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GRIFFON VULTURE.
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Bird HISTORY
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BRITISH BIRDS.
BY THE REV. F. 0. MORRIS, B.A,
MEMBER OF THE ASHMOLEAN SOCIETY
WPL, iF.
CONTAINING FORTY-THREE COLOURED ENGRAVINGS,
‘Gloria in excelsis Deo.’
LONDON: GROOMBRIDGE AND SONS, 5, PATERNOSTER ROW,
_ZQSONIAN IN qusON SHG I>
(M321 890 G JUL 11 1946
“ATONAL wust™
rad , Ly } or Pot *
CONTENTS OF
THE PERSE VODUM E
PAGE
Griffon Vulture . ; , : L , : F : 1 Egyptian Vulture . ! : : : : : , : 3 Hrne . 5 : : : ; : : , : : 6 x Golden Eagle . ; : : : ; é 3 ; ah WAG
~ Spotted Hagle . ; : : : : : : 21 Osprey : : ; : ; ; é ‘ ‘ : Lee
, Buzzard : . ; : : : a ; ; 30 $ Rough-legged Tee : 3 ; ‘ f : ’ aie “\ Honey Buzzard . : : ; : ‘ 2 : 4A
Kite é : , : : ; : ‘ p ecg 52
~Swallow-tailed Kite : : ; é , ; ; : 59
> vJer-Falcon : ; , ; } s . ; 4 <n Oe * Peregrine . : - : 4 , : : ( 67
¢Hobby . : , ; gti ie , iy Orange-legged Hobby : : ; 81 Merlin . : : , : : : ants...
p Kestrel : ; ; ; : : : : é 92 re ss, ae a ee ~Sparrow-Hawk .. : , Paloke Sy ys ae
Ag Marsh Harrier eth aa é ; : ; ; : al ly: Hen Harrier : : ; ; ‘ : . , : 122
ae,
LV CONTENTS.
Montagu’s Harrier Short-eared Owl . Long-eared Owl Eagle Owl . Scops-eared Owl Snowy Owl Tawny Owl White Owl . Little Owl Tengmalm’s Owl Mottled Owl . Hawk Owl . Great Shrike . Red-backed Shrike Woodchat
Great Tit
Cole Tit . Crested Tit
Blue Tit.
Marsh Tit Long-tailed Tit Bearded Tit
PAGE
127 130 134. 138 143 146 151 155 163 167 170 174 178 182 187 190 194. 198 02 210 214. 219°
HISTORY OF BRITISH BIRDS.
GRIFFON VULTURE.
Gyps fulvus, GRAY.
Gyps vulgaris, SAVIGNY,.
Vultur fulvus, GOULD. Gyps—A Vulture. Fulvus—Yellow—tawny.
Tur Griffon Vulture is an inhabitant of various parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, regardless alike, seemingly, of cold and heat. It is met with in Turkey, Greece, the Tyrol, and Silesia; on the Alps and the Pyrenees; and is particularly abundant on both sides of the straits of Gibraltar, and as it has once been known, as presently mentioned, to visit this country, it may be hoped that if may again be met with here.
Like the rest of its congeners, this bird feeds on carrion, and thus performs a useful part in the economy of nature. Occasionally it will attack weak or sickly animals, but this is only as a ‘dernier resort,’ and when it cannot supply its appetite by the resources which are more natural to it. Thus, ‘vice versa,’ the Eagle, whose congenial prey is the living animal, will, when forced by the extremity of hunger, put up with that food which under other circumstances it rejects, and leaves for the less dainty Vulture.
When the Griffon meets with a plentiful supply of carrion, it continues feeding on it, if not disturbed, which it easily is by even the minor animals, until quite gorged, and then remains quiescent until digestion has taken place: if surprised in this condition, it is unable to escape by flight, and becomes an easy capture. It feeds its young, not by carrying food to them in its talons, as is the habit of the Eagles, Falcons, Hawks, and Owls, but by disgorging from its maw part of what it had swallowed.
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GRIFFON VULTURE.
Only one example of this grand addition to British ornithology has as yet occurred. A single specimen—an adult bird, in a perfectly wild state, was captured by a youth, the latter end of the year 1843, on the rocks near Cork harbour, and was purchased for half-a-crown for Lord Shannon, by whom, when it died, it was presented to the collection of the Dublin Zoological Society.
This species, also, like the rest of its kindred, possesses great powers of flight, though it is not rapid on the wing, and often soars upwards, almost always spirally, until it has become invisible to the human eye: it descends in the same manner in circles.
It builds its nest, as might be expected, on the highest and most inaccessible rocks, or sometimes on lofty trees, but in the winter it frequents more the lower and open grounds. ‘The structure is three or four feet in diameter. The eggs, two or three in number, rather larger than those of a goose, of a dingy white colour, sometimes marked with a few pale red blots.
The length of this bird is about three feet eight inches. The bill is by some described. as bluish lead-colour, by others, as yellowish white or horn-colour; the cere, bluish black; iris, reddish orange. The head and neck are covered with down, which, as well as the ruff round the neck, and which is of the same material, is dull white; the eyes are margined with black. The upper and middle part of the breast also dull white, mixed with light brown, the lower part reddish yellow brown. The expansion of the wings eight feet. The back, and the wing coverts, light yellowish brown, the shafts lhght brown; the larger under wing coverts, dull white; lesser under wing coverts, light brown; primaries, dark brown; the tail the same colour. The legs and toes lead-colour, the former reticulated, the latter each with six large scales in front; the claws black.
The male and female are scarcely distinguishable, except in size—the former being smaller than the latter; as is the case generally with birds of prey; why, it is extremely difficult to say. Some reasons which have been advanced must at once be pronounced unsatisfactory.
Immature birds differ very considerably in plumage from those which have attained to the adult state: the former are much spotted all over, and the down on the head and neck is conspicuously marked with brown.
EGYPTIAN VULTURE.
Neophron percnopterus, SAVIGNY. Vultur .s BEwIck. Cathartes ae TEMMINCE.
Neophron—Quere, ne—Intensitive, and Osphraino—To smell. Percnopterus, percos, Or percnos—Black, or spotted with black. Pteron— A wing.
THIS species is, as might be gathered from its name, most numerous in Africa, being met with from the Isthmus of Suez to the Cape of Good Hope. It is also widely spread throughout Europe, being found in Spain, France, Italy, and Malta; in Turkey, very abundantly, in Switzerland, Norway, and other parts of this continent, as also in India; and has occurred, but only on one occasion, as mentioned below, in England. Perhaps the more cleanly state of our towns, as compared with the condition of those on the continent, may in some degree account for this unfrequency, as making its presence as unnecessary to us as uncongenial to itself.
Two specimens of this bird, supposed to be a pair, were observed in Somersetshire, near the shore of the Bristol Channel, in the month of October, in the year 1825—one of them was on the wing at the time, and was seen in the neighbourhood for a few days afterwards; the other was feeding on a dead sheep, and being either too hungry or too sated to be disposed to leave it, was easily approached sufficiently near to be shot. It was preserved, and came into the possession of the Rev. A. Matthew, of Kilve, in the before-named county.
The Egyptian Vulture, like others of its tribe, delights and revels in the most decomposed carcases, the natural consequence of which is, a most disgusting odour from itself, and when dead it quickly putrefies. Occasionally it will feed on reptiles, by way perhaps of a more delicate meal, and on small animals; sometimes, through lack of other food, it will ‘follow the plough,’ for the sake of the worms and insects turned up by it, but its favourite haunt seems to be the sea-shore, where
4 EGYPTIAN VULTURE.
for the most part it finds its proper and legitimate sustenance in sufficient abundance.
As before observed, it is extremely abundant on the northern shores of Africa, but becomes gradually less frequent as the latitude becomes higher. It is held in much and deserved respect in those countries of which it is a denizen, as acting gratuitously, through a benevolent arrangement of Providence, the part of a scavenger, by devouring all decaying animal substances which would otherwise still further putrefy, and rapidly become fruitful sources, in these hot climates, of pesti- lence, disease, and death. Its habits in fact are those of the other Vultures, except that it 1s of a more timid character. It is occasionally seen in small flocks; and is sometimes tamed.
The Egyptian Vulture builds on high and inaccessible preci- pices, and lays from two to four eggs, which are generally white, or bluish white, but sometimes mottled a little with brown, and occasionally as much so as those of the Kestrel; they are widest in the middle, and taper towards each end.
It makes its nest about the end of March, and the young are hatched late in May, but remain in the nest until July, as they are not ready sooner to take flight.
The adult bird is about two feet seven inches in length. The base of the bill is bare of feathers, and of a pale flesh- colour; the space between the bill and the eyes is covered with a white down; iris, red; front of the crown and cheeks also bare of feathers, and flesh-coloured; back of the crown, feathered with a sort of crest, which the bird has the power of raising when in any way excited; throat bare of feathers, and flesh-coloured; the feathers on the lower part of the neck long and pointed. The whole of the rest of the plumage, white or yellowish white, with the exception of the greater quill feathers, which are black, and the bases of the secondaries, which are brown. The legs and toes are pale yellowish grey; the toes partially reticulated, the middle one having five scales, and the outer and hinder ones, three each; the outer and middle ones are united at the base; the claws black, and not strongly hooked, as in the Eagles, owing to the different use they are required for.
The female resembles the male, but is a little larger.
In the young bird the whole plumage is of a dull greyish brown, with yellowish spots on the tips of the feathers; the quills black, as in the adult. As it advances in age, the dark parts of the plumage become of a rich purple brown.
EGYPTIAN VULTURE. 5
The following is the description of a yearling bird, the age, as is believed, of the specimen before spoken of:—Bill, of a dark horn-colour; cere, which is thickest at the base, and reaches over half the length of the bill, yellow; iris, red; (Meyer says that at a year old the iris is brown;) there are a few bristles on the edges of the bill, and between it and the eyes; crest, as in the adult bird. The head is covered with a bare skin of a deep reddish colour; the neck clothed with long hackle feathers, which form a kind of ruff of deep brown, tipped with cream-colour; and the nape with thick white down, interspersed with small black feathers. The chin has some tufts of hair beneath it. The back is cream white; the wings, five fect six to five feet mine inches in expanse; secondaries, pale brown, tipped and edged with yellowish white; larger wing coverts, deep brown, varied with cream white; lesser wing coverts, deep brown near the body, succeeded by lighter feathers, and these again by cream-coloured ones; tail, long and wedge-shaped; legs, yellowish grey; the middle toe has four scales on the last joint, and the outer and inner ones three each; the claws are blackish brown, and only slightly curved.
ERNE. Haliétus albicilla, SELBY. Falco F MontTaau. Aquila ws JENYNS.
(H )als—The sea, Aietos—An Eagle. Alba—White. Cilla—A tail.
Ir, beyond perhaps a kind of daring courage, and even this, most probably, the mere result of hunger, the Golden Eagle cannot be shewn to have any valid claim to the title usually conferred upon it, so neither can the present species, or in fact any other of the tribe to which it belongs, assert any nobility beyond that of appearance and personal strength.
The Erne, or Sea Eagle, seems to be a compound of the characteristics of the Vultures, the Eagles, the Hawks, the predatory Gulls, and the Raven. It is a bird of imposing aspect, though less striking and handsome than the Golden Eagle, and not so compact: when excited it throws its head backwards, sets up the pointed feathers of the head and neck, and assumes many elegant and graceful attitudes. Its proper habitat is near the sea-shore, or fresh-water lakes surrounded by precipitous mountains: it 1s not however confined exclusively to coast localities, for it sometimes has been met with inland —in one instance as much as forty miles from the sea, and it occasionally also resorts to the sides of streams, in quest of salmon, trout, and other fish.
This species is of very frequent occurrence in many parts of the old world, and is in this country far more numerous than the Golden Eagle. It is the most abundant in the northern parts of Jreland and Scotland, and in the Orkney and Shetland Islands, but has also been repeatedly met with in England. It is most frequently seen in Scotland, north of Aberdeen and the Ord of Caithness, and but rarely south of St. Abb’s Head.
In flight, the feet are drawn close up, and the neck doubled back, so that the head appears as it were to grow from the shoulders. In this attitude it beats its hunting grounds, the
Fi) ¥ » | ‘ | (e, ah \
ERNE. if
cliffs, or mountain sides, the open moors, or the shores of the ocean or lake, sailing with a gentle and hardly perceptible motion of its wings, like the Buzzard, or, if flying off in a straight line to a distance, with regular flappings hke a Raven. When at rest, in its ordinary position, it sits with its wings drooped, like the Cormorants and Vultures, with the latter of which it was indeed classed by Linneus, and it will be per- ceived that I have placed it next to those birds for the lke and other reasons. It is not so easy on the wing as the Golden Eagle, though swift and strong in flight on occasion, and often extremely graceful. It rises with difficulty from a level surface, along which it flaps for some distance before it can do so, and may thus sometimes be brought within gun-shot, by running or riding down quickly upon it. It is described as being therefore for this reason seldom met with in such a situation at rest, but as then preferring some projection, or pointed surface, from which it can the more easily launch into the air: when it has done so and has got upon the wing, it wheels away in large circles.
Fish afford its proper and most congenial food, and these it occasionally plunges upon, after the manner of the Osprey, a little below the surface, and sometimes, an humble imitator of the predacious White-headed Eagle, is said to rob the original captor, the Osprey, of its prey, by forcing it to drop it in the air, and then seizing it before it has time to fall into its native element.
It also preys on various aquatic birds, such as gulls, puffins, and gunillemots; occasionally on fawns, young roebucks, and even, though very rarely, on full-grown deer, as well as on sheep and other smaller animals, lambs, dogs, and cats, as also, on straggling domestic poultry, and in default of these, will readily feed on carrion of any kind. MHerein also it seems to shew a strong affinity to the Vultures, for on meeting with such, it remains on the spot for hours and sometimes for days together, and quits it only when it no longer affords the means of satisfying the cravings of its appetite. A whole puffin was once found in the stomach of one of these birds. This species has the power of abstaining for a very long time from food. One has been known to have lived for four or five weeks in ‘total abstinence.’
Its note, which is a double one—a harsh and loud scream, uttered many times in succession—and which may be _ heard at the distance of a mile or more, is shriller and sharper than
8 ERNE.
that of the Golden Eagle, and is rendered by the words— kooluk, klook.
The following curious exploit of one of these birds is related by Mr. Meyer:—‘A circumstance illustrative of the great muscular strength which these birds possess, I had the pleasure of witnessing in one confined in the Zoological Gardens in the Regent’s Park, in the severe winter of 1835. I was employed in completing a sketch of the bird in question, when I observed him make many endeavours with his beak to break the ice that had frozen upon the tub of water placed in his cage. Finding all his efforts to get at the water in this manner were ineffectual, he deliberately mounted the uppermost perch in his cage, then suddenly collecting his strength he rushed down with irresistible force, and striking the ice with his powerful claws, dashed it to atoms, throwing the water around him in all directions. After performing this feat of strength and sagacity, he quietly allayed his thirst and returned to his perch. This is no doubt the mode employed by this species in a wild state, to obtain its aquatic food, from the frozen rivers and inland seas it frequents in various parts of the continent.’
From the vast altitude at which the Erne often flies, it would seem, in common with those of its class, to be able to live in a much more rarefied atmosphere than many other birds. Occasionally a pair of these Eagles are seen fighting in the air, and their evolutions are described as being then most beautiful, as indeed they may easily be imagined to be. The ‘point d’appui’ is, in common parlance, to get the upper hand, so as, secure from assault, to be able to attack from a vantage ground, thus to call it though in the air, and when one of the two has succeeded in this endeavour, and is launching itself at its adversary, the latter suddenly turns on its back, and is in a moment prepared, with upraised feet and outspread talons, to receive its foe; a ‘cheval de frise’ not the most desirable to impinge upon.
In the Hebrides, the great damage done by, and therefore feared from Eagles of this species, makes the people interested in their destruction. Various ingenious and yet simple modes of trapping and destroying them have been devised, some requiring great patience, but all at times successful in the end. Sometimes the farmer builds a temporary hut, in which he lies hid within sight of the carcase of some animal, which he has placed at once both within shot and within view,
ERNE. 9
and after a greater or less exercise of patience, is rewarded by the approach of the Eagle, attracted to its quarry, either by its own immediate perceptions, or from its following other birds attracted to it by the exercise of theirs. The ravens, crows, and sea-gulls have preceded him to the repast, but his arrival, harpy like, at once disperses them; the tables are turned, and they are compelled at first to withdraw to a respectful distance while he regales himself. But when he himself has become a carrion, laid low by the deadly aim of the ambuscade, it falls again to their lot to finish at leisure the feast which so lately he had disturbed; perhaps even to make a second course of his own defunct body. Mr. Macgillivray says that he has known no fewer than five of these birds destroyed in this manner by a single shepherd in the course of one winter, and he also says that in the Hebrides, where a small premium, a hen, I believe, from each house, or each farm-house in the parish, is given for every Eagle killed, as many as twenty fall victims every year.
The same motive which prompts to the destruction of the parent birds, leads also to various ‘hair-breadth ’scapes’ in attempts to destroy their young. By means of ropes, the attacking party is lowered over the edge of some awful-looking precipice, some ‘imminent deadly’ crag—for it is only in the most secure retreats that the Erne builds, conscious, as 1t would seem, of the odium under which he lives, and the proclamation of outlawry which has been made against him in consequence —and having taken dry heather and a match with him, sets fire to the nest, and both it and its tenants are consumed before the gaze of the bereaved parents. Sometimes the eyrie can be approached and destroyed without the aid of ropes, by the experienced and adventurous climbers, who, habituated to the perils of those stupendous cliffs, make little of descents and ascents which would infallibly turn dizzy the heads of those who have only been accustomed to ‘terra firma.’
This bird is the perpetual object of the buffets of the raven and the skua gull, of whom he seems to be in the greatest dread. It is indeed related that the latter does not exercise this hostility in the Hebrides, but that it does in the Shetland Islands; but I cannot understand how one individual bird, and still less how a colony of birds, can be gifted with an instinct not possessed by a colony of its own Here in the same region.
In prowling for food near the ocean, the Erne - generally
10 ERNE.
flies along the side of the cliff, at an elevation of a tew hun- dred feet, but its powers of sight, or of smell, enable it to discover a dead quarry from a vastly greater height, and from thence it will stoop like a thunderbolt upon it. True it is, that its sense of smell does not enable it to detect the presence of a man concealed from its sight at the distance of only a few yards, but this can be no argument whatever against its having a keen scent for that which forms naturally a large proportion of its food, and especially when it is so strongly calculated to act powerfully on the organs of scent.
The Erne is never a gregarious bird; its habits perhaps forbid the exercise of the sociable qualities. Five is the largest number that have been seen in company, even when assembled to prey on a common carrion, and at other times, if as many as three are observed together, it is probably just before the breeding season, or at, and subsequent to that time: it is not until some weeks after the young birds have forsaken the nest, that both the parents leave it altogether.
An Erne has been known to be attacked by a hawk, supposed to be, probably a Goshawk, and struck down into the sea, both birds falling together. One has been seen in the island of Hoy, sailing off with a pig in its talons, which on enquiry at the farm from whence it had been stolen, was found by the clergyman of the place, who witnessed the fact, to have been four weeks old. Another which had a hen in its talons, dropped it to make a swoop at a litter of pigs, but the sow, with maternal courage, repelled the aggressor, who consequently lost his previous prey, which escaped safely, decidedly a narrow escape, into the farm-house. Another is recorded to have entered a turf pig-stye, in which a pig had died, and being unable to escape through the hole at the top, by which it had descended, in the way of the hungry mouse in the fable, was caught in this novel and unintentional kind of trap, and slain in due course. Others are decoyed in Sutherlandshire, and doubtless in the same manner elsewhere, into a square kind of stone box with an opening at one end, in which has been fixed a noose: the Eagle, after eating of the bait placed within it, walks lazily out of the opening, and is caught by the loop.
On one occasion, a large salmon was found dead on the shore of Moffat water, and an immense Erne lifeless also beside it, having met its fate by being hooked by its own claws to a fish too large and powerful for it to carry off—an unwilling
ERNE. $b
example of ‘the ruling passion strong in death,’ and an un- wonted passage in the life and death of a fish, in whose case the usual order of things in the matter of hooking was reversed.
The following somewhat similar story is related by Bishop Stanley:—‘A halibut, a large flat-fish, resembling a turbot, reposing on or near the surface of the water, was perceived by an Erne, which immediately pounced down and struck his talons into the fish with all his force. Should the halibut be too strong, the Eagle, it is said, is sometimes, but rarely, drowned in the struggle. In this case, however, as more frequently happens, he overcame the fish, on which he remained as if floating on a raft, and then spreading out his wide wings, he made use of them as sails, and was driven by the wind towards the shore.’
