The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1878-02-05 00:00:00

MOUS 17 HY.
THE SWANERY.

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The swan is, and always has been, • bird royal to the
possession of which the Crown hail an especial right
A tame or reclaimed swan in • private pond or lake is, no
doubt, as much the prooerty of the owner of lb, eat.?..
if be bad it under a hencoop in his own hon.*. If, how-
ever, swans come upon a man's land or into • creek or
river or estuary of which he I. riparian proprietor, they
are not, like other game, hia property, but belongs
exclusively to the Sovereign. This being so, the Crown
km from an early period allowed certain luxe landed
proprietors • special limne, to own swans, and in each
case where such privilege has been granted • swan mark,
as it is called, has also teen given, so that each owner
might know Ili. own birds The swan mark is • device
cut or burnt into the upper mandible of the bill. The
skin is destroyed by it down to the bone, and the bird,
although untutored, remains indelibly marked far life.
The notch**, cuts, and nicks in • swan's hill are inefface-
able, and any one possessed of • Royal licence for keeping
swan, is by this means always able to recognise and
identify his own birds. So bishly waa the privilege of
swan-keeping enteetnesl that in the second year of Edward
IV. a special Act was named ordering that no person
other than the King's son should have • swan mark or be
allowed to own a 'game" of swans unless he possessed •
freehold of the clear yearly value of live marks. A
"game • of swain means the right to catch, seism, and
kill or mark all swum In certain and at this
moment there are three games of swans in England. The
Vintners' Company and the Dyers' Company have with
the Crown • joint magi of swans on the Thames ; and the
old Abbots of Abbotsbury, in Dorietshire, had a game in
the estuary formed by the Isle of Portland and the Chesil
Bank. This swannery now reels in the Earl of Ilchesteir.
About eighty swans frequent It, and as the cygnets are not
caught to be either marked or pinioned, the uthgullcsmt
sight is often then of thirty or forty of these majestic
birds on the wing together. Each August the operation
of swan nicking on the Thames is performed, for at the
Abhotsbury swannerv, as we have said, the nicking has
been discontinued. The swan-hoppers or Berth-uppers—
for no one knows exactly what Is the etymolgy of the
terns, or how It ought to be spelt—make their way up the
Thames in boata, and capture and mark all the young
cygnets. The R ynl Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
to Animals has come to the conclusion that the nicking
of swans I. • barbarous practice, and on Wednesday, at
the Petty Sessions at Slough, the swanherds of the
Vintners Company. the Dyers' Company. and the Crow•
were summoned Mr cruelty illtreatlng and torturing
certain swans which they bad nicked In Ailicu.t last
The ease has just been decided.—Christopher Nicholas
an akar of the Royal Society for the PreveuUon of
Cruelty to Animals, said that on the Bth of August he,
with Kr, Whitehead, a superior offf Per, took • boat at
Windsor and went down the river. Hr saw six boata, and
noticed the men catch the swans and mark them. Ho
followed the boats to a place opposite the Eton playing-
tield, and saw four swans caught The late Mr. Hamilton,
the Royal swanherd, was there. and the swans were
thrown into his boat. Before they were thrown In the
swan'. legs were tied, the birds being lifted out of the
water by a long crook into the boat A man then held •
swan's neck between his knee. facing Hamilton, the
operator, and the latter with a clasp knife cut the bird's
mandible ten times, and in ten different places. At each
cut the blood flowed freely out of the wounda, and the
animal's neck quivered as if a pain ran down It to the
body. None were marked with is. than ten. There was
• great deal of blood, am the nieces bands were immediately
covered, and there was • quantity of blood in the boat.
The birds were then passed to other Mtn, the wings spread
out and • large quill pulled out. At the end of thews
quills he saw blood. Tbe birds were then thrown over.
hoard and rapidly made their escape. After the four
swans were marked, the men mopped out the boat, and
an hour later he saw the swans wiping their bill, n their
backs—Kr, G. Fleming, of the Veterinary College,
testified to the cruelty of Oinking, the bill being an Orland
touch and very sensitive. The ringing of swims CM very
humane and consistent, but be had known • swan
In England marked in an, other way than on the rnandi-
ble.—Professor Pritchard bore similar testimony.—Kr.
Montagu Williams charthterised the procsedings as an
advised prosecution. What had been done was for a
useful and lawful purpose, and thus the matter mond to
corn* under the statute. He quoted extracts from the
Swan Case in Coke's reporta, decided so far hack as tee
reign of Queen Elisabeth to allow how the custom of
swan marking became privileged. He thought it would
have been much better or the society to have called the
attention of the Lord Chamberlain and the authoritim of
the Dyers and Vintners' Company to the matter than to
' have brought down Mr Seeley and • beet of witnesses.,,,,
The hearing lasted nearly the whole day, end at it. cicem
the magistrates dismissed the case, stating, however, that
the present !Totem of marking was open to grave
objections. —{What can be the grave objections if the bird.
do not sutsrt U they do why the disminal of the
Summar fj