French among others," says Monsieur
Soyer, "formerly ate the heron, crane, crow, stork, swan, cormorant, and
bittern. The first three especially were highly esteemed; and
Laillevant, cook of Charles VII., teaches us how to prepare these
meagre, tough birds. Belon says, that in spite of its revolting taste
when unaccustomed to it, the bittern is, however, among the delicious
treats of the French. This writer also asserts, that a falcon or a
vulture, either roasted or boiled, is excellent eating; and that if one
of these birds happened to kill itself in flying after game, the
falconer instantly cooked it. Lebaut calls the heron a royal viand."

1017. THE HERON WAS HUNTED BY THE HAWK, and the sport of hawking is
usually placed at the head of those amusements that can only be
practised in the country. This precedency it probably obtained from its
being a pastime to generally followed by the nobility, not in Great
Britain only, but likewise on the continent. In former times, persons of
high rank rarely appeared in public without their dogs and their hawks:
the latter they carried with them when they journeyed from one country
to another, and sometimes even took them to battle with them, and would
not part with them when taken prisoners, even to obtain their own
liberty. Such birds were esteemed as the ensigns of nobility, and no
action was reckoned more dishonourable in a man of rank than that of
giving up his hawk. We have already alluded to the hunting propensities
of our own Edward III., and we may also allude to his being equally
addicted to hawking. According to Froissart, when this sovereign invaded
France, he took with him thirty falconers on horseback, who had charge
of his hawks, and every day, as his royal fancy inclined him, he either
hunted, or went to the river for the purpose of hawking. In the great
and powerful, the pursuit of game as a sport is allowable, but in those
who have to earn their bread by the sweat of their brow, it is to be
condemned. In Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy" we find a humorous story,
told by Poggius, the Florentine, who reprobates this folly in such
persons. It is this. A physician of Milan, that cured madmen, had a pit
of water in his house, in which he kept his patients, some up to the
knees, some to the girdle, some to the chin, _pro modo insaniae_, as
they were more or less affected. One of them by chance, that was well
recovered, stood in the door, and seeing a gallant pass by wi