The Erne, like the Golden Eagle, is said to have not un- frequently supplied the wants of different persons in the Hebrides, by the food it had brought to its nest in abundance, for its young. It does not, as that bird, attack those who molest its nestlings, but there are two curious accounts on record of its assailing, in an unprovoked manner, persons whom it had surprised in hazardous situations on the edges of some dangerous cliffs. Mr. Leadbeater had one of these birds which became quite tame, and even affectionate to those about it.
It is said that the Erne is more plentiful in Britain in the winter than at any other season, which, if so, would make it appear that it partially migrated. It builds in March, and sits very close, but is by no means so courageous as the Golden Eagle in defending its brood; one instance to the contrary is indeed on record, but the exception only proves the rule.
The nest, which is about five feet wide, and very flat, having only a slight hollow in the middle, is a mass of sticks, heather, or sea-weed, as the case may be, arranged in a slovenly manner, and lined with any soft material, such as grass, wool, or feathers. It is placed on some precipice, or in the hollow of a crag or rock, overhanging the sea, or else on some inland fastness, perhaps an island in a lake, or sometimes on a rock at the edge of one. The male bird is said to take his turn at incubation with the female. The Erne is less strongly attached to its haunts than the Golden Eagle, but it seems in some degree fond of them, and not unfrequently returns to the same breeding place for several years in succession.
The eggs, which, by a merciful provision, are few in number, as are those of the other Eagles, one, or at the most, two,
oe ERNE.
(though some say three, and that the third is always an addled one,) are white, yellowish white, or yellowish brown, and some are wholly covered with light red spots, while others have only the large end dotted over. One of these birds has been known to lay an egg after having been in confinement for more than twenty years. The young are hatched about the beginning of June, and fully fledged about the middle of August.
The Erne varies much both in size and in colour, which latter becomes more cinereous as the bird advances in age, and this was the cause of the one species, in the different stages of its plumage, having been imagined to be two distinct ones. One has been killed in Sutherlandshire, entirely of a silvery white hue, without any admixture of brown, and another of the lke appearance was seen at the same time in company with it. A very curious variety in the Zoological Society’s Collection is thus described by Meyer, in his ‘Illustrations of British Birds,’ ‘No painting can fitly represent the delicate and beautiful colour of this bird. When its feathers are rufiled, as may be frequently observed, at the pleasure of the creature, a delicate azure blue tint is seen to pervade the basal part of the feathers, which, appearing through the whole transparent texture, imparts to its plumage the singular tint it displays. It is observable that the beak of this individual is rather less in depth at the base than is usual in this species, and the iris yellowish white.’
It is also to be remarked that the differences in size between the male and the female, is not nearly so great as is usual in the case of the other Eagles, and so conspicuously so in the species next described, and that they are also very similar in general appearance. The following is the description of the adult bird:—Weight, about eight or nine pounds; length, about three feet. Bill, dark straw-colour (at two years old, increasing in intensity of colour as the bird grows older,) and with a bluish skin, slightly bristled over, extending from its base to the eyes; cere, yellow; iris, bright yellow, and remarkably beautiful and expressive. The feathers underneath the lower bill are bristly; crown of the head and neck, pale greyish brown, the ijeathers being hackles; breast and back, dark brown. The wings, when closed, reach the end of the tail, the’ fourth and fifth quill feathers being the longest: their expanse is about six feet and a half; secondaries, brown, partly tinged with grey. The tail, which is rather short and rounded, and consists of twelve broad feathers, has a small
ERNE. le
portion of its base deep brown, and the rest white, that is, when fully adult, which some say is after the third moult, and others not until the bird is five years old. The legs, which are feathered a little below the knee, are straw-coloured, and have a series of scales in front. The middle toe has eight large scales, the outer one five, and the inner and hinder ones four each. Another description assigns to the first and second toes three; to the third twelve; and to the fourth, six. Another describes the middle toe as having sixteen, and the side and hind toes, six each; and, again, another gives thirteen to the middle one; so that it seems to me pretty certain, that no distinctive character is to be derived from their number: age may very possibly have something to do with it. The claws are black, the middle one being grooved on the under side.
The young birds, when first hatched, are covered with down of a whitish appearance: when fully fledged, the bill is deep brown tinged with blue; the cere, greenish yellow; iris, dark brown; head, deep brown; chin, dingy white; nape, white tipped with brown; breast, dull white spotted with brown; back, light brown; primaries, blackish brown; lower tail coverts, dull white, tipped with deep brown; tail, greyish at the upper end, and the rest deep brown; feet, yellow; claws, blackish brown. When further advanced in plumage, the bill is bluish black, paler towards the base; cere, yellowish; iris, chesnut brown; head, crown, and neck, dark brown, the roots of the feathers white, and the tips paler than the rest. The breast is variegated with different shades of reddish brown, a few white feathers being interspersed. ‘The wings expand to the width of about seven feet. The tail is brown of different shades, darkest towards the end; the legs and toes, yellow; and the claws, bluish black, tinged with brown.
GOLDEN EAGLE.
Aquila chrysaétos, SELBY. JENYNS. Falco : MonrTacu,
Aquila—An Eagle, possibly from Aquidus—Dark—sunburnt. Chrysaétos— Chrusos—Gold. Aietos—An Eagle,
Tue Golden Eagle is so called from the golden red feathers on the head and nape of the neck. It seems to have established a prescriptive right, though on what exclusively sufficient grounds it might be difficult to say, to the proud appellation of the king of birds, as the Tiger, in the corres- pending predatory class among quadrupeds, has obtained that of ‘Royal.’ The epithet would however be more appropriately conferred upon the Lion, to whom many noble qualities, to be looked for in vain either in the Tiger or the Hagle, have in all ages been attributed, though whether even in his case justly, is more than doubtful.
The appearance, however, of this bird, is certainly very noble and majestic, though not more so, perhaps, than that of many others of its family, and if his aspect is fine in the only state in which we can have an opportunity of observing him closely, how much more striking would it appear, if we could, ourselves unseen, behold him in his state of nature, standing on the outermost projection of some overhanging precipice of the mountain, and looking out, with his large and piercingly lustrous eye into the far distance below, for some quarry on which to stoop for his own food, or that of his young ones in the nest.
The Golden Eagle seldom strays far from its native haunts, and is, probably from the nature of its habits, not numerous in any particular spot; but those habits make it but too much so where it is found, which is, as may at once be imagined, in the most mountainous and rocky districts—the natural haunts of these ‘feree: nature’ which are its food—or in large
(lA all if i! \
SS “~
i (ill }/ pine
;OLDEN EAGLE.
GOLDEN EAGLE. 15
forests on the plains. It is met with in India, and various parts of Asia, as well as in every part of the continent of Europe, and also in North America, in greater or less numbers. It was formerly far from uncommon in England, and in still ‘more ancient times, in all probability, was much more frequent. In Yorkshire, one has been recorded by Arthur Strickland, Esq. as having occurred in the East Riding, and a second was killed by Admiral Mitford’s gamekeeper. Another was shot in 1847, at Littlecott, the seat of Mr. Popham, near Hungerford, in Berkshire: it had glutted itself on a dead deer, and was unable to fly away on the approach of the keeper, who fired six times before he killed it. Another was captured in Cheshire, in the year 1845, at Somerford Park, the seat of Sir Charles Peter Shakerley, Bart., and another, in the same county, a few years previously, near Eaton Hall, the seat of the Marquis of Westminster.
It has been known to breed regularly, even up to a com- paratively recent date, in Cumberland and Westmorland, and also formerly in Derbyshire; in which county one was captured alive, near Clossop, in some severe weather, in the year 1720; another, about the year 1770, was shot at Hardwick Park, a seat of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire, one of the foun- dations of the celebrated ‘Bess of Hardwick,’ another about the year 1820, near Cromford, and another was seen at Matlock in 1843, but, though frequently shot at, it was not procured. They are still not very unfrequently to be seen in the highlands of Perthshire and Sutherlandshire, chiefly in the north and north-west parts, and on the mountains of other counties in Scotland, such as Ben Lomond, and Ben Nevis, and still more frequently on the mountains of Ireland. Thirteen or fourteen were killed between the years 1828 and 1882, in the county of Donegal, and some have been in the habit of breeding in the Island of Achil, as well as near Killarney, and at Rosheen, near Dunfanaghy: others have been met with near Belfast, Tralee, Monasterevan, the mountain of Croagh Patrick, and in many other parts of that island, as also on the Scottish border, and in the highlands of Wales, as well as, though but rarely, in Shetland.
The flight of the Golden Eagle, when not pursuing its prey, is ‘at first slow and heavy like that of the Heron, and when sailing in the air, much resembles that of the Common Buzzard. It often ascends to a vast heigns when looking out for food, and on perceiving its quarry, descends up:~ it like a flash of
16 GOLDEN EAGLE.
lightning, though sometimes in doing so, it will make several spiral turns at intervals, as if to break the extreme violence of the shock of its fall. If it does not then at once discern its victim, which has, perhaps, attempted to hide itself, it peers about with its outstretched neck in every direction, when, if it again catch a glimpse of it, as it is almost sure to do, it is down upon it directly with extended legs, and scarce seeming to touch it, bears it off in triumph. It usually thus secures the animal, seizing it before it can even attempt to escape, or perhaps paralyzed through fear, but occasionally, as in the instances hereafter stated, follows in pursuit. One is mentioned which was seen hovering above a hare, which it frightened from bush to bush, until at last it forced it to leave its cover, and attempt escape, when it was almost immediately overtaken and pounced upon.
It is a curious fact that two Eagles will sometimes course a hare together—one flying directly over it, and the other following it near the ground; and one has been known to stoop at a hare pursued by the hounds, and to carry it off, a hundred yards before them—a singular realization of the fable of Tantalus.
The female is noisy and clamorous at the approach of spring, and also before wet or stormy weather.
The food of the Eagle consists principally of the smaller animals, such as sheep, lambs, fawns, rabbits, and rats, as also of birds, such as blackcock, grouse, and sea-gulls. It does not hesitate, however, on occasion, to attack larger game, but assails with characteristic resoluteness even roebucks and other deer. It is said to fix itself on the head of the victim it has aimed at, and to flap with its wings in the animal’s eyes, until in distraction it is driven over some precipice, or into some morass, where it then becomes a secure and easy prey. One was seen flying in one of the Orkney Islands with a pig in its talons, which it dropped alive when fired at. Another, in Ireland, alighted and carried off a lamb, with which it flew in a straight direction towards its haunt in the Mourne mountains. There arrived, it was seen to soar upwards, probably towards its nest, but dropped the lamb at the edge of a wood, and it was recovered unhurt—the distance flown was reckoned to be more than two miles with this burden to support. There are at least three authenticated imstances of their having carried off children in this country—one of these in one of the Orkney Islands, and another in the Isle of Skye,
GOLDEN EAGLE. 17
but both, providentially, were rescued. Doubtless there have been often such cases, some not recorded, having occurred in remote districts, and others possibly not even known of. The numbers of animals and birds destroyed by Eagles must be very great: the remains of three hundred ducks and forty hares were found in the eyrie of one in Germany; and it is on record, that a peasant in the county of Kerry, and another in the county of Antrim, supported their families for a con- siderable time, by means of the animals brought by parent Eagles to their nests. The Golden Eagle never feeds on carrion, unless forced by hunger, when unable to meet with prey to kill for itself. The age attained by the Eagle is unquestionably very great: one that died at Vienna, is reported to have lived, even in confinement, one hundred and four years. It rarely drinks, but is fond of washing itself. It is said to keep fat to the last, as if the faculties of its natural instinct did not deteriorate as its age increased, but were sufficient, with the benefit of its experience, to supply the place of its pristine strength. One which I have lately seen the body of, previous to the skin being stuffed by Mr. Graham, of York, was remarkable for the quantity of fat upon it. It appeared to be a very old bird, and the talons were of an extraordinary length. It had just been sent from Assynt, in Sutherlandshire, by W. M. E. S. Milner, Esq, M.P. The Golden Eagle is easily kept in con- finement, and in some cases becomes to a certain extent tamed, from being constantly familiarized with the sight of its keeper. It is, nevertheless, on the whole extremely intractable; one however is related to have been tamed at Fortwilliam, near Belfast, by Richard Langtry, Esq., which would come at its master’s call, and another to have been trained by Captain Green, of Buckden, in Huntingdonshire, to take hares and rabbits. Another, as I presume it to have been, is mentioned by the late Bishop Stanley, in his ‘Familiar History of British Birds,’ as having been so thoroughly tamed as to have been left at perfect liberty, neither chained or pinioned: of this freedom it would often avail itself, and after having been absent for two or three weeks would again return. It never attacked children, but on one occasion, it is supposed from its master having neglected to bring it its usual supply of food, it assailed him with some violence. Young pigs it would occasionally make a meal of. After having been safely kept for ten or twelve years, it was unfortunately, in the end killed WoL. iss Cc
18 GOLDEN EAGLE.
by a savage mastiff dog. The battle was not witnessed, but it must have been a long and well-fought one. The Eagle was slain on the spot: he did not, however, die unrevenged, for his antagonist very shortly afterwards expired of his wounds. Again, instances have occurred where Eagles which have carried off such animals as weasels, stoats, etc., have been attacked with relentless bite by these fell blood-suckers, and have at last fallen to the ground lhfeless in consequence. There is a similar story told of the encounter of one in the air with a cat, which it had carried off. He was fairly brought to the ground, the talons of the cat proving more effective than his own, and both were captured together.
When the Golden Eagle has pounced upon its victim, it kills it, if small, by a stroke with its talons, behind the head, and another at the region of the heart. It seems not to use the bill for slaughter, but only for tearing up its prey when killed. It generally, in spite of its care and skill in skinning or plucking, swallows part of the fur or feathers, or small bones, or parts of bones of the animal or bird it has seized, and these it afterwards disgorges from its mouth in large pellets.
In India, and other countries, there are numerous accounts of young children having been carried off by Eagles, but, as it must now be impossible to say with any certainty what species they were of, though possibly m some, or even in many cases, they may have been of the one I am treating of, yet as in others, beyond all doubt, they have been birds of the Vulture kind, or of other species of Eagles, I omit them from this account, recording those instances alone in which the bird at present before us has been the robber.
By the Ancients the Eagle was denominated the Bird of Jove, and alone deemed worthy of bearing his thunder. The Highland Chieftain at the present day exhibits the Eagle’s plume as the designation of his nobility, and as uncivilized nations have also always associated birds of this tribe with the idea of courage, quickness, and dignity, their warriors too in like manner pride themselves on the badge which the feathers of the Eagle furnish them with, either as an emblematic trophy of past, or a pledge of future bravery and daring. They prize it so highly, that they will often exchange a valuable horse for the tail feathers of a single Eagle. They also adorn with them their arrows, and the calumet or pipe of peace. The feathers of the Eagle are used in our own country for making certain salmon flies.
GOLDEN EAGLE. 19
The nest, which is very large, and has no lining, according to some authors, but is stated by others to be lined a little with grass or wool, and where these cannot be procured, or not in sufficient plenty, with small sticks, twigs, rushes, sea- weed, or heather, is generally built on high and inaccessible rocks and precipices, or the stump of some tree projecting from them, or the lofty trees of the forest. It is always, where possible, rebuilt of the same materials—the accustomed eyrie being made use of for many successive years, or, most likely, from the most favourable locality as to food and security combined having been chosen, for many generations, if its owners are not driven from it by their only superior enemy, man. ‘This latter assertion must however be understood with certain exceptions, as in the instances recorded above. |
The eggs, generally two in number, but in some cases three, are purely white, sometimes greyish white, and sometimes completely mottled or marbled over with lght russet brown.
The length of the male bird is about three feet or three and a half, and the expanse of the wings eight feet to eight and a half; the female, as is the case with the rest of the Eagle tribe, is larger, measuring about three feet and a half in length, and nine feet in width: one was killed at Wark- worth, in Northumberland, which measured the unusual size of eleven feet and a quarter from tip to tip.
In the adult, which weighs from nine to sixteen or eighteen pounds, the bill, (with which it sometimes makes a snapping noise,) is horn-colour, or deep blue; the cere, pure yellow; the iris, which is dark in the young bird, grows lighter as the bird advances in age, and ends in being of a clear orange brown; the crown of the head and the nape, the feathers of which are hackles, are sometimes bright golden red, but generally of a grey or hoary colour; all the rest of the body is obscure dark brown, more nearly approaching to black as the bird grows older; but when in extreme age, to which the Eagle is known to reach, its plumage becomes very light coloured, thin and worn, so much so, as to make it appear that the bird had ceased to moult. The tail, which is a little longer than the wings, and of a square shape, with the ex- ception of the two middle feathers, which exceed the others in length, and are rather pointed, is deep brown, paler on the base, barred with dark brown, with one broad bar ter- minating it. - The legs are feathered down to the toes, and the plumage on them is of a clearer brown than that of the
20 GOLDEN EAGLE.
rest of the body. The feet are at first greyish yellow, which merges into pure yellow; the expansion of the foot seven inches, including the claws; the middle toe measures three inches and a half “in length, and there are on it three or four large scales; and on the outer, inner, and hinder toes, three, on the last joint of each. The claws are black, much hooked, and very formidable weapons of attack or defence, the middle one being three inches in length. During the first year there is a well-defined white bar on the upper and larger half of the tail, but after this period, it is at each moult encroached upon by the brown colour of the lower half, until the roots alone of the feathers remain white.
21
SPOTTED EAGLE.
Aquila nevia, GOULD. “ melanaétos, SAVIGNY. Falco nevius, TEMMINCK, Aquila—An Eagle. Nevus—A spot.
Tue Spotted Eagle is an inhabitant of most parts of Europe, having been observed in France, Belgium, Italy, where among the Apennines it is very common; Germany, Sicily, and Russia; also in the northern districts of Africa, and in Asia, in India, in Siberia, the Bengal territory, Nepal, and near Calcutta. As in the case of the Griffon Vulture, only one example of this addition to our native Fauna, has, as yet, been obtained for preservation. It is singular, also, that the one in question occurred in the same neighbourhood as the other alluded to, namely, in the county of Cork. It was shot in the month of January, in the year 1845, in the act of devouring a rabbit, in a fallow field, on the estate of the Earl of Shannon, near Castle Martyr. Another individual in lighter plumage, no doubt its mate, was killed at the same place, about the same time, but unfortunately was not preserved: both had been observed for the two preceding months sweeping over the low grounds in the neighbourhood. It has been thought that very probably this species has been confounded in Ireland with the Golden Eagle, and that it may be indigenous there, both the specimens above mentioned having been in immature plumage. It has by some been asserted, that it is a common species in that country, and known by the name of the Silver Eagle. One is said to have been kept in captivity at Cahirciveen, and a pair are related to have bred regularly on the island of Valentia.
Cuvier says, that it was formerly employed in falconry, but that being deficient in courage, it was only employed for taking the smaller kinds of game. It seems to form one of the con- necting links between the Eagles and the Buzzards, as I have in a previous article stated that the Sea Eagle seems, in like
Pay SPOTTED EAGLE.
manner, to do between the Eagles and the Vultures. In fact, though called an Eagle, and classed with those birds, it would seem to be possessed of more of the characteristics of the Buzzards.
The Spotted Eagle flies low in hawking after its prey. It feeds on rabbits, rats, and other small animals and reptiles, as also on birds, particularly on ducks, as well as on some of the larger species of insects.
It builds on high trees, and lays two whitish eggs, slightly streaked with red. Like the Osprey, it seems to suffer smaller birds to build without molestation, in the immediate vicinity of its nest, or even in the outer parts of the nest itself.
This species is about two thirds the size of the Golden Nagle in linear dimensions. It measures about two feet three and a half or four inches in length. Jn the adult state, the general colour of the plumage is brown, varying in depth of tint according to the age of the bird. The bill is dark bluish horn-colour; cere, yellow. The head, both above and below, of a light brown; neck, dark reddish brown, the feathers, as in the Golden Eagle, being hackles; back, the same colour. The breast is rather lighter than the back. The wings, which when closed reach to the end of the tail, have the fourth and fifth quill feathers nearly of an equal Jength, but the fifth rather the longer, as if is also the longest in the wing; the primaries are almost black—all the feathers white at the base. The tail coverts are bright brown; tail, dusky black, barred with a paler colour, and the end of a reddish hue. The feet are yellow; claws, black.
The young bird in its first year has the bill of a dark bluish horn-colour, darker towards the tip than at the base; cere, yellow; iris, hazel; the head, neck, and back, dark chocolate brown; breast, the same; the margins of the greater and lesser coverts, as also the tertials, tipped in a well-defined elliptical form with yellowish white or white. The tail is dark chocolate brown. The legs are feathered down to the feet, and these feathers are variegated with lighter shades of brown; toes, yellow, reticulated for part of their length, but ending with four large broad scales; claws, nearly black. In its second year, the colour of the whole plumage becomes more uniformly of a general dark reddish brown.
23
OSPREY. Pandion ha/liaétus, SAVIGNY. Faleo J BEwIck. Balbusardus haliaétus, FLEMING, Aquila JENYNS.
