“No. 2, May 27th, 1612.—Payment to the said John Wood for getting cormorants from the north.
“No. 3, August 31st, 1618.—James I. to Robert Wood. Advance of £66 13s. 4d., in part payment of the sum of £286 due in respect of the cormorant houses, and making nine ponds, &c., at Westminster, the ground called the Vine-garden having been taken upon lease of the Lord Danvers.
[“In this document,” says Mr. Salvin, “this Wood is described as keeper of His Majesty’s cormorants, ospreys, and otters. It is therefore clear that the fishing-hawk was
tried, and as we hear so little about it afterwards, there can be no doubt but that it proved a failure, which, indeed, might have been expected, as the bird is what falconers would call an habitual ‘carrier.’ Neither do the otters seem to have answered. Vines were grown in Surrey for wine in ancient times, and I wonder if this vine-garden was for that purpose.”]
“No. 4, February 28th, 1619.—To John Wood, whom His Majesty heretofore appointed to attend the French ambassadors, with the cormorants sent by His Majesty’s good brother, the French King, the sum of £215, for so much by him disbursed and laid out for his charges incident to the performance of the said service, over and above the sum of £50, impressed unto him, for and towards the said charges, appearing by his bill, of the particulars thereof, delivered in upon oath, and allowed by us and the rest of the Commissioners of the Treasury. By writ dated the 18th July, 1609, and by confirmation dated the last of July, 1618.
“14th October, 1619.—To Robert Wood, whom His Majesty intendeth to send, with divers cormorants, to his good cousin, the Duke of Lorraine, the sum of £60, by way of an imprest towards defraying the expenses in that journey. By writ, dated 7th October, 1619.
“28th August, 1624.—To Robert Wood, the sum of £98 8s. 6d., in full satisfaction of the charge and loss sustained by Luke Wood, in his late travels, with three
cormorants, to Venice, having been stayed in his passage thither, and his cormorants taken away from him by the Duke of Savoy.”
[“From these two documents,” says Mr. Salvin, “it would appear that cormorant fishing was likely to have become fashionable upon the continent, if poor Wood and his birds had not come to grief.
“The civil wars in the next reign extinguished the office of The Master of the Royal Cormorants, and his assistants, and in the Record Office we find this petition from poor old Mr. Wood, who appears to have been rather hard-up and neglected in his old age.