Evelyn gives a long account in his Diary of the zoological collections (February 9th, 1664-65). He says:
"The parke was at this time stored with numerous flocks of severall sorts of ordinary and extraordinary wild fowle, breeding about the Decoy, which for being neere so greate a citty, and among such a concourse of souldiers and people, is a singular and diverting thing. There were also deere of several countries, white; spotted like leopards; antelopes, an elk, red deere, roebucks, staggs, guinea goates, Arabian sheepe, etc. There were withy pots or nests for the wild fowle to lay their eggs in, a little above ye surface of ye water."
Charles II. was a saunterer by nature, and he appears to have been quite happy in the park either chatting with Nell Gwyn, at the end of the garden of her Pall Mall house, in feeding the fowl, or in playing the game of Mall.
This game was popular from the end of the sixteenth to the beginning of the eighteenth century, and then went out of fashion. At one time there were few large towns without a mall, or prepared ground where the game could be played. There is reason to believe that the game was introduced into England from Scotland on the accession of James VI. to the English throne, because the King names it in his "Basilicon Dōron" among other exercises as suited for his son Henry, who was afterwards Prince of Wales, and about the same time Sir R. Dallington, in his Method of Travel (1598), expresses his surprise that the sport was not then introduced into England.
The game was played in long shaded alleys, and on dry gravel walks. The mall in St. James's Park was nearly half a mile in length, and was kept with the greatest care. Pepys relates how he went to talk with the keeper of the mall, and how he learned the manner of mixing the earth for the floor, over which powdered cockle-shells were strewn. All this required such attention that a special person was employed for the purpose, who was called the cockle-strewer. In dry weather the surface was apt to turn to dust, and consequently to impede the flight of the ball, so that the cockle-strewer's office was by no means a sinecure. Richard Blome, writing in 1673, asserts that this mall was "said to be the best in Christendom," but Evelyn claims the pre-eminence for that at Tours, with its seven rows of tall elms, as "the noblest in Europe for length and shade." The game is praised by Sir R. Dallington "because it is a gentlemanlike sport, not violent, and yields good occasion and opportunity of discourse as they walke from one marke to the other," and Joseph Lauthier, who wrote a treatise on the subject, entitled Le Jeu de Mail, Paris, 1717 (which is now extremely scarce), uses the same form of recommendation.
The chief requisites for the game were mallets, balls, two arches or hoops, one at either end of the mall, and a wooden border marked so as to show the position of the balls when played. The mallets were of different size and form to suit the various players, and Lauthier directs that the weight and height of the mallet should be in proportion to the strength and stature of the player. The balls were of various sizes and weights, and each size had its distinct name. In damp weather, when the soil was heavy, a lighter ball was required than when the soil was sandy. A gauge was used to ascertain its weight, and the weight of the mallet was adjusted to that of the ball. The arch or pass was about two feet high and two inches wide. The one at the west end of St. James's Park remained in its place for many years, and was not cleared away until the beginning of the reign of George III. In playing the game, the mallet was raised above the head and brought down with great force so as to strike the ball to a considerable distance. The poet Waller describes Charles II.'s stroke in the following lines:—
"Here a well-polished Mall gives us joy,
To see our prince his matchless force employ.
No sooner has he touch'd the flying ball,
But 'tis already more than half the Mall;
And such a fury from his arm has got,
As from a smoking culverin 'twere shot."
Considerable skill and practice were required in the player, who, while attempting to make the ball skate along the ground with speed, had to be careful that he did not strike it in such a manner as to raise it from the ground. This is shown by what Charles Cotton writes:—
"But playing with the boy at Mall
(I rue the time and ever shall),
I struck the ball, I know not how,
(For that is not the play, you know),
A pretty height into the air."
This boy was, perhaps, a caddie, for it will be seen that the game was a sort of cross between golf and croquet.