Pandion—The name of a Greek hero, changed into a bird of prey. Huliaétus. (H)als—The sea. Aietos—An Eagle,
Ir is not every one who has had the fortune—the good fortune—to visit those scenes, where, in this country at least, the Osprey is almost exclusively to be met with. In these, which may in truth be called the times of perpetual motion, there is indeed hardly a nook, or mountain pass, which is not yearly visited by some one or more travellers. Where shall the most secure dweller among the rocks be now free from the intrusion of, in ornithological language, at least “occasional visitants:’ Still the case is not exactly one to which applies the logical term of ‘universal affirmative.’ Though every spot may be visited, it is not every one who visits it. How many of those who shall read the following description of the Osprey, have taken the ‘grand tour’ of Sutherlandshire?
In that desolate and romantic region, though even there at wide intervals, and ‘far between,’ and in a very few other localities, the Fishing Hawk may yet be seen in all the wild freedom of his nature. There it breeds in the fancied con- tinuance of that safety, which has for so many ages been real. You may see, even in the year eighteen hundred and fifty, an occasional eyrie on the top of some rocky islet in the middle of the mountain lake.
This species is very widely distributed over a large portion of the globe, being met with, in greater or less abundance, in Europe, Africa, and America, sometimes in very considerable numbers, and doubtless in Asia also. In America it seems to be most particularly numerous, a whole colony tenanting the same building place. It is also met with in Russia, Siberia, Kamtschatka, Scandinavia, France, Spain, and Germany, Swit-
24 OSPREY.
zerland, and Holland, in Egypt, Tripoli, Nigritia, the Cape of Good Hope, Japan, and New Holland, and has been hitherto far from unfrequent in England, most numerous at either extremity of the country, namely, in Sutherlandshire and Devonshire. Specimens have been killed in Berkshire, at Don- nington and at Pangbourne, the latter one in the year 1810, in the month of January. Three in Oxfordshire, one of them at Nuneham Park, the seat of George Harcourt, Esq.: and one at Udimore, in Sussex, by the keeper of F. Langford, Esq. in November, 1848. Others in Shropshire, Somersetshire, and Hertfordshire. One is mentioned by the Rev. Gilbert White, in his ‘Natural History of Selborne,’ as having been killed at Frinsham Pond, in Hampshire.
It has been frequently observed at Killarney, in Ireland, and no doubt occurs in many other parts of the sister island.
It has been in the habit of building regularly in many parts of Scotland, on Loch Awe, Loch Lomond, Loch Assynt, Seowrie, Loch Maddie, near Durness, and MRhiconnich, in short, on many, or most of the Highland Lochs; also at Killechurn Castle, and is said to breed in the Orkney Islands, Killarney, and near the Lizard Point. It has frequently been seen on and near Dartmoor, in Devonshire: two were procured in that locality in the month of May, in the year 1831, at Estover; one in the same year at another place in the same county, and two on the Avon. Three or four have been met with in the county of Durham—one seen near Hartlepool—others in Sussex —one in Hampshire, in Christchurch bay, where, Mr. Yarrell says, this bird is called the Mullet Hawk, a name far from unlikely to be appropriate, for these fish are remarkably fond of basking near the surface of the water, so that they may easily be killed with stones. In Yorkshire numerous specimens have been at various times procured; so many that I need not here more particulary enumerate them. ‘There is no record of the Osprey having been seen in the Hebrides.
The Osprey being so strictly a piscivorous bird, is only met with in the immediate neighbourhood of water; but salt and fresh water fish are equally acceptable to it—bays and the borders of the sea, as well as the most inland lakes, rivers, and preserves, are its favourite resort: when young, it may even, it is stated, be trained to catch fish. .
Temminck and Wilson state that the Osprey migrates in the winter. In Scotland, it is said to arrive in Sutherlandshire in the spring, but on the other hand the specimens which
OSPREY. 25
have occurred on the Tweed, are recorded as having appeared there in the autumn.
The Osprey is in some degree, or rather in some situations, a gregarious bird. As many as three hundred pairs have been known to build together in America, which, as_ before remarked, seems to be by far its most abundant habitat. It is a very frequent circumstance for several pairs thus to con- gregate; the similarity of their pursuit by no means seeming to interfere with that harmony which should ever prevail among members of the same family. They sometimes unite in a general attack on their common enemy, the White-headed Eagle, and, union being strength, succeed in driving him from their fishing-grounds, of which they then maintain the peaceable possession.
It would appear from the mention of the Osprey, by Izaak Walton, under the name of Bald Buzzard, that it was formerly used in falconry.
The flight of the Osprey, though generally slow and heavy like that of the Buzzard, and performed with a scarcely per- ceptible motion of the wings, is strikingly easy and graceful. It rises spirally at pleasure to a great height, darts down perhaps at times, and then again sails steadily on. When looking out for prey, on perceiving a fish which it can strike, it hovers in the air fora few moments, like the Kestrel, with a continual motion of its wings and tail. Its stoop, which follows, though sometimes suspended midway, most likely from perceiving that the fish had escaped, or to ‘make assur- ance doubly sure,’ is astonishingly rapid. The similar action of the Sea Swallow may serve to give some faint idea of it.
If the fish it has pounced on be at some distance below the surface, the Osprey is completely submerged for an instant, and a circle of foam marks the spot where it has descended: on rising again with its capture, it first, after mounting a few yards in the air, shakes its plumage, which, though formed by nature extremely compact for the purpose of resisting the wet as much as possible, must imbibe some degree of moisture, which it thus dislodges. It then immediately flies off to its nest, if it be the breeding-season, or to some tree if it is not, and in that situation makes its meal. When this is ended, it usually, though not always, again takes wing and soars away toia great height, or else prowls anew over the waters —unlike the other Hawks, which, for the most part, remain in an apathetic state, the result apparently of satisfied hunger:
26 OSPREY.
thus continues the routine of its daily life. Sometimes it is said to devour its food in the air, but I cannot think this. The audacious White-headed Eagle often robs the too patient Osprey of its hardly-toiled-for prey before it has had time to devour it itself, forcing it to drop it in the air, and catching it as it falls.
The sole food of the Osprey is fish, and from its manner of taking it by suddenly darting or falling on it, it has been called by the Italians, ‘Aquila plumbina,’ or the Leaden Eagle. It is however said by Montagu, that it will occasionally take other prey—that one has been seen to strike a young wild duck, and having lost its hold of it, to seize it again a second time before it reached the water. I must, however, express the strongest doubt of this having been the case. If the cir- cumstance as described to him really occurred at all, I can hardly think but that some other species must have been mistaken for the one before us, particularly from the latter fact mentioned, for Wilson, whose opportunites of observing this bird were so abundant, says expressly, that not only does it feed exclusively on fish, but that it never attempts to seize a second time one which it may have dropped. It usually takes its prey below the surface of the water, and never catches it when leaping out, even when in the case of the flying fish it has ample opportunities of doing so, though when that persecuted creature is again submerged, it will follow it into its more legitimate element, and take it there without scruple. It never preys on any of the inferior land animals, which it might so easily capture were it thus disposed. Even when the lakes, which supply its usual food, are frozen over, and when it is difficult to imagine how it can supply its wants without resorting to other, even if uncongenial, food, it does not do so. .
The Osprey seldom alights on the ground, and when it does so, 1ts movements are awkward and ungainly. It is not in its element but when in the air; occasionally however it remains for several hours together in a sluggish state of repose.
It:builds at very different times, in different places—in January, February, March, April, and the beginning of May: the latter month appears in this country to be the period of its nidification. It repairs the original nest, seeming like many other species, to have a predilection from year to year, for the same building place. The saline materials of which it is com- posed, and perhaps also the oil from the fish brought to it,
OSPREY. a7
have the effect, in a few years, of destroying the tree in which it has been placed. The male partially assists the female in the business of incubation, and at other times keeps near her, and provides her with food—she sits accordingly very close. Both birds, when the young are hatched, share the task of feeding them with fish, and have even been seen to supply them when they have left the nest and have been on the wing themselves; they both also courageously defend them against all aggressors, both human and others. They only rear one brood in the year. If one of the parents happen to be killed, the other is almost sure to return, ere long, with a fresh mate: where procured, as in other similar cases, is indeed a mystery.
The nest of the Osprey is an immense pile of twigs, small and large sticks and branches, some of them an inch and a half in diameter—the whole forming sometimes a mass easily discernible at the distance of half a mile or more, and in quantity enough to fill a cart. How it is that it is not blown down, or blown to pieces by a gale of wind, is a question which has yet to be explained. It occasionally is heaped up to the height of four or five feet, or even eight, and is from two to three feet in breadth, interlaced and compacted with sea-weed, stalks of corn, grass, or turf; the whole, in conse- quence of annual repairs and additions, which even in human dwellings often make a house so much larger than it was originally intended to be, not to say unsightly, becoming by degrees of the character described above. It is built either on a tree, at a height of from six, seven, or eight to fifteen feet, and from that to fifty feet from the ground; on a forsaken building, or the ruins of some ancient fortress, erected on the edge of a Highland Loch, the chimney, if the remains of one are in existence, being generally preferred, or on the summit of some insular crag; in fact, it accomodates itself easily to any suitable and favourable situation. Bewick, erroneously following Willughby, (and Mudie him,) says that the Osprey builds its nest ‘on the ground among reeds’—it very rarely indeed does so. It is a curious fact that smaller birds frequently build their nests in the outside of those of the Osprey, without molestation on the one hand, or fear on the other. Larger birds also build theirs in the immediate vicinity, without any disturbance on the part of either.
The eggs, which are sometimes only two in number, but occasionally three, and in some instances, but very rarely, as
28 OSPREY.
many as four, are described by several writers, apparently following Willughby, to be of an elliptical form. They are laid in May, and are about the size of those of a hen, and are generally similar to each other in colour, but occasionally vary considerably in size and shape: the ground colour is white, or dingy yellowish, or brownish white, much mottled over, par- ticularly at the base, in an irregular manner, with yellowish brown or rust-colour, with some specks of light brownish grey. The larger spots are sometimes of a very fine rich red brown.
Weight of the male, between four and five pounds; length, about one foot ten or ‘eleven inches; bill, black, bluish black, or brownish black, probably according to age, and blue or horn-colour at the base; cere, light greyish blue; iris, yellow. ‘The rudiment of a crest is formed by the feathers of the nape, which are lanceolate; head, white in the fully adult bird; until then, the feathers are brown, margined with white; crown, whitish or yellowish white, streaked with dark brown longitudinal marks; neck, white, with a brown mark from the bill down each side. The nape, whitish, streaked with dark brown; chin, white, with sometimes a few dusky streaks; throat, white or brownish white, streaked with dark or dusky brown; breast, generally white, mottled about the upper part with a few rather hght brown feathers, forming an irregular band, and also more or less sprinkled with yellowish or brown markings—the margins of the feathers being paler than the rest. Selby says that the brown admixture is indicative of a young bird, the adults generally, if not always, having that part of an immaculate white, and there can I think be no doubt but that itis so. The whole plumage, especially on the under side, is close set, as is the case with water birds, their frequent submersions requiring such a defence.
The back, dark brown—in some individuals the feathers being margined with a paler shade; wings, long, and of wide ex- panse, measuring five feet three or four inches across. When closed, they extend a little beyond the end of the tail—not quite two inches; the first three quills are deeply notched on the inner side near the end; primaries, dark brown, black, or nearly black at the ends. The tertiaries assume the form of quills; larger and lesser under wing coverts, white, barred with umber brown; tail, short and square, waved with a darker and a lighter shade of brown above, and beneath barred with greyish brown on a white ground—the two middle feathers darker than the others. The legs reticulated, and pale blue.
OSPREY. ( 29
They are very short and thick, being only two inches and a quarter long, and two inches in circumference—great strength being required for its peculiar habits. They are feathered in front about one fourth down, the feathers being short and close. The toes, pale greyish blue, and partially reticulated, with a few broad scales near the end, and furnished beneath, particularly the outer one, with some short sharp spines, or conical scales, for the evident purpose of holding fast a prey so slippery as that which the bird feeds on. The outer toe is longer than the inner one, the contrary being the case with others of its congeners, and adapted for a more than ordinary turning backwards, the better to grasp and hold a fish. The hind toe has four scales, the others only three. The claws, black, and nearly alike in length: those of the first and fourth toes being larger than those of the others.
The female is considerably larger than the male, but the colour of both is much alike. There is, however, in her a greater prevalence of brown over the white, and it is of a deeper shade, approaching on the lower part of the breast to brownish red. Weight, sometimes upwards of five pounds; length, two feet to two feet and an inch; expanse of the wings, about five feet and a half.
The young birds are much variegated in their plumage, which becomes of a more uniform hue as they advance in age—the grey and the brown giving way by degrees to white.
Variations of plumage occur in the Osprey, even in its fully adult state; the white being more or less clear, and the brown more or less prevalent: the legs also vary from light greyish blue to a very pale blue, with a tinge of yellow.
30
BUZZARD. Buteo vulgaris, FLEMING. Falco buteo, PENNANT. SB ULCO— leer ss tsece ? Vulgaris—Common.
Dr. JoHnson assigns as the meaning of the word Buzzard, ‘a degenerate or mean species of Hawk,’ but being by no meaus one of the admirers of the author of the Dictionary, I shall take leave to differ as much from the present as trom another well-known definition of his touching the ‘gentle art,’ of which for many years 1 have been a professor.
The Buzzard is plentifully distributed over nearly the whole of the continent of Europe, and is also found in North America, and in the more northern parts of Africa. It inhabits Spain and Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Russia, Holland _ and France, but does not appear to be known in the Orkney
or Shetland Islands. In England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, it is sufficiently abundant, affecting both the wildest and the most cultivated districts, but in both taking a more than ordinary care to choose such situations as will either exempt it from the intrusion, or enable it to have timely notice of the approach of an enemy. Still, with all its precautions, and with every aid that its own instinct and the most retired or the most rugged localities can afford, it, hke too many others of our native birds, is gradually becoming more rare. The advancement of agriculture upon grounds heretofore wild and uncultivated, the natural consequence of an increase of population within a fixed circumference, and other causes, contributing to this fact, which at all events a naturalist must lament.
The Buzzard is found in a variety of situations, such as rocky cliffs, chases, parks where timber abounds, or in ‘ci devant’ forests. It remains in England throughout the year, but, nevertheless, is partially migratory.
I am much indebied to my liberal-minded friend, Arthur Strickland, Esq., of Bridlington-Quay, for the following striking
R11 ve. : SUGAGANLD,
BUZZARD. él
notice of the fact of its migration in this country, communicated to him in the year 1847, by his brother, then residing at Coleford, in the forest of Dean, in Gloucestershire. I must
observe that the letter was not originally intended to be published.
‘Coleford, 1847.
I have a curious circumstance in ornithology to tell you. There is no account that I have heard of relating particularly to the migration of some of the Hawks, proving them to as- semble in flocks for the purpose of migration, and going off together in large parties like Swallows, but of this I have positive proof in the Common Buzzard. On the 2nd. of August, 1847, just at sunset, we were assembled in the yard to the number of five persons; we were busily engaged talking on a fine bright evening: the air was filled as far as we could see, (about forty yards to the north, and one hundred to the south,) with great Hawks, all proceeding together steadily and slowly to the westward. Those immediately above us were within gunshot of the top of the house—with large shot I might have brought some down from where I stood. The man called them Shreaks—a common name for the Wood Buzzard. The evening was so bright, and they were so near, that I saw them as plain as if they were in my hand. They were flying in little parties of from two to five, all these little parties flying so close together that their wings almost touched, whilst each little party was separated from the next about fifteen or twenty yards: fourteen parties passed imme- diately over us that 1 counted, but as I did not begin to count them at first, and as 1 have no doubt the flock extended beyond the boundary of jour view, I cannot tell how many the flock consisted of. On this day a remarkable change occurred in the weather, which may have caused an early migration.’
Again, the same gentleman writing from Coleford in the following year, 1848, says—
‘Coleford, 1848.
I last year wrote you a history of the migration of large parties of the Great Wood Buzzard. ‘This year, on the 29th. of July, 1848, a party went over numbering forty, and the next day another flight of eighteen. I calculate the Hawks in three months must eat more than a ton weight of food,
4
32 BUZZARD.
as | know that one Hawk will readily eat more than four pounds weight of beef in a week—what can they have lived upon? there is next to no game in the forest or country any where.’
Whether the flights of the birds mentioned were adults moving from one part of the country to another, or young birds leaving their paternal home, in obedience to those laws of population to which even lordly man is forced to submit, it is difficult in the absence of ascertained facts, to hazard even a conjecture. Temminck has observed that the species before us migrates at certain periods of the year, and that it is at such times frequently associated with the Rough-legged Buzzard, which, if so, is rather curious.
Their flight when thus migrating appears to be slowly per- formed—retarded by various evolutions in the air—and many of the birds often remain for days, and even weeks together at some halting place or places on their way.
In confinement the Buzzard is easily tamed, and becomes in fact quite companionable. Various amusing anecdotes are recorded of different individuals which have been thus kept. It has generally been described as being of a slow and sluggish nature, but it is so only comparatively, with reference to some other species of birds of prey, and must not come under a wide and unexceptionable censure. According to Bewick, whom other writers seem to have followed in forming their estimate of the character of the bird before us, it 1s so cowardly and inactive that it will fly before a Sparrow Hawk, and when overtaken, will suffer itself to be beaten, and even brought to the ground, without resistance. I however incline much rather to the opinion of Mr. Maegillivray, that the Buzzard is by no means such a poltroon as he generally has had the character of being.
The Buzzard is described by some writers as flying low, but such however is by no means the result of repeated ob- servations which I have had opportunities of making upon it: I have almost invariably seen it flying at a very considerable elevation. Unquestionably it does, because it must, fly low, not only sometimes, but often, but that it passes no small portion of its time in lofty aerial flight, I must unhesitatingly affirm. The slow sailing of this bird, as I have thus s:en it, is very striking—the movement of its wings is hardiy perceptible, but onward it steadily wends its way: you can scarcely take your eyes off it, but follow it with a gaze as
BUZZARD. 30
steady as its own flight, until ‘by degrees, beautifully less,’ it leaves you glad to rest your eyeballs, and if you look again for it, you look in vain. When soaring aloft, the flight of the Buzzard is even peculiarly dignified, if J may use such an expression, nor do I know of any bird by which, on the wing, the attention is more immediately arrested. It looms large also in the distance, and those who have had frequent oppor- tunities of comparing together its apparent size and that of the Golden Eagle, have said that the former may easily be mistaken for the latter, if both are not seen together in tolerable propinquity. Even when high in the air, particularly on a bright and sunny day, the bars and mottled markings on the wings and tail, the motions of which latter are also clearly discernible in steering its course, appear visibly distinct.
The flight of this species appears heavy, but is not so in reality: a series of sweeps, when, in piscatorial language, the bird is on the feed. It rises slowly at first, more after the manner of an Eagle than a Falcon, and when on the wing proceeds sedately in quest of its prey, which, when it perceives, halting sometimes for a moment, it darts dowa upon, and generally with unfailing precision. Its quarry is then either ‘consumed on the premises,’ or carried off for the purpose to some more convenient or more secure place of retreat, or to its nest, to supply the wants of its young. It does not continue on the wing for a very long time together. When not engaged in flight, it will remain, even for hours together, in the same spot—on the stump of a tree, or the point of a cliff, motionless; as some have conjectured, from repletion; and others from being on the look out for prey, at which, when coming within its ken, to stoop in pursuit. It frequents very much the same haunts, and may often be seen from day to duy, and at the same hour of the day, beating the same hunting ground.
I am inclined to think that the species of prey most naturally sought by the Buzzard is the rabbit. It feeds, however, for necessity has no law, on a great variety of other kinds of food. It destroys numberless moles, of which it also’ seems particularly fond, as well as field mice, leverets, rats, snakes, frogs, toads, the young of game, and other birds, worms, insects, and newts. The latter it seems to have been thought to have obtained, by some means or other from their pools, but such a supposition is by no means necessary, for those little animals, like many other water reptiles, are often to be
VOL, I. ’ D
od BUZZARD.
found wandering on dry land—out of, and far away from their more proper element. The way in which the Buzzard procures moles is, it is said, by watching patiently by their haunts, until the moving of the earth caused by their subterraneous burrowings, points out to him their exact locality, and the knowledge of it thus acquired he immediately takes advantage of to their destruction. His feet, legs, and bill being often found covered with earth or mud is thus accounted for.
The Buzzard never, or very rarely, attempts to obtain its prey by pursuit. It prowls about, and pounces down on whatever may be so unlucky as to fall in its way. Feeding, as it does, on various kinds of vermin, it is of great service in corn-growing countries, and according to Mr. Meyer, is itself esteemed a delicacy on the continent, notwithstanding the not over nice selection of its own food.
The note of the Common Buzzard is wild and striking, its shrillness conveying a melancholy idea—though, as every feeling of melancholy produced by any thing in nature must be, of a pleasing kind—when heard in the retired situations in which this bird delights. One of its local names is the Shreak, evidently derived from the sound of its note.
