunting of the Bore) know ye goodnesse or swiftness of them, and there withall to confesse a truth, I think it a great pitie to hunte (with a good kenell of hounds) at such chases and that for such reasons and considerations as followe.

"First, he is the onely beast which can dispatch a hound at one blow, for though other beasts do bite, snatch, teare, or rend your houndes, yet there is hope of remedie if they be well attended; but if a Bore do once strike your hounde, and light betweene the foure quarters of him, you shall hardly see him escape; and therewithall this subtiltie he hath, that if he be run with a good kenell of hounds, which he perceiveth holde in rounde and followe him harde, he will flee into the strongest thicket that he can finde, to the end he may kill them at his leisure one after another, the which I have seene by experience oftentimes. And amongst others, I saw once a Bore chased and hunted with fiftie good hounds at the least, and when he saw that they were all in full crie and helde in round together, he turned heade upon them, and thrust amiddest the thickest of them in such sorte that he slew sometimes sixe or seaven in [this] manner in the

twinkling of an eye: and of the fiftie houndes there went not twelve sounde and alive to their masters houses.

"Againe, if a kennell of houndes be once used to hunte a Bore, they will become lyther, and will never willingly hunte fleeing chases againe. Forasmuch as they are (by him) accustomed to hunte with more ease and to find great scent. For a Bore is a beast of a very hot scent, and that is contrary to light fleeing chases which are hunted with more paine to the hound, and yet therwith do not leave so great scent. And for these causes, whosoever meaneth to have good hounds for an Hart, Hare, or Row-deare, let him not use them to hunt the Bore: but since men are of sundry opinions, and love to hunte such chases as lie moste commodiously aboute their dwelling places, I will here describe the propertie of the Bore and how they may hunt him, and the manner of killing him either with the sword or bore-speare, as you shall also see it set out in portrayture hereafter in his place."

Then follows a chapter "of the nature and subtiltie of the Bore," wherein we are told that "the Bore is of this nature, that when his dame doth pigge him, he hath as many teeth as ever he will have whiles he liveth, neither will their teeth any way multiply or encrease but onely in greatnesse and length. Amongst the rest they have foure, which (with the Frenchmen) are called défenses, and we call them tuskes or tusches, whereof the two highest do not hurte when he striketh, but