These birds pair in the beginning of March, at which time they may be seen wheeling about, and often at a great height above the place of their intended abode, in slow and graceful flight. They are very attentive to their young, and are said not to drive them away so soon as other Hawks do theirs; but to allow them to remain in company with them, and to render assistance to them for some time after they have been able to fly, in the same way that Rooks and some other birds do.
The Buzzard is extremely fond, even in captivity, of the task of incubation: one at Uxbridge, a female, brought up safely several broods of chickens, to which she proved a most kind and careful foster-mother. The landlord of the inn, in whose garden she was kept, noticing her desire to build and to sit, supplied her with materials for a nest, and with hen’s eggs for the purpose, and this was repeated with the lke success for several years. On one occasion, thinking to save. her the trouble of sitting, he provided her with chickens ready hatched, but these she destroyed. She seemed uneasy when her adopted brood turned away from the meat she put before them to the grain which was natural to them. Several other similar instances are on record.
BUZZARD. 35
The Buzzard builds both in trees, and in clefts, fissures, or ledges of mountains and cliffs, and if the latter are chosen, in the most secure and difficult situations. One in particular I remember in a most admirable recess, out of all possible reach except by being lowered down to it by a rope. The nest is built of large and small sticks, and is lined, though sparingly, with wool, moss, hair, or some other soft substance. Not unfrequently, to save the trouble of building a nest of its own, it will appropriate to itself, and repair sufficiently for its purpose, an old and forsaken one of some other bird, such as a Jackdaw, a Crow, or a Raven, and will also occasionally return to its own of the preceding year.
The eggs are two, three, or four in number, generally the former, and rather incline to a rotundity of form. They are of a dull greenish or bluish white, streaked and blotted, more especially at the thicker end, with yellowish or pale brown. Sometimes they are perfectly white. Occasionally their markings are extremely elegant in the eye of a connoisseur. I may here mention that I strongly suspect that many colourings of different eggs are adventitious, and not intrinsic.
Mr. Hewitson, in his very much to be praised ‘Coloured Illustrations of the Eggs of British Birds,’ writes, ‘Mr. R. R. Wingate had the eggs of the Common Buzzard brought to him from the same place for several successive years—no doubt the produce of the same bird. ‘The first year they were white, or nearly so; the second year marked with indistinct yellowish brown, and increasing each year in the intensity of their colouring, till the spots became of a rich dark brown.’
The Buzzard is one of those birds which either happily or unhappily, as different naturalists may choose to consider it, varies very much in plumage—scarcely any two individuals being alike. The feathers also fade and wear much _ before moulting—the only permanent markings are the bars on the tail. It is the upper part which varies most in depth of tint, the general colour being brown, more or less deep or dull. In the darker specimens a purple hue is apparent. The feathers are darker in the centre, and lighter at the edges; the margin being sometimes of a pale brown, or reddish yellow. Bewick says that some specimens are entirely white, and others are recorded as nearly so. The males appear to be lighter in colour than the females. Generally they are, however, dark brown, though in some cases white prevails; the feathers being spotted in the centre with brown. Weight, from thirty to
36 BUZZARD.
forty ounces; length, about one foot eight inches. The general colour of the bill is black, or leaden grey, yellow at the edges, and greyish blue where it joins the cere. The cere, which is bare above and below, but bristled on the sides, is of a greenish yellow, darker in specimens of darker colour; iris, yellowish brown, or pale yellow, but it is found to vary in some degree, according to the general tone of the colour of the bird, and sometimes approaches to orange. ‘The head, which is very wide and flattened on the top, is streaked with darker and lghter shades of brown; occasionally with yellowish white; neck, short and wide in appearance—so much so, as, in connection with the shape of the head and the general loose character of the plumage, together with the habit of these birds of prowling for food in the evening, to have led some to suppose that an approximation is furnished by the Buzzards to the Owls.
The colour of the feathers of the neck is dusky grey, very much streaked with brown; chin and throat, white, or nearly white. The breast, greyish white, or yellowish white, also very much streaked with darker and lighter shades of brown— some of the feathers being white, with brown spots in the centre of each. In some specimens the breast is nearly as dark as the back, in others it is belted beneath with a broad band of a purple tint, and occasionally is entirely variegated with reddish brown. The back, dark brown, sometimes shewing a purple hue. Wings, large, measuring from four feet to four feet and a half in extent. They are rounded at the ends, so much so that this feature is not only clearly discernible, but a distin- guishing mark of the bird when on the wing: when closed they reach nearly to the end of the tail. The tips are deep brown, shaded at the base with pure white. The wings beneath are lighter, being mottled with white and brown—they are crossed irregularly with dark bars: greater and lesser wing coverts, dark brown; primaries, brownish black; greater under wing coverts, and lesser under wing coverts, dark brown. The tail, which has six, eight, ten, or twelve narrow bars of alternate dark brown and pale greyish brown, the last dark bar being the widest, is tolerably long, rather wide, and slightly rounded at the end: the tips of the feathers are pale reddish brown. The under side of the tail is of a general greyish white, barred with dark brown. Its whole appearance is often extremely beautiful—the upper surface being varied with a fine grey brown of different shades, and reddish yellow. Upper tail coverts, dark brown; lower tail coverts, yellowish white, or white
BUZZARD. 37
spotted with brown on each feather. The legs, which are rather short, are feathered about a third down, the bare part, which is yellow, being covered nearly all round, but principally in front, with a series of scales. The toes, bright yellow, and short—the third being the longest, and united to the fourth by a tolerably large web; the others are nearly of equal length. In specimens of this bird of dark plumage, the colour of the legs is correspondingly darker than in those of a lighter hue. The toes are reticulated to about half their length; claws, black, or nearly black, and though very sharp, not very strongly hooked.
The female is considerably larger than the male, measuring from one foot nine to one foot ten inches in length, and nearly five feet across the wings; sometimes as much as full five feet. The young birds, while in the nest, are of a lighter colour than the old ones, and the tips of the feathers are paler than the rest—the whole plumage being variegated with brown and white, and the latter predominant on the back of the neck. As they advance towards maturity, the plumage at each moult becomes gradually of a darker hue, and at the same time the white or yellowish white markings on the throat and lower parts become more apparent and distinct. The iris is deep brown in the immature state, and becomes of its permanent colour when the bird is adult.
‘A beautiful variety,’ says Mr. Meyer, ‘of which there is a specimen in the Zoological Museum, is also occasionally seen, but is comparatively rare. The ground of the plumage in this variety is white, tinged in various parts with yellow. The head is marked down the centre of the feathers with narrow streaks of brown; a few of the feathers on the breast are marked with arrow-shaped spots of the same colour, the smaller coverts of the wings the same. The quill feathers are dark brown towards the tips; the tail is crossed on a white ground with dark brown bars, seven or eight in number, the bar nearest to the white tip broader than the rest. In the white variety the eyes also partake of the light colour of the plumage, and are pearl-coloured, or greyish white; the cere and feet are also lighter in the same proportion, being a pale lemon yellow.’
38
ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD.
Buteo laaopus, FLEMING. falco lagopus, PENNANT,
Buteo—........... ? Lagopus, Lagéos, or Lagis—A hare. Pous—A toot.
THE Rough-legged Buzzard, says the accurate Macgillivray, may, like certain other bipeds, notwithstanding his boots and whiskers, be really less ferocious than he seems to be. This qualifying remark, however, it must be noted, is made with reference to a claim put forth in behalf of the character of this bird, to rescue it from the sweeping condemnation under which the preceding species has in lke manner fallen.
The Rough-legged Buzzard is found in considerable numbers in various parts of Europe, Africa, and America. It occurs from the Cape of Good Hope, and the northern shores of Africa, to Russia, Lapland, and Scandinavia; likewise in Holland and France, and is common among the Rocky Mountains in North America, as also in North Carolina, and other parts of the United States. It is particularly abundant in some of the extensive forests of Germany, and is very frequently seen in the more cultivated districts which border on them. In England it appears to be more plentiful in the eastern and south- eastern parts, than in any others, particularly in the counties of Norfolk and Sussex, in the latter of which it is said, by A. E. Knox, Ksq., to be the abundant species, as compared with the other called the common one, which latter is there but rarely met with.
It is quite within my own recollection that the Rough-legged Buzzard was esteemed a very rare bird in this country; in fact, it is only within the last few years, that it has been so much oftener observed as to have become less valuable than previously on account of its supposed rarity. It is always easily distinguishable by its legs being feathered down to the toes, and by the permanency more or less, in all varieties,
ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD.
ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD. 39
of the white at the base of the tail, and, in most specimens, the white on the middle, and the dark brown patch on the lower part of the breast. It has a habit of sitting with its feathers much ruffled and loose, which gives it the appearance of being a larger bird than it really is.
Several specimens have been obtained in different parts of Ireland, as recorded by William Thompson, Esq., of Belfast, who however, considers it extremely rare there. He mentions one as having been taken alive about the middle of October, in the year 1831, near Dundonald, in the county of Down: the remains of birds, and of a rat, were found in it on dissection. Two others were seen about the same time at Killinchy, in the same county, one of which was shot, but, unfortunately not preserved. Another was shot in the autumn of the year 1836, at Castlewellan, in the same county; and another near the end of the year 1837, at Powerscourt, the seat of the Marquis of Waterford, in the county of Wicklow. Others in the southern and eastern parts of Scotland; and there is now scarce a county in England in which one or more have not been procured almost every year since attention has been directed to its specific distinction from the Common Buzzard, with which species, beyond all question, it was before continually confounded.
In Yorkshire, a number of specimens were obtained near Sheffield, in the winter of 1839-40. Mr. H. Chapman, of York, has received some for preservation; and others are mentioned by Mr. Denny, as having been shot at Garforth, in the year 1833. Two are recorded by Arthur Strickland, Esq.; one of them as having come into his own possession. It had been noticed on the Wolds for some time previously, and its flight was described as having a great resemblance to that of an Owl. Dr. Farrer reports two as having been taken in 1840: one of them shot at Clayton Heights, and the other trapped at Hawkworth Hall. One was shot at Bilham, near Doncaster, now in the possession of the Rev. Godfrey’ Wright, of that place, and others near Hudderstield, and at Black Hill, then a rabbit warren. For this information [I am indebted to Mr. Allis, of Osbaldwick, near York, as well as for voluminous records of the whole of the Yorkshire Birds. To these valuable documents I shall have frequent occasion to refer, but this one acknowledgment of the favour must not be withheld.
Montagu has recorded the occurrence of a few in his time in the south of Hngland—one of them in Kent, picked up dead on the coast, in the winter of 1792, and Selby several
40 ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD.
as having been met with in Northumberland, in the winter of the year 1815; others in East Lothian, in 1828, and one near Alnwick, m March, 1828. In Devonshire two have been killed near Dartmoor; one at Egg Buckland, in November, 1886. Mr. Doubleday has mentioned more than fifty specimens taken in one rabbit warren, in the county of Norfolk.
This bird frequents the more wooded parts of the open country, and, if undisturbed, will continue to resort at night to the same tree, or the same wood, to roost.
The 2ough- legged tee ved remains in this country through- out the nile es ihe year, at least some individuals ‘have been met with both in summer and winter. It is migratory like the species deseribed in the preceding article, and, as there mentioned, even accompanies it in its meena! but whether its flights on those occasions are long or short—complete expatriations, or mere local removes, or flittings,’ to use a not inappropriate Yorkshire word, is a matter which at present cannot be pronounced upon with certainty. They do not always accompany the more extensive caravans of Common Buzzards, but sometimes keep to themselves in small flocks of from three to five.
It would appear that this species is more nocturnal than others
of the Falcon family in seeking its prey—sometimes hawking even until long after sunset, a fact which, in connection with the looseness and softness of its plumage, has not unnaturally suggested an approximation to the Owl tribe. But, inasmuch as the Harriers approach still nearer to them in acti respect, if it is to be linked with them, it must be by means of an imaginary loop—the links of the direct chain being broken, or rather superseded. That a real natural bond of union, so to call it, does exist from the highest to the lowest anatal in the Bealls of creation, is Without doubt to be received as true, but even with the materials to his hand, how short- sighted is man to trace it—how utterly blnd—a mere wanderer in darkness, while all around him is light.
The flight of the species before us is, like that of the Common Buzzard, slow and stealthy. The bird is easy on the wing, and passes much of its time in hawking for its food, though it does not continue long at once in the air. Sometinias, however, it will remain fy a considerable time stationary in a tree, doubtless for the same reason that actuates its predecessor (in this work.) In the breeding season it has also the like habit of soaring aloft over and around its eyrie.
ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD. 41
The Rough-legged Buzzard preys on rabbits, leverets, rats, mice, moles, frogs, lizards, birds, and insects. When instigated by hunger, it has been known to fly at ducks, and other larger game than the Common Buzzard aims at. In general, however, its habit is not to pursue its prey if on the wing, but to pounce on any which it may suddenly and unawares steal on. A wounded bird it will more readily fly after, conscious that it offers more certain success.
The note is a loud squeal, somewhat resembling the neighing of a foal, but, says Wilson, more shrill and savage.
This species breeds occasionally in this country, and I am happy to be able to mention Yorkshire as the county in which the fact was first ascertained, the locality bemg among the beautiful scenery around Hackness, near Scarborough. The nest resembles that of the Common Buzzard, being composed of sticks, and but slightly lined. It is built, like those of other birds of the Hawk and Eagle kind, either on high trees, or precipitous and inaccessible cliffs, mountains, or rocks.
The eggs vary very considerably in colour. Some are found nearly entirely white, others of ‘a dingy or yellowish white, more or less blotted with yellowish brown; some of a greenish white shade, spotted with pale brown, and others with reddish brown. They are from three to five in number, but generally four.
The bird before us, like the preceding one, varies also much in plumage, though not quite to so great an extent as it, the brown and the white prevailing in different individuals in a greater or less degree. The belt on the lower part of the breast, and the white at the base of the tail, are the least variable parts, but even these are by no means permanent in shape or depth of colouring. Weight, about two pounds and a half; length, from about one foot ten inches to two feet, or two feet one; bill, bluish black, or horn-colour at the base, and black at the tip; it is weak, small in size, much hooked, and has no tooth, but only a slight inclination towards one; eere, yellow, or greenish yellow, probably according to age; iris, pale yellow, but it occasionally, as is likewise the case with the Common Buzzard, is found to vary, and is brown, or greyish white. The space between the bill and the eye is covered with short bristly feathers. The head, which is very wide and flat above, is light brown, or buff, sometimes yellowish, or yellowish white, streaked with brown. 'The neck, short, yellowish brown, streaked or spotted with a darker shade of
49 ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD.
the latter in the centre of each feather; chin, fawn-colour, tinged with rust-colour; throat, fawn-colour, or yellowish white inclining to cream-colour, and slightly streaked with brown, sometimes a mixture of fawn and rust-colour; breast, brown, with streaks, or yellowish white with spots of brown, the lower part being banded with a bar of dark brown; back, brown, the feathers being edged with a paler shade.
The wings, which measure from about four feet two to four feet three or four inches across, and reach nearly to the end of the tail—about an inch short of it—are brown, some of the feathers edged with fawn-colour; the third and fourth quill feathers are the longest in the wing, the first and second are short. The wings are partly white midlernen th, Greater wing coverts, pale brown, edged with dull white, or still paler brown, or yellowish white; lesser wing coverts, pale brown, edged with yellow; primaries, brownish black. The tail, ae is rather long, and slightly rounded at the end, is white at the base, and irregularly barred with deeper or lighter brown near the end, which is tipped with white, the general colour being buff white on the upper half of the superior surface, and brown on the lower half; beneath, the upper half white, the lower greyish brown. In some specimens there are no indications of bars on either side of the tail, and others have only a band near the tip on the under side; upper tail coverts, white, or buff white, streaked or spotted with brown, and edged with yel- lowish brown; under tail coverts, yellowish white, or buff white. The legs are feathered down to the toes—this being in fact the distinguishing ‘trait in its character.’ The feathers are reddish, tawny yellow, or cream yellow, streaked and spotted with brown; toes, dark yellow, and rather short—the outer and middle ones are united bya membrane. They are all reticulated at the upper end, and have several large scales at the lower end, near the claws: the middle toe is said to have seven or eight, the outer one five, and the mner and hinder ones four each; but I must here repeat the remark I have previously made. The claws, black and long, but not much hooked.
The female is considerably larger than the male—the larger measurements given above belonging to her. The lighter parts of the plumage are darker in her than in him, and the under tail coverts are spotted with brown. One variety is so very dark as to appear almost black at a little distance, and the legs and bill are darker in proportion, assuming an orange hue.
Temminck, and after him Meyer, describes a dark mottled
ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD. 43
variety of this species, of which the latter says that the whole head, neck, and breast, are black, the feathers bordered with +eddish tee: the band above the thighs white, crossed with black lines; the thighs and feathered tarsi a crossed with many narrow black bars , the black occupying rather the greater portion: in these specimens the tail is white, banded near the tip with a broad black bar, above which are four or five narrower bars of the same colour. In some of them the throat and sides of the body are quite black, very narrowly streaked with yellowish white: these are considered to be the oldest birds. In autumn, after moulting, all are darker than in the summer, the plumage having become faded.
Montagu describes another variety killed in Suffolk, having the tail of a cream-coloured white, a brown bar, above an inch in length, near the tip; above that another, half an inch broad, and above these, each feather as having a spot upon it in the middle, resembling, when spread, a third bar; the two outer feathers on each side marked with a few irregular spots of brown on the outer webs, almost the whole of their length. - It was probably a male, as it measured only one foot ten inches in length.
Pennant has mentioned another, shot near London, which had the extreme half of the tail brown, tipped with dull white; but I see scarcely any variety in this from the ordinary marking of the bird, unless it be that there were no bars in the lower—the brown half of the tail.
44.
HONEY BUZZARD.
BOD Y MEL, OF THE ANCIENT BRITISH.
Pernis apivorus, CUVIER. Buteo apivorus, JENYNS. Falco apivorus, PENNANT. Pernis—A kind of Hawk. (Aristotle.) Apivorus. Apis—
A Bee. Voro—To devour.
THIS species is widely distributed over the earth, being found in India, and in various countries of Hurope—rarely in Holland, unfrequently in France, and also in Turkey, Hungary, Italy, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Russia, the Levant, and other parts. In ‘Asia also, in Siberia. If the specific English name is to be considered as in any way descriptive of the bird it is attached to, it has been well observed by Mr. Macgillivray that the tested ‘Honey Buzzard’ should be set aside for ‘Bee Hawk,’ as the bird does not feed on the honey, the produce of the bee, but on the bee, the producer of the honey; except therefore by a sort of recondite implheation, its present name must be considered as a misnomer. There is indeed one instance to the contrary recorded by Mr. J.T. Bold, who says that an individual of this species, kept in confinement by Mr. John Hancock, ‘not only ate honey, but did so with great apparent relish, preferring it to other food.’ May it not however, possibly, have been thought to be eating the honey-comb, when it was in fact only picking it to pieces, or swallowing it accidentally in search of the food which its instinct led it to expect to find im it?
One kept in a tame state by Mr. Gordon Joseph Fisher, of Newton-on-the-sea, lived in perfect amity with three Lap- wings, a Seagull, and a Curlew. The one described by him had a quantity of moss in its stomach, which, as he very justly remarks, it had doubtless swallowed with the bees
HONEY BUZZARD.
+ - : ia ’ . + sae ar
HONEY BUZZARD. 45
which were also found in it; yet no one would therefore contend that moss formed part of its food. It was observed by Mr. Fisher, when very hungry, to swallow pieces of comb with the larve in it, eating both together in its hurry; but when it was not very hungry, it used to pick the insects out, and reject the comb.
In this country many more specimens of this bird have been noticed and procured of late years than formerly, doubtless from more attention having been directed to the study of ornithology. Montagu says “that in his time it was extremely rare, and he describes a specimen which was killed at High- dere, the seat of the Earl of Carnarvon, in Berkshire. The Rey. Gilbert White mentions the circumstance of a_ pair having built in his parish, in Selborne Hanger, (the common name in Berkshire for a wood.) Latham had only seen one recent specimen, and though Willughby says that it was tolerably common in his time, yet he most probably was not speaking with any very gre at accuracy. A. HK. Knox, Esq. says that it is more frequent in Sussex than either the Kite or the so-called Common Buzzard. It will be observed that most of the specimens which have occurred have been on the eastern side of the island, which seems rather to confirm the supposition, suggested by the nature of its pe and the season of the year it has been met with, that it is a summer visitant.
It is easily tamed, and shews little or none of the fierceness of birds of prey.
In Yorkshire, a few specimens have been met with in the East and West Ridings, more, it is said, in the neighbourhood of Doncaster, than in any other part, and it is not unlikely, as there are a great many large woods, as I well know, on all sides of that handsome town. One killed near York has the honour of being preserved in the British Museum. In the year 1849, one was obtained at Bridlington-Quay in the following curious manner:—The goodman of the house had gone to bed, and about twelve o’clock at night, he was disturbed by a beating against his window. ‘The noise con- tinuing, he got up, opened the lattice, and captured a fine Honey Buzzard, which had been flapping and beating against it. In Northumberland, one was killed at Wallington, and — another in Thrunton Wood in the same county, in the year 1829, as recorded by the Hon. H. T. Liddell. One shot near Blaydon, two picked up dead on the sea shore, and two
46 HONEY BUZZARD.
young male birds shot on the 26th. of August, near Hexham. These five last were procured in the year 1841. The parents of the latter two were also frequently seen. One near Twizel; one at Cheswick, near Berwick-upon-Tweed. In Sussex, A. i. Knox, Ksq., in his pleasant ‘Ornithological Rambles,’ says that though rare, a few specimens have been met with—one in Charlton Forest; one or two near Arundel; one shot in September, in the year 1845, on Poynings Common; another obtained in the autumn of 1841, between Henfield and Horsham; and another shot in the forest of St. Leonard, by the gamekeeper of — Aldridge, Esq. Others in Norfolk, Dorsetshire, Devonshire, and Worcestershire, and, though very rarely, in Cumberland, where it has been said to have bred in the woods near Lowther. One was taken, and one shot near Yarmouth, in the county of Norfolk, in September, 1841; another at Honingham; one at Gawdy Hall Wood, near Harleston; and one at Horning, in 1841, in the same county. One in Kent, in the parish of Lydd; a few others’ near Tunbridge Wells; two pairs in Warwickshire, near Stoneleigh Abbey, and one in Suffolk. In Oxfordshire, a few have been recorded by my friend, (if after the lapse of so many years, ‘eheu fugaces,’ I may still call him so,) the Rev. A. Matthews, of Weston-on-the-Green. One of them he describes as having been taken in the following singular manner:—It had forced its head into a hole in the ground, probably in search of a wasp’s nest, and becoming by some means entangled, was captured by a countryman before it could extricate itself.
In Scotland, three or four in Berwickshire, one of them about the month of June, 1845.
The Honey Buzzard frequents woods, and especially those in which water is to be met with.
The flight of this bird is, like that which is characteristic of others of the smaller species of the Hawk kind, silent and swift, a gliding through the air without apparent effort, and for the most part low. It flies generally for only a short distance, from tree to tree. When on the ground, it has been noticed by several authors, to run with great rapidity, some- what in the way that a pheasant does. It often remains for hours together, on some solitary tree from which a good look out can be kept, and at such times has been observed to erect the teathers of the head into a sort of crest, indicative, perhaps, either of attention or sleep.
HONEY BUZZARD. 47
Although it is beyond all question that the Honey Buzzard feeds at times on small animals, reptiles, and small birds, yet I feel convinced that insects are the food which is natural to it, and which it therefore prefers. This is indeed conveyed by its name, which happens in this instance, though circuitously, as before remarked, to be more appropriate than trivial names often are. Buffon says that it is itself good eating, but though it may be so in comparison with other birds more decidedly carnivorous, yet the authority of the French author will probably not have much weight with English tastes in the matter of the ‘cuisine.’ The larve of bees and wasps, found in the combs of those insects, are a favourite food with the bird before us.
The one deseribed by Montagu, was skimming over a large piece of water, in pursuit, it would seem, of the insects to be met with in such situations, and another, at least a bird which there is every reason to believe was of this species, was observed by the Rev. Mr. Holdsworth, skimming for several successive days over a large piece of w ater, called Slapton Ley, in the south of Devonshire, in pursuit of dragon flies, which it seized with its talons, and then conveyed to its beak: the one mentioned before, as described by Mr. Liddell, was shot in the act of pursuing a wood pigeon. Whatever it had fed on seemed to have agreed with it, for that gentleman has described it as being so excessively fat, that the oil ran from the holes made by the shot, and that to such an extent, as to have rendered it extremely difficult to preserve the skin clean for stuffing. Rabbits, young pheasants, rats, frogs, and small birds, have been known to form the food of those birds, and even fish, when in confinement.
Its note is said to resemble that of the Golden Plover—a plaintive sound; and it has another indicative of alarm.
The young, as recorded by White of Selborne, are hatched at the end of June, so that the period of nidification must. be in the month of May, or the early part of June. A female is recorded by J. P. Wilmot, Esq., in the ‘Zoologist,’ page 437, as having been shot off the nest in Wellgrove Wood, in the parish of Bix, near Henley-on-Thames, by a gamekeeper of Lord Camoys. The male bird kept in the neighbourhood of the nest, and was shortly afterwards shot by another of the keepers. The nest itself was also taken with two eggs, which it contained. The same gentleman also relates that both the pairs mentioned before, as procured by Lord Leigh’s gamekeeper, were breeding at the time. The
48 HONEY BUZZARD.
nest of the pair mentioned by Willughby, contained two young birds; and again another, recorded by Pennant, two eggs. Of the five specimens whi I have alluded tb as having been found in Northumberland, two were young birds, evidently only just come out of the nest, which was built in a wood near the place.
According to White of Selborne, the nest of this species is built in trees, in the angle formed by the larger branches, and is flat in shape. It is composed of sticks, larger and smaller, and is lned with leaves or wool, or probably any soft materials that the birds can obtam. It sometimes ap- propriates the old nest of a Kite or other bird as its own. ‘Fools, says the proverb, ‘build houses for wise men to live in; and the remark, it would appear, may sometimes apply to birds.
The eggs are two or three in number, and of a general dark rusty red colour, much blotted with still deeper shades of the same, somewhat like those of the Kestrel im. general appearance, but very much darker. Others are but slightly dotted over at each end, the middle being belted with a dark red band; some are grey, much blotted with small spots. Others, again, are described by Temminck as yellowish white, marked with large reddish brown patches, and often entirely of that colour, or with numerous spots so close together that the white is scarcely perceptible.
This bird is of a slender and graceful form, and in many particulars fully justifies its separation by Cuver from the preceding genus. Weight, SF tae, one pound ten ounces; length, about two feet, the males being rather under, and the fecal a little over that measurement. The bill, which is black and dusky, is small in comparison with those of the other Buzzards, nor is it so strong as theirs. The space between the bill and the eye is covered with short closely-set feathers, without hairs, as in most others of the Hawk tribe; cere, dusky greenish
grey; iris, large and yellow, sometimes inclining to orange m the adult male. The head, which is rather flat , is very small, -and looks still more so from the nature of its “phu mage, and this particularly, after the strikingly wide and large shape of that of the two preceding species. Its colour isa light brownish or bluish ash grey, sometimes white or cream white, the feathers in some cases being tipped with dark brown. The feathers of the neck behind are white for about two thirds of their length, and on the sides greyish brown, tending downwards
HONEY BUZZARD. 49
to dark brown: sometimes the neck, like the head, is white, or cream white, or pale yellowish brown; nape, dark brown or ash grey; chin, whitish; in some specimens white, as are the rest of the feathers round the base of the beak; throat, white, or yellowish white, with dark brown shaft lines; breast, white, yellowish white, or pale yellowish brown, barred trans- versely with broad brown bands, tinged with rust-colour, which are lighter in front, and darker towards the sides; the hght feathers are tipped with bright brown; back, dark brown shaded with grey, or ash colour, the feathers themselves having a blot of a darker shade in the centre, and sometimes tipped with white, and many of them crossed by dusky marks, which cause a series of bars when the wings are closed. The wings are longer than those of the true. Buzzards, and rounded at the ends; they expand above four feet; greater wing coverts, brownish grey: primaries, nearly black. The tail is very long, and in this particular, as well as in the length of the wings and the smallness of the head, this species shews an approximation to the Kites. The tip is brownish white, and the base of the feathers white, as is the case with most of the feathers on the body, if not withall. It is of a rather dark brown, tinged with grey, and barred with dark brown, but the bars vary, so that no dependence can be placed upon their number, and in some there is no bar at all; the middle feathers are the longest; tail coverts, partly white, sometimes white; under tail coverts, varied with yellowish brown and white. The legs are rather short, and feathered half way down; the lower part is a good deal reticulated, and of a dull yellow colour; toes, dull yellow. The claws, which are black, are long, rather slight, and very acute, but not much curved.
The female is larger than the male, namely, about two feet two inches: the forehead, grey; upper parts of the plumage, deep umber brown; under parts, light yellowish red, spotted with brownish red, sometimes white with dark crescent-shaped spots upon a white ground, and the upper parts barred with brown and grey.
The young are said to resemble the adult birds in colour, but Willughby deseribes them as covered with white down, spotted with black.
The Honey Buzzard is subject to very great variety of plumage. In the ‘Zoologist,’ pages 375 etc. there are figures and descriptions given by W. R. Fisher, Esq. of seven of its varieties gradually
VOL, I. E
50 HONEY BUZZARD.
changing from a very dark and apparently almost black uniform colour, to nearly pure white on the breast and neck, with white markings on the wings. One he describes as bemg almost entirely dark brown, with a few light spots about the neck and shoulders, and the tail as having three bars of very dark brown—the spaces between them being divided by narrower bars of a lighter tint than the former, but darker than the ground colour of the tail itself. A second, (described in a postscript, at page 795,) of which the predominant colour was a light brown, rather darker on the back. The feathers round the neck, and also on the breast and legs, had dark margins; the quill feathers, black; secondaries, dark brown; tertiaries, lighter—all these parts exhibiting a beautiful purple gloss; tip of the tail, light yellow, barred like the other; cere, pale yellow; iris, grey. The third variety in this interesting series had the head, breast, and back of a light brown, with streaks and blots of a darker colour. The wings, dark brown with light tips; quills nearly black with hght tips. The tail, lke that of the first described, but more of a yellowish brown, tipped with the same. ‘The fourth had the feathers on the top of the head and neck of a dark brown, with light tips, giving those parts a mottled appearance; round the eye, and between the eye and the bill, dark ash grey; a large patch of dark brown on the breast. The wings tipped with ight brown, approaching to white on the quill feathers and secondaries; tail, as in the bird last described. In the fifth, the whole head light ash grey; wings, dark brown tipped with a hghter shade of the same; all the under parts white barred with brown. The tail, nearly like that of the last, but with a fourth bar, or several patches in the form of a bar, at the upper end, tipped with light yellow brown. The sixth had the forehead white; breast, white, with some patches of brown; round the eye and between it and the bill, dark ash grey; neck, white, with some dashes of brown; upper part of the wings, white, slightly dashed with brown; secondaries and tertiaries, brown tipped with white. The tail, barred with two shades of dark brown, and tipped with light brown. The seventh had the wings alone tipped with white, as also the secondaries and tertiaries, the under parts without the brown patches, and the dark stréaks much narrowed. The tail as in the last. Variations of plumage occur in this species as in so many others. In one described by Montagu, the breast was light brown; and in another, described by the Hon. H. T. Liddell,
HONEY BUZZARD. SL
all the under part was dark brown. Some have the head of a uniform ash grey; and A. E. Knox, Esq. describes two, one of them as having the upper part of the head, the wings, and tail of a dark brown, and all the rest of the plumage of a beautiful cream white, or light straw-colour; the other as much resembling a Cuckoo in general appearance. Sometimes the whole plumage is strongly glossed with a purple tint. One is described by Temminck, as having the head, neck, and all the under parts, yellowish, with dark shafts to the feathers.
KITS.
PUTTOCK. FORK-TAILED KITE. GLEAD.
BAREND, OF THE ANCIENT BRITISH.
Milvus regalis, Brisson. Falco milvus, LINN.&US. Milvus Ictinus, SAVIGNY. “vulgaris, FLEMING. Milvus—A Kite. Regalis—Royal—regal.
Tue Latin and English names of this species are, to say the least, inconsistent with each other, the word ‘Kite’ being equiv- alent in our language to the aed craven or coward, and the term ‘Royal’ being inseparable from the idea of spirit and bravery. Buffon however asserts that the name ‘Royal’ has been given to it, not from any supposed royalty in itself, but because in former times it was considered royal game.
The Kite is common throughout Europe, being found even in very northern latitudes. It inhabits Italy, France, Switzer- land, and Germany; is very uncommon in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Russia, and Siberia; and is met with, though rarely, in Holland. It is also found in various parts of the north of Africa, and over the greatest part of Asia. Clusius relates that these birds were formerly very abundant in the streets of London, and very tame; it being forbidden to kill them on account of the use they were of, in acting the part of scavengers.
The Kite is described by authors as being local in this country, and strange indeed would it be if it were not. Where is a bird of its size, and of its handsome appearance, and which is moreover so easily caught in traps, and so destructive of game, to remain incognito, or in safety in these days? The marvel is that a single specimen survives, ‘sola
KITE.
KITE. 53
superstes, as a living monument of the former existence of its kind. In these times of so-called ‘progress’ it. is, however, to be feared that even this state of things may not continue —no ‘Aborigines protection society’ exists for the Kite.
In Yorkshire, the Kite has been in former times far from uncommon, but the following are all that are now on record. About twenty-five years ago, one was caught in a trap at Edlington wood, near Doncaster, and a pair were taken from the nest by Mr. Hugh Reid, of that place. One was obtained at Hornsea wood, in 1883, and another in Lunn wood, both near Barnsley, in 1844. It has been observed, but very rarely, near Halifax, and one was seen by Charles Waterton, Esq., near Huddersfield. Others by Sir William Jardine, Bart., and one by Mr. W. Eddison, near Penistone, but there is no notice, that I am aware of, of any having been met with in the North or East Ridings. Not far from Aleonbury hill, a well-known place on the old ‘Great North’ road, (how different in all but name from the ‘Great Northern,’)—a locality in which I perceive that Mr. Hewitson records that he has seen it, I had the pleasure some years ago of seeing the Kite on the wing; too striking a bird, when once seen, not to be easily recalled at bidding before the mind’s eye.
In addition to the before-named places, this ‘Royal’ bird has been a dweller in several parts of Wales, and of Scotland. Many have hitherto found a temporary refuge in various parts of the ‘far north.’ The waters of Loch Awe have reflected the graceful flight of some, and the ‘burnished gold’ of Loch Katrine has been darkened by the passing eclipse of others. In Sussex it was, says Mr. Knox, indigenous in former times, but is now no longer known there, only one near Brighton, and one near Siddlesham, having occurred within the last ten years. In the Hebrides it appears to be unknown. In Sutherlandshire it is becoming very rare, though formerly common. On the banks of Loch Fine it is said by Sir William Jardine, to be more abundant than in any other quarter of the country, on Ben Lomond, as also in many parts of the western Highlands, Aberdeenshire, Stirlingshire, Nairneshire, and Argyleshire, but only north of the Forth, being almost entirely unknown in the south of Scotland. Mr. Macgillivray says that in the space of eight years only one specimen came into the hands of the Edinburgh bird-stuffers. In the New Forest in Hampshire, it has hitherto been frequently seen. In Devonshire it seems to be very rare: Montagu only observed
54 KITE. °
one there in the course of twelve years; one was caught on Trowlsworthy Warren, Dartmoor; one at Widey, in 1881; one at Saltram; and one at Sydenham, in 18385. <A few in Durham, Cumberland, Westmoreland, Essex, and Hertfordshire: very rarely in Gloucestershire—between Gloucester and Bristol, according to Mr. Knapp.
It is said by J. J. Briggs, Esq., in his catalogue of the Birds of Melbourne, to be there sometimes seen sailing over the grass fields at a considerable height, in a steady and graceful manner; and the Rev. Messrs. Matthews, in their catalogue of the Birds of Oxfordshire, say likewise, that a few years ago it was so common there, that occasionally two or more might be seen at the same time about its favourite haunts, but that it has now become very scarce.
In Ireland, it is stated by Smith, in his history of Cork, -which was completed in the year 1749, to have been at that time common. Now, however, it is said by William Thompson, Esq., of Belfast, to be known only as a very rare visitant. The Rev. Joseph Stopford has seen it at Ballincollig Castle, in 1827, and near Blarney. In the park of Shanes Castle, the seat of Lord O’Neil, two were seen by Mr. Adams, his Lordship’s gamekeeper, one about the year 1830, and the other in March, 1835. Others are said to have been observed in the same park in previous years; and one was once seen by Wilham Ogilby, Esq., in the county of Londonderry.
It retires in great numbers from the north of Europe to Egypt and the northern shores of Africa, before winter, staying there to breed, and returning again in April to Europe, where it breeds a second time, contrary to the nature of rapacious birds in general. It remains with us the whole year, but may be, and indeed probably is, partially migratory.
The flight of the Kite is rapid, and, like several other birds of prey, it soars at times to a vast height, and there frequently remains for hours together, seemingly in the tranquil enjoyment of its easy exercise; sometimes it ascends beyond the reach of human vision: doubtless, however, its sight far excelling ours, it can perceive objects in the ‘vast profound;’ and at times it descends from a great altitude upon its prey, with astonishing swiftness. One of the vernacular names of this bird, the Glead or Gled, is derived, according to Pennant, from the Saxon word ‘glida,’ descriptive of its gliding motion. Wheeling round and round, supported on its extensive wings, and guided by the steering of its wide tail, it thus by degrees
KITE. 55
advances, sometimes for a time poising itself in a stationary position. If its nest is attacked or approached, it dashes in a wild manner around and near its enemy, supposed or real, with screams, either caused by alarm for its young, or intended to excite fear in its assailant. When searching for prey, it flies at a moderate height from the ground, at an elevation of from about twenty to about one hundred feet, performing a variety of sweeps and curves, and appearing, as indeed at other times, to be not only guided, but almost partially supported, by its wide-spread and expansive tail, which it moves about from side to side. Buffon (quoted by Macgillivray) says of its flight, ‘one cannot but admire the manner in which it is performed; his long and narrow wings seem immoveable; it is his tail that seems to direct all his evolutions, and he moves it continually; he mses without effort, comes ees as if he was sliding along an inclined plane: he seems rather to swim than to fly.’ Frequently, however, his flight 1s unsteady and dashing, strongly resembling that of several of the Seagulls.
The food of this species consists of small quadrupeds, such as leverets, moles, mice, rats, and rabbits; game, and other birds, especially the young; frogs, lizards, snakes, worms, insects, and occasionally carrion, and it is said by Bewick that it is particularly fond of chickens, but that the fury of the mother is generally sufficient to scare it away. In search of these, it, like the Sparrow-Hawk, sometimes approaches the poultry yard, but doubtless such approaches were far more common in former times than now. Montagu, however, in his Ornithological Dictionary, gives an account of one which was so eager in its attempt to obtain some chickens from a coop, that it was knocked down by a servant girl with a broom; and he-relates that on another occasion, one of these birds carried off a portion of some food which a poor woman was washing in a stream, notwithstanding her efforts to repel him. They have been known to feed on fish, the produce of their own capture from a broad river, and will readily devour the reliques of a herring or other fishery.
The Kite, like the Buzzards, and unlike the Eagles and Falcons, does not pursue its prey, but pounces down unawares upon it.
Its note. is called by gamekeepers and others its ‘whew’, a peculiarly shrill squeal.
The author of the ‘Journal of a Naturalist,’ has the fol-
56 KITE.
lowing curious account in his entertaining and profitable book. He says, ‘I can confusedly remember a very extraordinary capture of these birds when I was a boy. Roosting one winter evening on some very lofty elms, a fog came on during the night, which froze early in the morning, and fastened the feet of the poor Kites so firmly to the boughs, that some adventurous youths brought down, I think, fifteen of them so secured! Singular as the capture was, the assemblage of so large a number was not less so; 1¢ bemg in general a solitary bird, or associating only im pairs.’
In the breeding season it is a common thing to witness eontlicts between the male birds. Montagu speaks of two which were ‘so intent on combat that they both fell to the ground, holding firmly by each others’ talons, and actually suffered them- selves to be killed by a woodman who was close by, and who demolished them both with his billhook’ It also at such times approaches the villages, which at other times it avoids, perhaps searching for materials for its nest. The young are defended with some vigour against assailants. The hen sits for about three weeks, and during that time is diligently attended to by the male bird.
The nest is built early in the spring, between the branches of a tall tree, but rather in the middle than at the top, and occasionally on rocky precipices, and is composed of sticks, lined with any soft material, such as straw, hair, grass, wool, or feathers. It is flat in shape, and rather more closely com- pacted than that of some other birds of the Hawk family, and is generally built in the covert of a thick wood.
The eggs of the Kite, which are rather large and round, very much resemble those of the Common Buzzard, and possibly this fact may afford some confirmatory justification of the juxtaposition of these birds. The ground colour is a dingy white, bluish or greenish white, or dull brownish yellow, and in some instances unspotted at all; in others it is dotted mui- nutely over with yellow or brown, or waved with lnear marks, and in others is blotted here and there with brown or reddish brown, but especially at the lower end. They are generally two or three in number—rarely four.
This handsome and fine-looking bird weighs light in _pro- portion to its apparent size, so that it is very buoyant in the air: its weight is only about two pounds six ounces, or from that to two pounds and three-quarters; length, two feet two inches, to two feet and a half; bill yellowish, or yellowish
KITE. 57
brown at the base and edges, and dusky or horn-colour at the tip. In extreme age it all becomes of a yellowish colour; cere, yellow; iris, yellow; bristles are found at and about the base of the bill. The head, dull greyish white, light yellowish brown, hoary, or ashy grey with brown or dusky streaks in the middle of each feather along the shaft; the feathers are long, narrow, and pointed. In some specimens the head is rufous. The feathers of the neck are also long and pointed, which give a kind of grizzled appearance to that part; it is light yellowish red in front, each feather being streaked with dark brown, and the tip reddish white; nape, chin, and throat, greyish white; breast, pale rufous brown, each feather with a longitudinal streak of dark brown; back, reddish orange, or rufous brown, with dusky or dark brown stripes in the centre of the feathers, the margin of each being pale, or dusky, edged with rust-colour; the breast is lighter than the back, and specimens vary much in depth of colour in both parts. The wings extend to five feet, and, when closed, two inches beyond the tail, the quill feathers are dusky black, from the fifth to the tenth dashed with ash-colour, with a few dusky bars, and white at the base and on the inner webs; the rest are dusky with obscure bars; of the tertiaries some are edged with white: the under surface of the wings, near the body, is rufous brown with dark brown feathers, edged with reddish brown towards the outer part of the wing. The feathers of the greater wing coverts are dusky, edged with rust-colour; the two outer primaries, nearly black; the others greyish brown on the outer web, and paler, barred with blackish brown on the inner: the fourth quill is the longest, the third only a little shorter, the fifth nearly as long, the second a good deal shorter, and the first much shorter than the second; secondaries, greyish black, or deep brown, shaded with purple, the tips, reddish white, the inner webs more or less mottled. The tail is the distinguishing feature in this bird, as the legs are in the Rough-legged Buzzard: it is both wide and long, and very much forked. The bird may by it be ‘challenged’ at any distance from which it is brought in sight. Its upper side is reddish orange, or bright rust-colour with white tips; and beneath it is reddish white, or greyish white, with seven or eight obscure brown bars. The middle feathers are a foot long: the outer ones between fourteen and fifteen inches. The two outermost, which turn slightly outwards at the tip, are dusky on the outer webs; the first barred on the inner web with
58 KITE.
the same. The bars on the upper surface shew through to the under; upper tail coverts, rufous, or reddish orange; under tail boeerts the same; legs, yellow or orange, short, scaled, and feathered about an inch below the knee. The toes are small in proportion to the size of the bird: the outer and middle ones are united by a membrane; claws, black, or bluish black, and not much hooked.
The female is considerably larger than the male; length, two feet four inches. Her plumage inclines more to grey and orange than his. The feathers on her head become gradually more grey, until they fade to a pale hoary white. The young, when first fully fledged, are of a deep red, especially on the back, and the central markings of the feathers are darker and larger than in the adult bird; the head and neck are also darker. The iris is yellowish brown ; the feathers on the back have a tinge of pur ple; the bars on the tail are more distinct, and the colour of it is darker than in the old bird.
After the first moult, the young birds nearly acquire their perfect plumage. The central dark markings on the feathers become less, and their red edges paler with advancing age.
The ‘varieties of this species as to size and colour, though not unfrequent, are unimportant.
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SWALLOW-TAILED KITE.
Elanus furcatus, FLEMING. Milvus furcatus, JENYNS. Nauclerus furcatus, GOULD. Falco furcatus, WILson. Elanus—Perhaps from Hlaund—To drive or chase. furcatus—Forked.
Tuts elegant species 1s very abundant in the southern and south-western states of America—to the extensive prairies of the latter of which it is peculiarly attached, and becomes much less frequent towards the north, particularly on the eastern side of that continent. It is found also in Peru and Buenos Ayres.
Two specimens only have as yet occurred in this country, driven over probably by _tempestuous winds. One of them was killed in the year 1772, at Balachoalist, in Argyleshire, and the other was captured in Wensleydale in Yorkshire, at Shaw-gill, near Hawes, on the 6th. of September, 1805. The ‘pitiless pelting’ of a tremendous storm, and the simultaneous buffetings of a flock of Rooks, drove it to take shelter in a thicket, in which it was caught before it was able to escape. It was kept by the person who captured it, for a month, but it then made its escape through a door which had accidentally been left open. It alighted for a short time on a tree not far off, from which it soon afterwards rose upwards spirally to a vast height, and then, guided by its instinct, went off in a southerly direction as long as it could be observ ed. These facts are recorded in the fourteenth volume of the ‘Linnwan Transactions, in a letter from W. Fothergill, Esq., of Carr- end, near Askrigg, the next town to Hawes.
The Swallow-tailed Kite is migratory in those countries of which it is an inhabitant, visiting certain parts in the spring to breed, and leaving them again in the autumn.
The flight of this bird is singularly easy and graceful, as
60 SWALLOW-TAILED KITE.
its whole appearance at once indicates. Its airy evolutions are described as being most remarkable, its tail directing them in a peculiarly elegant manner. They are engaged in flight, generally, like their miniature effigies, the Swallows, throughout the day, so that except when on their migrations they are not easily approached.
The Swallow-tailed Kite always feeds on the wing. In fine weather they soar to a great height in pursuit of large winged insects, which seem to form their favourite food, grasshoppers, locusts, cicade, and caterpillars, bees, wasps, and their larve in the comb, as well as flying insects, being extensively preyed upon by them. They also, however, devour small snakes, lizards, and frogs. In search of their terrestrial food, they sweep closely over the fields, and alighting, or rather seeming for an instant to alight to secure any which they may have observed, bear it off, and devour it in the air, feeding themselves with their claws. Meyer says that they sometimes take their prey off the branches of trees, as they fly among them.
The note of this species is described by Audubon as sharp and plaintive.
The pairing time is in the beginning of April, and the male and female sit alternately, each in turn feeding the other. They have only one brood in the year.
The nest, which is composed of sticks, and lined with grass and feathers, is usually built on the top of a tall tree, and the vicinity of water is preferred, probably on account of the insects to be found there.
The eggs are from four to six in number, of a greenish white colour, irregularly blotted with dark brown at the larger end.
Length, one foot eight inches, and from that to two feet, and even upwards; Dill, bluish black; cere, light blue, and covered at the base with bristles; iris, silvery cream-colour, surrounded with a red ring; head, crown, neck, nape, chin, throat, and breast, pure white. The back, wings, and wing coverts, black, with a metallic green and purple lustre. The greater part of the plumage is white at the base, which sometimes gives the bird a mottled appearance. The tail is of a black colour, glossed with green and purple, and very deeply forked; upper tail coverts the same colour; under tail coverts, white. The legs, which are short and thick, are feathered in front half way below the knee, are, like the toes,
SWALLOW-TAILED KITE. 61
greenish blue. The claws, which are much curved, the outer one being very small, are dull orange, or flesh- eblene:
There is little if any difference in dilear between the male and female. The young are at first covered with yellowish down; afterwards they assume the distinct divisions of colour of their parents, but do not acquire the metallic lustre until arrived at maturity. The outside feathers of the tail do not reach their full length until autumn, so that it is gradually becoming more and more forked until then. In the followi ing spring the whole plumage is complete.
JER-FALCON.
Falco TIslandicus, LATHAM. ‘© Gyr falco, Liyy.zvs, Gyrfalco candicans, FLEMING. Faleo—To cut with a bill or hook. Islandicus—Of, or belonging to Iceland,
I am compelled to say ‘not proven,’ with reference to the arguments of Mr. John Hancock, read before the British Association at Newcastle, with a view to establish the sup- position that two species are confounded together in the one bird before us. It may, I think, be depended upon that the white plumage is the token of advanced age, as the dusky brown is of youth. The indentations on the bill are un- questionably alterable, and as to the specific difference endeavoured to be established from the bars on the tail, both the varieties have been found in one and the same individual specimen.
This noble bird may well be regarded as the personification of the ‘beau ideal’ of the true Falcons, at the head of which it pre-eminently stands. Its courageous spirit, together with its rarity even in its native countries, and the difficulty of procuring it, made it highly estimated in the days of falconry, as it was qualified and disposed to fly at the larger kinds of the ‘game’ of those days, such as herons and cranes. Its education was indeed difficult, but it was sure to repay the patience and perseverance required for training it for the aristocratic pastime, so highly thought of in the olden times.
I am indebted to J. McIntosh, Esq., of Milton Abbey, Dorsetshire, for a quaint old treatise on the subject of Hawking, as one of other former ‘countrey contentments,’ but I am obliged, against my will, to omit much which I should be glad, if space permitted, to insert. My thanks however are not the less due to him, and other obliging correspondents.
JER-FALCON.
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JER-FALCON. 63
The hyperborean regions are the native place of this Falcon: thence indeed its specific name. It occurs in the Shetland and Orkney Islands, but is considered by Mr. Low, in his ‘Fauna Orcadensis’, to be only a visitant even there, and not a permanent resident. Iceland, Greenland, and the parallel parts of North America, and Northern Asia, are its proper haunts, as also Norway, Russia, and Lapland, and it is occa- sionally met with in the northern parts of Germany, and the south of Sweden. In Asia too, in Siberia.
The Jer has been but rarely killed in this country: a few in Scotland, and still fewer in England, Wales, and Ireland.
In Yorkshire, one is said to have been obtained in the year 1847, in the month of March: another was shot in the year 1837, March 138th., in the parish of Sutton-upon-Derwent, near York, and was kept alive for some months by Mr. Allis, of York, after refusing food for the first three or four days. Another in the year 1837, in the middle of the month of March, on the moors near Guisborough, in Cleveland. It was a young bird. One was shot in Devonshire, on the Lynher river, in the month of February, 1834. Polwhele has also noticed this specimen. A young bird was killed in the parish of Bellingham, in Northumberland, in the middle of January, 1845. ‘Two are recorded by Thomas Edmonston, Jun., Esq., as having been killed in Shetland, where he also says that it is only a straggler. The Rev. J. Pemberton Bartlett, speaks of it as ‘rare’ in Kent. One was seen by the Revs. A. and H. Matthews, on the 10th. of October, 1847, near Tetsworth, in Oxfordshire, in the act of devouring a wood-pigeon. They observed it again a few days afterwards near the same spot. Another had been shot a few years previous near Henley-on- Thames; both of these were in immature plumage. Another was caught in a trap some years ago near Brigg, in Lincoln- shire, on a rabbit warren named Manton Common I believe; one in Pembrokeshire, on the estate of Lord Cawdor; and another on Bungay Common, in the county of Suffolk; one was shot in the county of Northumberland; one seen by Mr. Bullock, in Stronsa, one of the Orkney Islands; one near Aberdeen, and one killed in Sutherlandshire, in the winter of 1835. In the same year above mentioned, 1847, one was seen by W. M. EK. Milner, Esq., M.P., near Thurso, in Caithnesshire.
In Ireland, but three specimens have occurred, (described as being of the other supposed species,) one on the wing over
64 JER-FALCON.
a rabbit warren, near Dunfanaghy, in the county of Donegal; another near Drumboe Castle, in the same county; and the third in the year 1803, near Randalstown, in the county of Antrim.
The flight of the Jer-Faleon, which resembles that of the Peregrine, but is more lofty and swifter, is astonishingly rapid: it has been computed that this -bird flies, when at its speed, at the rate of one hundred and fifty miles an hour. It is said to use its wings with more action than is required in the sailing motion of some species. It captures its prey by rising above them, hovering for a moment, and then descending upon them, and geherally with unerring aim; not, however, per- pendicularly, but with a literal stoop. If it misses its first stroke, it again ascends over its victim, and repeats the attack.
The food of this species consists of the smaller animals and the larger birds, such as hares and rabbits, geese, grouse, partridges, whimbrels, curlews, guillemots, ducks, plovers, and other sea and land fowl.
The Jer-Faleon breeds not only in the highest and most inaccessible rocks, but also occasionally in cliffs which are of lower elevation, both those of the sea-coast and those of inland lakes, and when engaged in the task of incubation, is partic- ularly daring in attacking any aggressor.
The nest is composed of sticks and roots, and is lined with wool, moss, sea-weed, or probably any soft substance suitable for the purpose which the builder can procure. It is supposed to be in the habit of appropriating to itself the deserted nests of other birds.
The eggs are believed to be of a light yellowish brown colour, dotted with rusty red, with here and there an occasional patch of the same; or dull white, mottled all over with pale reddish brown. They are said to be two or three in number.
It is impossible not to be struck by the general resemblance of this species, especially in plumage, and partially also in shape, to the Snowy Owl, its noble companion in the icy regions of the north. When of full age the whole plumage is white. I have seen perfectly immaculate specimens in the possession of Mr. Hugh Reid, of Doncaster. The whole plumage is close and well set. Length, from twenty-two inches to two feet; bill, rather short, but thick and strong, much hooked, and of a pale blue or greenish grey colour. Much stress has been laid upon the tooth, as it is called, as establishing a specific
JER-FALCON. 65
difference, but ‘me judice’ it is by no meaus an unfailing mark, being worn down by attrition, and varying in different indi- vidals; cere, dull yellow; iris, dull reddish brown.
The female resembles the male, except in size, being rather larger, and the spots are broader, especially on the breast and sides. In the young bird the bill is dark blue, tipped with black; cere, bluish; iris, dark brown. All the upper parts are of a brown ash-colour; the feathers being edged with white: a dark streak descends from the corner of the bil down the side of the throat: all the feathers are margined with paler colour. The wings, nearly as long as the tail; the under parts brown, gradually becoming white, with large longitudinal brown spots; tail, barred with light brown; legs, greyish blue, or blue tinged with yellow; claws, dusky.
In birds of less mature age, and which are by far the most ordinarily met with, the head, crown, and neck are pure white, or white with a few brownish black spots or streaks; the latter is rather short and thick, at least in its plumage, in some degree in this respect resembling the Owls. The nape, chin, and throat, pure white; breast, white, or slightly spotted or lined as the other parts; back, more or less spotted and mottled with blackish brown. ‘The wings are rather long, being, when closed, about four inches shorter than the tail; the second and third, and the first and fourth quills are respectively of nearly equal length; primaries, white, their tips dark and narrowly edged with white; larger and_ lesser under wing coverts, pure white. The tail, long, and slightly rounded at the end. In some specimens it is white, and in others barred alternately with blackish brown and white, or greyish white; the outer feathers are about half an inch shorter than those in the centre; tail coverts, white. The legs, bright yellow, or bluish grey, according to age; (Montagu says bluish ash-colour, and Bewick pale blue, but this is in the young bird;) they are short and robust, feathered more than half way down, and covered in front transversely with oblong scales, and behind with small round scales; toes, yellow, and covered with small scales; the second and fourth are nearly equal in length; the third the longest; the hind one the shortest: underneath they are very rough. ‘The claws, black and strong; the hind one being the longest.
Montagu describes a bird, which he says appears to be a variety of this species, as follows:—‘It is white, with a few
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—
66 JER-FALCON.
scattered spots of dusky black on the upper part of the body and the head streaked with the same; the wings and tail, black, the latter with a band of white at the end, and a little white at the base; the quills slightly tipped with white; the secondary quills and under coverts elegantly barred with black and white. The wings were very short in proportion to the size of the bird, for if the primary quills had been closed, they would vertainly not have reached near the end of the tail.’
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PEREGRINE. Falco peregrinus, LATHAM. FLEMING. Falco communis, LATHAM. SELBY. Faleo—To cut with a bill or hook. Peregrinus—A stranger or foreigner
—a traveller from a distant country.
Tue Peregrine-Falcon has always been highly prized both living and dead, in the former case for its value in falconry, on account of its courageous spirit and docility, combined with confidence and fearlessness, and in the latter for its handsome and fine appearance. It is a bird of first-rate powers of flight, and from its frequent exertion of those powers has derived its name. It has very often been seen crossing the Atlantie at a great distance from land.
The Peregrine is widely distributed, being found throughout the whole of North America, and in parts of South America, even as far south as the Straits of Magellan, and northwards in Greenland; in Africa, at the Cape of Good Hope; in most countries of Europe, particularly in Russia, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Lapland; in Siberia and many parts of Asia; and also in New Holland. The rocky cliffs of this country have hitherto afforded it a comparative degree of protection, but ‘protection’ seems exploded—explosion in fact sounding the knell of the aristocratic Peregrine.
Strange to say these birds have been known to take up'a temporary residence on St. Paul’s Cathedral, in London, any- thing but ‘far from the busy hum of men,’ preying while there on the pigeons which make it their cote, and a Pere- grine has been seen to seize one in Leicester Square.
In the county of York many of these birds have at different periods been shot, some at Nutwell and Flamborough. ‘Three specimens have been procured in the neighbourhood of Fal- mouth, of which W. P. Cocks, Esq. has obligingly sent me information. In Sussex, the Peregrine has been occasionally
G3 PEREGRINE.
met with inland: sometimes near Petworth, Burton Park, Lewes, Chichester, Arundel, Seaford, Pevensey, Shoreham, and Rye; but seldom on the Weald. ‘Two curious mstances of the obtaining of the Peregrine are mentioned by A. E. Knox, Esq.: one was caught in a net, with which a person was catching sparrows from under the eaves of a barn, and the other was shot by a farmer, after it had dashed at a stuffed wood-pigeon, which he had fixed up in a field as a lure to decoy others within shot. I am informed by my friend, the Rev. R. P. Alington, that it is not uncommon in the spring in the neighbourhood of Swinhope, in Lincolnshire. ‘One was shot near there a few years since by Thomas Harneis, Esq., of Hawerby House. Others have been met with in Worces- tershire—one in 1849; some on Dartmoor, in Devonshire; and one was caught in a trap at Mutley, in 1831.
In Yorkshire, the Peregrine has had eyries at Kilnsea Cragg and Arncliffe, in Wharfedale, in Craven, as also near Pickering, and on Black Hambleton, the cliffs of the Isle of Wight, and of Devonshire and Cornwall; and it still breeds on New- haven cliff, and the high cliffs which form Beechy Head, in Sussex. A pair have been in the habit of building there for the last quarter of a century: three young birds were taken from the nest in 1849, and came into the possession of Mr. Thomas Thorncroft, of Brighton, who in his letter to me, describes them as very docile and noble: such they are indeed described to be by all who have kept them. The Bass rock in the Frith of Forth has been another of its breeding-places; as also the neighbourhood of Holyhead; the Great Orme’s Head; the rock of Llandedno, in Caernarvonshire; the precipice of Dumbarton Castle; the Isle of May; the Vale of Moffatt, in Dumfriesshire; many of the precipitous rocks of Suther- landshire; the neighbourhood of Banff and St. Abb’s Head; the borders of Selkirkshire, Loch Cor, Loch Ruthven, Knock- dolian, in Ayrshire; Ailsa, Ballantrae, and Portpatrick, in Scotland.
In Ireland it has had, according to William Thompson, Esq., of Belfast, many eyries in the cliffs of the four maritime counties of Ulster, as well as some in other parts: in Antrim no fewer than nine, three of them being inland, Glenariff, Salah Braes, and the Cave-hill. So also at Me. Art’s fort, three miles from Belfast, Fairhead and Dunluce Castle, the Horn in Donegal and Knockagh hill, near Carrickfergus, the Gobbins at the northern entrance to Belfast Bay, where two
PEREGRINE. C9
pairs built within a mile of each other—a very unusual cir- cumstance. Tory Island, off Donegal, the Mourne mountains in the county of Down, Bray Head in that of Wicklow, the cliffs over the Killeries in Galway, Bay Lough in Tipperary, the Saltee Islands, Wexford, the Blasquet Islands, Kerry, Ardmore and Dunmore in Waterford, and the sea-coast cliffs of the county of Cork.
Whether the Peregrine is partially migratory in this country, seems at present not to have been ascertained. It appears to be thought that the old birds remain about their haunts, while the young ones, after their expulsion from the nest, are compelled to wander about.
Its flight is extremely rapid, and is doubtless well described by Macgillivray, as strongly resembling that of the Rock Pigeon. It seldom soars or sails after the manner of the Eagles and Buzzards. It does so, indeed, occasionally, but its usual mode of flying is near the ground, with quickl repeated beatings of its wings. Montagu has calculated the rate of its flight at as much as one hundred and fifty miles an hour, and Colonel Thornton, at about sixty miles. An average of one hundred may I think be fairly estimated. Meyer says that it never strikes at prey near the ground, through an instinctive fear of being dashed to pieces; but the contrary is the fact, its upward sweep preserving it generally from this danger. The recoil, as it were, of the blow which dashes its victim to the earth, overpowers in itself the attraction of gravity, and it rises most gracefully into the air until it has stayed the impetus of its flight. Instances have however been known where both pursuer and pursued have dashed against trees, or even a stone on the ground, in the ardour of pur- suing and being pursued, and each has been either stunned for the time, or killed outright by the violence of the blow. Sometimes, in pursuit of its prey, the Peregrine will ‘tower’ upwards until both are lost to sight.
The food of the species before us consists principally of birds, such as the larger and smaller sea-gulls, auks, guillemots, puffins, larks, pigeons, ptarmigans, rooks, jackdaws, woodcocks, laudrails, wild geese, partridges, plovers, grouse, curlews, ducks, and even at times the kestrel; but it also feeds on hares, rabbits, rats, and other small quadrupeds; as well as at times on larger ones, such as dogs and cats, and also occasionally on fish. It is said to harass the grey crows, but not to use them for food. Instances have been known of Peregrines
val) PEREGRINE.
having fallen into the sea, and been drowned, together with birds which they had struck when flying over it; the more remarkable as the prey so seized were only small, and far inferior in size to themselves: probably they had been in some way hampered or clogged, as a good swimmer may be by a drowning boy, so that although if they had fallen on the land, they might have extricated themselves, yet such opportunity has been lost by their mischance of dropping into the sea, and they have met with a watery grave. A black grouse, a bird equal to itself in weight, if not heavier, has been found in the nest of one of these Falcons, with which it had probably flown several miles. Sometimes, if it finds a bird which it has struck down too heavy to carry away, it will drop it, and seek another in its stead. It seldom visits the poultry yard. It is said to overpower even the Capercailie. Its clutch is less fatal than its stroke: it has been known to bear away birds for a long distance in its claw, without serious injury.
This bird has frequently been seen to stoop upon and carry off game immediately before sportsmen, both such as had been shot at and killed, and others which were being followed. It takes its prey as well by pursuit, as by a sudden descent upon it. It seldom follows it into cover. Sometimes, for what reason it is impossible to say, it has been known to strike down several birds in succession, before securing one for its food. One instance however is recorded where having killed, and being in the act of devouring one bird, it chased and caught another of the game kind, still holding the former in one claw, and securing the latter in the other. The Pere- grine has been known to cut a snipe in two, and in like manner to strike off the head of a grouse or pigeon, ‘at one fell swoop.’ It is said that all the Falcons crush and destroy the head of their prey before devouring them. The Peregrine will occasionally kill and eat the Kestrel, though a bird of its own tribe. In confinement it has been known to do the same; and on one occasion to devour a Merlin, which it had slain. Two instances are recorded also of their killing and eating their partners in captivity. On both occasions the female was the cannibal, but in the latter of the two, she died a few days afterwards, from the effects of the wounds she had received from the male in his self-defence. They soon become quite tame in confinement.
It is very curious how these and all the other birds which
PEREGRINE. Th
form the food of the one before us, live in its immediate vicinity, without any apparent fear or dread. They seem patiently to ‘bide their time,’ and take their chance of being singled out from their fellows. Perhaps with equal wisdom to that of the followers of the Prophet, they are believers in fatalism, and content with the knowledge that whatever is, is, and whatever will be, will be, live a life of security, and resign it at the ‘fiat’ of the Peregrine, as a matter of course. This applies to cases where both are residents together; where however, strange to say, the Peregrine is only a straggling visitor, his presence but for a day or two has the effect of dispersing the flocks of birds, which had been enjoying them- selves before his arrival. Its mode of striking its prey has been variously described. It has by many been supposed to stun its victim by the shock of a blow with its breast, and by others it has been known to rip a furrow in its quarry completely from one end of the back to the other, with its talons or bill. In the former case it is said to wheel about, and return to pick up the quarry it has struck. It is, as may be supposed, the terror of all it pursues, which, rather than venture again on the wing while it is in the neighbour- hood, will suffer themselves to be taken by the hand.
In the pursuit of birds near the sea, the Peregrine frequently loses them by their seeking refuge on the water, where they are safe for the time from his attack. If they leave it for the land, they are again pursued, and most interesting chases of this kind have often been witnessed: they end either in the Hawk catching the bird before it can reach the water, or in his being tired out by its perseverance in thus keeping him at bay. Conscious of the disadvantage it is at on this element, it but very rarely indeed attempts to seize prey when upon it: it has, however, been known to carry off a razor-bill or guillemot from a flock in the water, and bear it away to its nest. The mention of this bird may introduce the fol- lowing anecdote related by Montagu:—‘A writer in a popular periodical describes one pursuing a razor-bill, which, instead of assaulting as usual with the death pounce from the beak, he seized by the head with both his claws, and made towards the land, his prisoner croaking, screaming, and struggling lustily; but being a heavy bird, he so far overbalanced the aggressor, that both descended fast towards the sea, when, just as they touched the water, the Falcon let go his hold and ascended, the razor-bill as instantaneously diving below.’
[2 PEREGRINE.
A sea-gull has been known to beat a Peregrine in a fair f(l)ight, baffling him by its frequent turnings, in the same way that a white butterfly by its zigzag motions escapes a sparrow.
Feeding as the Hawks do, on birds and animals, they have the habit, partaken of likewise by several other genera of birds, of casting up the indigestible part of their food, which in the present case consists of fur and feathers, in small round or oblong pellets.
The note of the Peregrine is loud and shrill, but it is not often heard except in the beginning of the breeding season.
It builds early in the spring. If one bird is shot, the other is sure to return with a fresh mate. A female bird which had been kept in confinement, has been known to pair with a wild male. She was shot in the act of killing a crow, and the fact was ascertained by a silver ring round her leg, on which the owner’s name was engraved. ‘The female while sitting, is heedless of the appearance of an enemy, but the male, who is on the look-out, gives timely notice of any approach, signifying alarm both by his shrill ery and his hurried flight. They defend their young with much spirit, and when the young are first hatched, both birds dash about the nest, in such a case, in manifest dismay, uttering shrieks of anger or distress: at times they sail off to some neigh- bouring eminence, from whence they desery the violation of their hearth, and again urged by their natural ‘storgé,’ re- approach their eyrie, too often to the destruction of one or both of them. In either case, however, the situation being a good one, and having been instinctively chosen accordingly, is tenanted anew the following spring, by the one bird with a fresh mate, or by a new pair. In the latter part of autumn, when the young birds’ education has been completed, so that they are able to shift and forage for themselves, they are expelled by the old ones from the parental domain. The young are sometimes fed by the one bird dropping prey from a great height in the air to its partner flying about the nest, by whom it is caught as it falls.
The nest, which is flat in shape, is generally built on a projection, or in a crevice of some rocky cliff. It is composed of sticks, sea-weed, hair, and other such materials. Sometimes the bird will appropriate the old nest of some other species, and sometimes be satisfied with a mere hollow in the bare rock. It also builds in lofty trees.
PEREGRINE. 73
A simple but ingenious mode of catching the young of these and other Hawks, is mentioned by Charles St. John, Esq., in his entertaining ‘Tour in Sutherlandshire.’ A cap or ‘bonnet’ is lowered ‘over the border’ of the cliff, down upon the nest; the young birds strike at, and stick their claws into it, and are incontinently hauled up in triumph.
The eggs are two, three, four, or, though but rarely, five in number, and rather inclining to rotundity of form. Their ground colour is light russet red, which is elegantly marbled over with darker shades—patches and streaks of the same. As many as four young have been taken from one nest. When this is the case, one is generally much smaller than the rest. In one instance, however, all four were of equal size; and, moreover, which is still more unusual, and perhaps accounts for the fact thus mentioned, all females—a proportion being generally preserved. Incubation lasts three weeks.
The Peregrine varies more in size than perhaps any other bird of prey; sometimes it is nearly equal to the Jer-Falcon. It varies also in colour, but the band on the sides of the throat is a permanent characteristic. Its whole plumage is close and compact; more so than that of any other British species of Hawk. It is a stout and strong-looking bird.
Male; length, from fifteen to eighteen or twenty inches; bill, bluish black at the tip, and pale blue at the base; cere, dull yellowish; iris, dark hazel brown; the feathers between the bill and the eye are of a bristly character; head, bluish black, sometimes greyish black, and sometimes brownish black; neck, bluish black behind, more or less white in front, in some specimens with, and in others without spots: a dark streak from the mouth, often called the moustache, divides it; chin and throat, white or pale buff colour; breast, white, cream white, or rufous white, mottled with spots and streaks; the sides, ash grey, lined lengthways, and barred across with dark brown; back, deep bluish grey or slate colour, shaded off into ash grey, and more or less clearly barred with greyish black some specimens are darker, and others lighter, according ta ace.
The wings are very long and pointed, extending when closed to within half an inch of the end of the tail: the second quill is the longest, and the first nearly as long, the third a little shorter; greater and lesser wing coverts, bluish grey, barred as the back; primaries and secondaries, dark ash-coloured brown, barred on the inner webs with lighter and darker spots,
74, PEREGRINE.
and tipped with dull white; tertiaries, ash colour, faintly barred, greater and lesser under wing coverts, whitish, barred with a dark shade. ‘The tail, slightly rounded, bluish black, or bluish white, tinged with yellowish grey, barred with twelve bars of blackish brown, the last the widest, and the others gr adually widening towards it; upper tail coverts, bluish black, barred as the back; under “tail coverts, ash grey, barred with dark shades; legs, dull yellow, short and strong, feathered more than half-way down, and scaled all round; the scales in front being the largest; toes, dull yellow, strong and, scaled and rough beneath; the second and fourth are nearly equal, the hind one the shortest, the third the longest, and the third and fourth united by a membrane at the base; claws, brownish black or black, strong, hooked, and acute.
The female is larger by comparison with the male than even is the case with other Hawks. The dark parts of the plumage are darker, and the dark markings larger: they decrease with age. Length, from nineteen to twenty-three inches; cere and iris, as in the male; head, deep greyish brown; neck in front, yellowish white, with longitudinal marks of deep brown, and on the sides and behind greyish brown; the streak on the sides is dark brown; throat, yellowish white, marked longitudinally like the neck; breast, brownish white, or yellowish white, with bars of deep brown: it is altogether more inclined to rufous than in the male, with less grey, the longitudinal spots come higher up, and the transverse spots and bars are broader and more boldly marked, and deeper in hue; back, deep greyish brown, brownish grey, or bluish grey, barred less distinctly than in the male with grey.
The wings, which are of a deep greyish brown colour, or varying as the back, expand to the width of three feet eight or nine inches; the quill feathers are of the same colour, spotted on the outer webs with ash grey, and on the inner ones with cream-colour; greater and Jesser wing coverts, blackish brown, with bars of grey on the outer webs, and spots of reddish white on the inner; secondaries, tipped with whitish. The tail has eighteen bars of ash grey and deep brown alternately; those of the latter colour are the broader: the tip is brownish white; the bars on the tail are more distinct than in the male bird.
The young are at first covered with white down: when fully fledged the bill is dull pale blue, darker at the tip; cere, greenish yellow; iris, dark brown. Forehead and sides of the
PEREGRINE. rea
head, yellowish white, or pale rufous; neck behind, yellowish white with dusky spots; chin, yellowish white; throat, white; the band on the side of it blackish brown; breast, reddish white, or pale reddish orange, darkest in the middle, with longitudinal markings of a dark brown colour, and the centre of each feather the same; back, brownish black shaded with grey, the feathers edged with pale brown or rufous. The quill feathers of the wings are blackish brown, spotted with brownish white on the inner webs, and tipped with the same; tail, blackish brown, barred and tipped with brownish red, or reddish white, greyish towards the base; legs and toes, greyish or greenish yellow: as the bird advances towards maturity, a bluish shade becomes observable on all the upper parts, while the lower parts become more white, and the dark markings smaller, as well as more inclined transversely than longi- tudinally.
Sir William Jardine describes a variety in a state of change, as having the upper parts of a tint intermediate between yellowish brown and clove brown. The tail, instead of being barred, has an irregular spot on each web of ochraceous, where the pale bands should be, and the longitudinal streakings of the lower parts wood brown, instead of the deep ruddy umber brown seen generally in the young.
76
HOBBY. Falco subbuteo, PENNANT. Berwick. SELBy, Falco—To cut with a bill or hook. Subbuteo, a diminutive of
Buteo—A Buzzard.
To my very dear ‘friend, thy Rev. R. P. Alington, of Swinhope Rectory, Lincolnshir>, I am indebted for the original drawin of the bird before us; and many others from the same skilful hand will adorn the pages of the present work, in attitudes entirely new and striking.
The Hobby is a spirited and daring Hawk, and very detr- mined in pursuit of its game, so that it was formerly much esteemed in falconry, and used accordingly for flying at the smaller birds. It may easily be trained to do so, and becomes very tame when kept in confinement. It has been known to dash through a window into a room, at a bird in a cage; and will occasionally follow sportsmen, and pounce upon the small birds put up by the dogs.
‘Though a well-known bird, Mr. Yarrell correctly says, ‘it is not very numerous as a species.’ It is, moreover, from its wild nature, difficult to be approached, and when met with within shot, it is generally when off its guard, in pursuit of its prey.
The Hobby is found thoughout Europe, occurring in Astra- chan, Norway, Sweden, Russia, and many other parts of this continent, and is also known in Asia, in Siberia and India— in the latter widely distributed, and in Africa near the Cape of Good Hope, and no doubt in other districts also. In many parts of England it has not unfrequently occurred. In Yorkshire, principally in the West-Riding, and occasionally near York. It is described by John Hogg, Esq., in a paper communicated by him to the British Association, at its session at York, in the year 1844, and since published in the ‘Zool- ogist,’ as being a rare species and migratory in Cleveland. In the East-Riding, one was killed near Knapton by a boy, with a stick: it was at the time in the act of devouring a rook. In Devonshire, it has been accustomed to breed in
TOBBY. rigs
Warleigh woods; in Essex, it has been met near Epping; in Norfolk, it occurs as a summer visitor, but the specimens obtained are, according to John H. Gurney, Esq. and William R. Fisher, Esq., in their Catalogue of the Birds of Norfolk, published in the ‘Zoologist,’ far from numerous, and generally in immature plumage. The same gentlemen record that it occasionally breeds in that county, and that an instance of its doing so occurred at Brixley, near Norwich, in the spring of 1844; and they mention that an immature specimen of the Hobby was shot some years since while sitting on a church tower, in the centre of the city of Norwich. The occurrence of this species at Yarmouth, so early as the month of February, is noticed at page 248 of the ‘Zoologist.’ It has once been met with in Durham. In the Isle of Wight it is, says the Rev. C. Bury, in his Catalogue of the Birds of that island, occa- sionally seen, but he adds that he has not been able to ascertat that it has been known to breed there. An adult male was shot in the land-slip, in October, 1841; and a pair were killed some years previous, also in the autumn, in the heart of the island. In Kent it is recorded by J. Pemberton Bartlett, Esq., to be not uncommon. In Sussex, it has occurred near Battle, Pevensey, Lewes, and MHalnaker, in September, 1836, and in other parts of that county. It is sufficiently common, according to the Rev. R. P. Alington, in the neighbourhood of Swinhope, Lincolnshire; as it also has been in Derbyshire, Oxfordshire, Lancashire, Dorsetshire, where it has been known to breed; as likewise at Cottenham, in Cam- bridgeshire. Cumberland as yet would seem to be its north- ernmost range. It does not appear to be known in Scotland.
‘Unlike the Peregrine, says A. E. Knox, Esq., ‘it prefers the wooded district of the weald to the downs or the open country near the coast, being there a summer visitor. Yet, even in these his favourite haunts, he must be considered | scarce, and you will rarely discover his decaying form among the rows of defunct Hawks which garnish the gable end of the keeper’s cottage—a sort of ornithological register, which would appear to indicate, with tolerable accuracy, the prevalence or scarcity of any species of raptorial bird in its immediate neighbourhood.’
“The courage and address of this Ilawk are remarkable. When shooting with a friend a few years ago, during the early part of September, we observed a Hobby pursuing a partridge, which, having been wounded, was then in the act
78 HOBBY.
of ‘towering.’ The little fellow proved himself to be a true Falcon, by the quickness with which he rose above his quarry in rapid circles, ‘climbing to the mountee,’ as our ancestors termed this manceuvre, with all the ease of a Peregrine. Unfortunately, at this juncture the partridge became suddenly lifeless, as is the case with all towering birds, and fell to the ground; while the Hobby, apparently disdaining to accept a victim which he had not obtained by his own exertions, scudded away after a fresh covey.’
_In Ireland, it is the opinion, much to be depended on, of William Thompson, Esq., of Belfast, that the few individuals of the Hobby reeorded in former years as having occurred, have been males of the Peregrine. He gives only one speci- _ men as having indubitably been met, which was shot on his garden wall by — Parker, Esq., of Carrigrohan, about three or four miles from Cork, up the beautiful River Lee. It by no means affects only the wilder districts, but is to be seen in such as are best cultivated, preferring, of course, those in which wood is plentiful.
It is said that the Hobby is in this country a summer visitor, appearing in April, and departing towards the end of October, or beginning of November. It has however been seen in the month of December, in the pursuit of its game, so that it would appear, at all events, not to be universally a migratory bird, at least from this country; it may besides make partial migrations from one locality to another, as pleasure or necessity happens to direct. It has been kept throughout the winter without any difficulty, by the Revs. A. and H. Matthews. It flies, like others of its tribe, till late in the evening, in pursuit of insects or other food.
The flight of this species is extremely rapid and easy, per- formed with little motion of the wings, and it continues for a long time together on the wing. It will sometimes ‘tower’ upwards in the most spirited manner in pursuit of its prey.
Its food consists of small birds, such as snipes, plovers, swallows, sandpipers, quails, and thrushes, and it would appear to be particularly partial to larks and buntings. It will even fly at the partridge, though a bird of so much greater bulk than itself. It also feeds on the larger coleopterous insects, such as cockchaffers, and on grasshoppers; the former it sometimes hawks after over ponds and streams until late in the evening. The male and female are said, according to Meyer, to hunt together, but sometimes to quarrel for what
HOBBY. 79
they have caught, and so to suffer their prey to escape from them.
The note is said to resemble that of the Wryneck.
The Hobby builds in the trees of woods and forests, generally among the topmost branches, but sometimes in a hole of a tree. In the former case, a preference is given to isolated fir or other plantations, as affording at the same time a less likelihood of disturbance, a better view of approach from. all sides, and a supply of the several kinds of food on which the bird lives. It has also been known to build on the ledges of steep precipices or mountains. The same pair will return to their breeding place from year to year if not disturbed. The nest is built of sticks, and is lined with moss, hair, and other such materials. Occasionally the forsaken tenement. of some other species of bird is made to serve the purpose of one of its own fabrication. It frequently avails itself of that of the carrion crow, or a magpie.
The eggs, which are laid about the first week in June, are two, three, or four in number; some say that the former, and others that the latter is the more frequent amounts: they are of a rather short and oval shape, and of a dingy white, or bluish white ground colour, much speckled all over with reddish or yellowish brown, or sometimes with olive green. Mr. Hewitson says that they are very much lke some of those of the Kestrel, as well as those of the Merlin, but that they are larger than either; of a pinker hue, less suffused with colour, and marked with fewer of the small black dots which are scattered over the surface of the others. The young remain for some time in the neighbourhood of the nest, until they have gradually learned to cater for themselves.
In general appearance, the Hobby resembles in some degree the Peregrine, at least on the back, for the breast is streaked instead of barred. It is also of a more slender shape—the wings are longer than the tail.
Male; upper parts of a general dark slate-colour, the shafts of the feathers being darker; the lower parts yellowish or rufous white, streaked with dark brown; weight about seven ounces or half a pound; length, about’ one foot or thirteen inches; bill, black or bluish black, darkest at the tip, blue at the base; cere, yellow; iris, reddish brown or orange. The head large, broad, and flat, of a dark slate-colour; crown, greyish black; neck, white on the sides, and brownish white or ferruginous on the middle part behind, a black streak or band running downwards from the angle of the bill; nape,
§0 HOBBY.
greyish black; chin and throat, white; breast, yellowish white, streaked with brown; back, dark slate-colour. The wings, which expand to about two feet two inches, have the quills dusky black, with yellowish brown or ferruginous oval spots on the inner webs—the second quill is the longest in the wing; greater and lesser wing coverts, dark slate-colour. The tail, which consists of twelve feathers, and is as much as six inches long, and slightly rounded at the end, is dark brownish grey, the two middle feathers plain, the others transversely marked with reddish white or yellowish brown; under tail coverts, bright orange red or ferruginous, with dusky streaks. The legs short, and feathered about a third down, the feathers on them deep rufous, and streaked lke the under tail coverts, but in extreme age these markings are said to wear off, and the ground colour alone to remain. The toes reticulated, and united at the base with short webs. Female; weight, about nine ounces or upwards; length, thirteen or fourteen inches; bill, the same as in the male. The feathers of the head are margined with brown, which probably wears off with age; neck, white on the sides, brownish white or light ferrugimous on the middle part behind; the band blackish brown; throat, white; back, greyish brown, the shafts being of a darker hue; breast, reddish white, streaked with dark brown. The wings expand to about two feet four inches; the quills are brownish black, spotted on the inner webs with reddish white. The tail greyish brown, faintly barred with a darker shade; under tail coverts, light yellowish red. The young bird has the cere greenish yellow, of a very light shade, at first almost white; iris, dark brown or dusky; front of the head, yellowish grey, with a line of the same over the eyes; crown of the head and nape, greyish black; the feathers edged with yellowish white. The neck white on the sides, and surrounded by a ring of yellowish white, which is indistinct behind, the band black; chin, white; throat, yellowish white; breast, yellowish white, streaked with brownish black; back, greyish black, edged with dull white; quills of the wings as in the old birds; greater and lesser wing coverts, greyish black; primaries and secondaries, nearly black, edged with dull white. The tail as in the female, but the bands are light red; the tip and the quills, reddish white; beneath, it is barred with dull white and greyish black; lower tail coverts, vellowish white with brown shafts. The legs yellow; feathers of the legs, yellowish white, with oblong brown spots; claws, black.
446
oh poe 2 Wh ;
Mi Z fore L
81
ORANGE-LEGGED HOBBY.
Falco rufipes, BECHSTEIN. Falco vespertinus, GMELIN, LinNa&us. LATHAM, Falco—To cut with a bill or hook. Rufipes. Rufus—Red. Pes—A foot.
THERE is not much at present to be said about the species before us, and it is so far well, in that it allows the greater space to treat of other more common, and therefore better known, British Birds. In a work of this kind, it is, for the most part, room and not matter that is wanting; ‘brevis esse laboro,’ and it is a matter of regret that I am obliged to do so, but a necessarily short article in the one case leaves the more scope for a longer one in another.
The Orange-legged Hobby, delighting in a mountainous and at the same time wooded region, is common in some parts of Europe, but rare in others. It is plentiful in Russia, Silesia, Hungary, Poland, and Austria; less so in Italy, Swit- zerland, and the Tyrol; uncommon in France, and unknown in Holland.
But very few examples of British specimens of this species have as yet been obtained. In Yorkshire, a male has been recorded by J. 8S. Foljambe, Esq., to have been obtained some years since; another is said to have been shot at Rossington, near Doncaster; a third was killed a few years ago near Easingwold, and was sent to Mr. H. Chapman, of York, to be preserved, with a message that if it was a cuckoo, he was to stuff it for the person who shot it; but that if it was not a cuckoo, he might, if he stuffed it, keep it for his pains. A fourth was shot on the 6th. of May, 18—, at Stainor Wood, near Selby. Three were obtained together in the month of May, in the year 1830, at Horning, in the county of Norfolk, an adult male, a young male in immature plumage, and an adult female. A fourth specimen, a female, was also shot in Holkham Park, the seat of Mr. Coke, (Lord Leicester ;)
VOL, I. G
§2 ORANGE-LEGGED HOBBY.
a fifth in the same county, in the year 1832; and a sixth, a male in adult plumage, in August, 1843, near Norwich— its stomach contained only beetles. ‘Two have been procured, both males, near Plymouth, as I am informed by Mr. R. A. Julian, of that place. The first he says flew on board a vessel in the Channel near the Breakwater, and was captured; the other was brought to Mr. Pincombe, bird preserver of that town, by a person who shot it at Wembury cliff, and who said that he saw another of the same kind in company with it. One has been obtained in the county of Durham. In Scotland it has hitherto been unknown. In Ireland one, (and possibly another, but it is uncertain,) was procured in the county of Wicklow, in the summer of 1832. It was shot just as it had pounced on a pigeon, of at least its own size, in a gentleman’s yard—both fell dead at the same discharge.
Mr. Meyer says—‘I have more than once seen this bird, but have not been so fortunate as to obtain it. On one occasion, in the summer of 1838, I was late one evening walking in the unenclosed plantations belonging to Claremont, on a heath on which I knew they were sometimes found, when my advance roused from the ground a bird, whose peculiar flight instantly arrested my attention, and I followed it as far as the enclosure of the plantation into which it had entered would permit; I presently perceived it sitting upon the branch of a tree, in company with another bird of similar size, but differing in colour. I was near enough to observe their plumage, and no doubt remained upon my mind respecting them—they were Orange-legged Hobbies.’
The food of this species consists of the smaller birds, such as quails, and even occasionally those that are much larger, as the pigeon just mentioned, and the larger coleopterous and other insects. In pursuit of the latter it is seen skimming over watery places until late in the evening—a habit also of others of the Hawks—uttering its note from time to time. One of its specific names, ‘vespertinus,’ (of, or belonging to the evening,) is doubtless hence derived.
Its nest is said to be built in the hollows of trees, and it is also stated that use is sometimes made of that of a magpie or other bird.
Male; after the first moult the whole plumage of the back is more uniforn than in the female. The general colour is deep leaden blue except the legs and under tail coverts, which are bright yellowish red. Length, about eleven inches; bill,
ORANGE-LEGGED HOBBY. : 83
yellowish white at the base, the rest horn colour, inclining to yellowish brown towards the tip; cere, reddish orange; iris, dark brown; head, crown, neck, nape, chin, throat, breast, and back, dull lead colour. The wings, which reach all but to the end of the tail, are of a dull lead colour, the quills lighter with brownish black shafts; the second feather is the longest in the wing, being about half an inch longer than the first and third, which are of an equal length. Greater and lesser wing coverts, primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries, of the same dull leaden hue; tail, dull lead colour; tail coverts the same; under tail coverts, deep ferruginous; legs, which are feathered in front more than one third down with deep orange ferruginous, and the toes, light reddish. The claws, yellowish white with dusky tips. It seems possible that the white colour may be the result of age.
The female, on the upper parts of the body is of a general greyish blue barred with black; the head and back of the neck, yellowish red; the lower parts light yellowish red with longitudinal brown spots. When old, the plumage is said to become lighter in colour, and the black bars narrower. Length, about twelve inches; bill and iris, yellow; forehead, whitish; crown, pale rufous; neck, on the back part, and nape, dark reddish brown or yellowish red, as is also the moustache, sometimes approaching to black. The neck behind is barred with greyish black. ‘The chin and throat nearly white, having a slight reddish or yellowish tint; breast, pale rufous brown, tinged with cinereous, with dark reddish brown longitudinal streaks; the shafts of the feathers and a spot near the tip, dark brown. ‘These marks are said to disappear with age. The back, greater and lesser wing coverts, blackish grey or bluish grey, transversely barred on each feather with bluish or greyish black; the quills blackish grey on the outer webs and tips, and transversely barred with white on the inner; under wing coverts, rufous with transverse bars of dark brown; primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries, dusky black. The tail on the upper surface, as also the tail coverts, blackish grey or bluish grey, transversely barred with bluish black; on the lower surface it is bluish grey, with nine or ten bars of bluish black, shewn through from above, the bars gradually wider in the direction of the tip; under tail coverts, light yellowish orange, (Meyer says white,) as are the feathers on the legs, The legs and toes deep orange yellow; claws, as in the male.
The young male is at first similar in plumage to the young
84 ORANGE-LEGGED HOBBY.
female, but at the first moult it assumes a general bluish grey colour, the feathers on the legs being ferruginous; the bill, cere, legs, toes, and claws, are like those of the old bird.
The young female has the bill, cere, and iris as in the adult; crown of the head, reddish brown with dusky streaks, the feathers tipped with lght red—a small moustache descends from the front of the eye; neck on the sides, pale reddish or yellowish white, with longitudinal brown streaks and_ blots. The throat white; breast, as the sides of the neck; back, dark brown, the feathers being tipped with reddish brown. Wing coverts, the same; primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries, dusky black, the inner edges and the tips being buff white. The tail dark brown, crossed with numerous bars of reddish brown; under tail coverts, deep ferruginous; legs, toes, and claws, as in the adult.
85
MERLIN. Falco esalon, PENNANT, Montacu. Bewick. FLEMING. Falco—To cut with a bill or hook. LEsalon—A species of Hawk,
(Aristotle,) supposed to be the Merlin, or the Sparrow-Hawk.
THoucH an Eagle, by comparison with some of the East Indian species of Hawks, the Merlin is the smallest that occurs in this country. In spirit it is ‘nulli secundus,’ inferior to none, and was accordingly used in former times in falconry for the pursuit of birds even much larger than itself, which it would frequently kill by a single blow on the head, neck, or breast. The author of the ‘Book of Falconrie’ says that they were ‘passing good Hawks, and very skilful.’ Unlike the Sparrow-Hawk and the Kestrel, if pursued by swallows and other small birds, it has been known, instead of flying from them, to become in its turn the aggressor, and at once disperse them. Like the Hobby, it has been captured by its dashing through a pane in the window of a cottage, in pursuit of a yellow-hammer.
This species appears to claim citizenship in all the four quarters of the globe. In Europe it is known in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Germany, and France; in North America, in Asia Minor, and in Africa as far south as the Cape of Good Hope. It is more frequently met with in the northern, than in the southern parts of England, though in neither can it be said to be common. The former are its breeding districts. In Yorkshire, it has very frequently occurred, especially in the West-Riding: occasionally in Derbyshire.
In Sussex, it has been repeatedly noticed in the wilder and less cultivated districts. In Berkshire, I once myself shot one, now many years ago. It was a beautiful female, flying up a brook down by which I was walking—an unfortuna e ‘rencontre’ for it—and fell, apparently quite dead, as indeed it proved to have been; but so remarkable was the similarity
$6 MERLIN.
of its plumage to the stones on which it had fallen at the side of the stream—a novel appropriation of its name of Stone Falecon—that I the less wondered at having before almost given up searching for it, and gone away with the belief that it had not been killed, but only wounded, and had run into some cover, than at finding it when I did. It is considered rare in Cornwall, (one was shot there in 1849, November 9th., near Falmouth, and one near Penryn,) Devon- shire, Dorsetshire, Kent, one at Dodington, in 1840, Essex, and Norfolk.
It breeds in Northumberland, Westmoreland, and Cumber- land. It is uncommonly met with in the neighbourhood of Swinhope, Lincolnshire. The Rev. Leonard Jenyns mentions one recorded by Graves, as having been killed in Cambridge- shire. In Aberdeenshire, and other parts of Scotland, and in the Orkney and Shetland Islands, it also breeds. In Ireland it is indigenous, both in the northern and southern parts, throughout the whole of the year, but would seem to be somewhat locally migratory. It breeds on the mountains of the counties of Londonderry, Tyrone, and Down, as also in those of Waterford, Cork, Tipperary, and Kerry. In Wales, it breeds on Cader Idris, and in other parts.
The Merlin is partially migratory in this country, being for the most part a constant resident in Scotland and the northern parts of England, but appearing to be only a winter visitant in the south. It has however, on one occasion, been known to breed in the county of Suffolk, and probably may have been overlooked in more frequent instances of the same kind in those wilder districts, such as Dartmoor, which are suitable to it.
From a habit it has of perching on stones, it has acquired the name of the Stone Falcon, and as such was formerly described as a distinct species. It must have a fondness for the practice, for it carries it out even on those rocks which are left partially prominent by the receding tide, when hawking, as it sometimes does, on the margin of the sea.
It is a very courageous bird—wild and shy, and according to Temminck, is able to endure a high degree of cold, and is described by him as being commonly found within the limits of the arctic circle. It is easily tamed, though it never becomes very familiar, and was accordingly in former times employed in the chase. Except when the young are hatched, it is difficult, on account of its wariness, to be
MERLIN. 87
approached; it is only by accident that it is occasionally met with within gun-shot.
The Merlin flies low, and with great ease and celerity. It suddenly sweeps by, and is gone almost before you have had time to glance at it, gliding along the side of a hedge or wood, and then over, or into it, and sometimes affording a more lengthened view, by its flight over the open fields, or the wide moor, where it may be seen following its prey through its devious track,: according to the nature of the ground. ‘In pursuit of prey,’ says Sir William Jardine, ‘the Merlin does not often mount above it and rush down, as we have generally seen the Peregrine, but at once gives chase, following the victim through all its turns and windings to escape, and unless cover is at hand, is generally successful.’
Its principal food consists of birds; and it attacks and slays those which are even double its own size, such as partridges, and also quails, plovers, and pigeons, as well as larks, linnets, starlings, sandpipers, snipes, chaffinches, blackbirds, swallows, thrushes, goldfinches, and others which are smaller; as also cockchaffers and other insects. In pursuit of shore birds, dunlins, ring dotterels, and others, it will course them to the edge of, and sometimes even over the water. It is so deter- mined on and in the capture of its prey, that it is difficult to make it leave that which it has secured, and which it often obtains by pouncing on it unawares, but it also chases it in the open air. The lesser birds it captures from the ‘ ground, but those which are too large to be thus borne off, it can only surprise when on the wing. It frequently perches on a stone or crag, flitting from one to another, as if for the purpose of surveying all around it, and when a flock of small birds comes within its ken, it singles out one from the rest, and is not attracted from it to any of the others.
The nest is generally, in this country at least, built on the ground on open moors or heaths, frequently on the side of a ravine, in a tuft of heath or projection of a rock or bank, and when this is the case, is composed of very scanty materials —a few sticks, with heather, grass, or moss—the bare ground almost sufficing for the purpose. In other countries it appears, occasionally at all events, to be built in trees, and is then made of sticks, and lined with wool. In the Orkney and Shetland Islands, it is placed among precipitous and inaccessible rocks.
The eggs are three, four, or five, in number; Bewick says
88 MERLIN.
six; and Temminck five or six. They are bluish white, blotted, particularly at the thicker end, with deep reddish brown or greenish brown. They vary, however, much in colour. Some of the varieties are often similar to those of the Kestrel or Peregrine, others to those of the Sparrow-Hawk, but still more to those of the Hobby. They are of course, however, rather smaller than the former, and also, in this variety, browner in colour and more closely spotted with small dots. One has been obtained of a rich erimson red, blotted with a darker shade of the same. The female sits close at first, but if disturbed or alarmed more than once, becomes extremely shy. The male takes up a position near at hand on the top of some eminence, from whence he can perceive the approach of any intruder, of which he gives notice by shrill cries of alarm. Montagu says that an instance has been known of a Merlin building in a deserted crow’s nest.
Male; upper parts deep greyish blue, each feather having a black central line; the lower parts dull ruddy yellow, with longitudinal dark brown oblong spots. Weight, from five to six ounces. Length, from eleven inches to a foot, or twelve inches and a half; (one described by Montagu was only ten inches long.) The male and female differ generally but little in size, compared with others of the Hawks. Bull, short, strong, pale blue at the base, blackish blue at the tip; cere, dull yellow; iris, dark brown; (one shot at Osberton, and described by J. S. Foljambe, Esq., had the iris yellow.) Head, large, broad, and flat; forehead and sides of the head, greyish ” white—the latter lined with black. There is a greyish white band over the eye, margined beneath with black. Crown, dark bluish or brownish grey, each feather streaked with black in the centre. Neck, short and thick-set, dull yellowish red, encircled with a reddish brown ring, spotted or streaked with black. From the corners of the mouth descend on each side a few black streaks, forming, though faintly, the moustache borne by all the true Falcons. Nape, banded with pale red; chin, white; throat, white, or greyish, or buff white; breast, dull yellowish red, sometimes deep orange brown; the shafts and a spot towards the end, dark brown. Back, deep greyish blue, lighter towards the tail—the feathers streaked in the centre with black, as are all the other bluish feathers of the back.
The wings, which when closed, reach from within an inch and a quarter to two inches of the end of the tail, and expand
MERLIN. §9
to about two feet four inches, have the primaries black, or blackish or bluish brown, tinged with grey—the outer margin of the first spotted with white, the inner webs spotted trans- versely with white; underneath they are of a paler colour, barred with white: the third feather is the longest, but the second is nearly as long; the fourth a little longer than the first; the fifth an inch shorter; secondaries, deep greyish blue, and curved inwards—the shafts black; tertiaries also greyish blue. Greater and lesser wing coverts, bluish grey—the shafts of the feathers black; greater and lesser under wing coverts, yellowish white, with dusky spots and streaks. The tail bluish grey; it generally has, but is sometimes without, from even only one, but commonly from three or five to six, and, ac- cording to Pennant, eight, and even thirteen dark bands; viz:—in the proportion of six on the middle feathers, to eight (probably age is the cause of the gradual difference in their number,) on the side ones, but which merge apparently into the smaller-named number—the last being the largest and darkest. The tail is five inches long; the feathers are twelve in number, being of nearly equal length, broad, and rounded: the tip is white, underneath it is barred with darker and lighter shades of grey, with the broad band and white tip. Legs, yellow, feathered in front more than one third down, and reticulated. The feathers are rufous, with dusky streaks; toes, yellow; the first the shortest; the third the longest; the fourth a little longer than the second: the front ones are connected at the base by a short membrane; claws, black. The female differs considerably from the male; upper parts dark bluish grey, tinged with brown—the feathers streaked with black; under parts yellowish white, with large brown spots. Weight, about nine ounces; length, about twelve inches and a half, occasionally as much as thirteen and a half or fourteen inches; bill, light blue, tipped with black. From the angle of the mouth extends a band of brown, formed by the markings on the middle of the feathers; cere, yellow; iris, as in the male; forehead, yellowish white; a yellowish line edged on the under side with blackish brown, extends over the eye; head, dark rufous brown, the feathers edged at the tip with red; crown, reddish brown, with dusky black streaks down the shafts of the feathers; neck, behind yellowish white, the feathers tipped with brown: there is a ring round it of yellowish white, streaked and spotted with dusky brown. The nape, inclining to rufous, and as the crown; chin and throat, white or yel-
90 MERLIN.
lowish white, the feathers on the side being tipped with brown; breast, pale reddish yellow, or brownish or yellowish white, marked with many oblong spots of dark brown, larger than those of the male; back and wings, brown mixed with rufous, the shaft and centre of each feather being darker, and the edge tipped with red; greater wing coverts, brown, edged with dull yellowish white or light rufous, the centre of the feathers being grey; lesser wing coverts, greyish brown, bordered with rufous, the shafts being black. Primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries, brownish black, spotted with light red spots on both the webs, and edged with red, the tips the same colour of a paler shade. Greater and lesser under wing coverts, brownish red, spotted and edged with yellowish white; tail coverts the same, edged the same. ‘he tail, which is greyish brown, or dusky, has five bars of very pale reddish brown or yellowish white spots, and the tip banded with greyish white; the side feathers have two light bars at the base; upper tail coverts, brown, edged with dull yellowish white; under tail coverts, white, with the exception of the feathers on the sides, which have each a line of brown. Legs, yellow, the long feathers streaked with brown; the shorter ones nearly white; toes, yellow; claws, black.
The young birds when fully fledged, most resemble the adult female, but are lighter in colour; the males however less so than the females, and tinged with blue on the back. The former gradually assume more blue, but the latter change less. The centre of the feathers in the immature birds is dark brown edged with rufous, instead of being marked in the centre with grey. Bill, as in the adults; cere, dull yellow. A yellowish line extends over the eye; iris, brown, but subject to variations of shade, according to Selby; forehead, yellowish white; head streaked on the sides, which are yellowish red, with brown, and a band of the latter colour descends from the angle of the mouth; neck, yellowish behind, the feathers tipped with brown; chin, yellowish white; throat, yellowish white, the shafts of the feathers brown; breast, pale reddish yellow, streaked longitudinally with brown; back, dark brown, slightly tinged with blue, the feathers edged and marked with pale yellowish red in obscure spots, and streaked in the centre with dark brown or black; greater wing coverts, spotted with light reddish spots, and tipped with the same; primaries, very dark brown, indistinctly spotted on the outer webs with pale yellowish red, and tipped with the same, but paler; secondaries,
MERLIN. 91
spotted in the same manner on both webs; tail, dark brown, barred with five distinct bands composed of pale reddish brown spots; the tip is reddish or greyish white: there are three other bars near the base; under tail coverts, partially streaked with a narrow brown line near the end; legs, dull yellow, the feathers marked with a brown streak.
The males vary in colour as they advance in age, the blue on the back being tinged with brown at first, and becoming gradually of a purer hue. In some specimens also the breast is of a light yellowish red, and in others deep orange brown. In some the tail is without the dark bands, except the last and broadest one; and in others the middle feathers are without them, while they are apparent on the rest.
The females differ less than the males, but assume more of the character of the plumage of the latter, especially on the upper parts, as they advance in age,
92
ICESTREL.
WINDHOVER. STONEGALL. STANNEL HAWK,
Falco Tinnunculus, Montacu. SELBY. Aceipiter alaudarius, BRIsson. Falco Tinnunculus. Faleo—To cut with a bill or hook.
Tinnunculus—Conjectured from Zinnio—To chirp.
THIS species is in my opinion, not only, as it is usually described to be, one of the commonest, but the commonest of the British species of Hawks. It is found in all parts of Europe—Denmark, France, Italy, Spain, Norway, Sweden, Lapland, Greece, and Switzerland; and also in Asia, in Siberia; in Central Africa, and at the Cape of Good Hope; and also, according to Meyer, in America. It is easily reclaimed, and was taught to capture larks, snipes, and young partridges. It becomes very familiar when tamed, and will live on terms of perfect amity with other small birds, its companions. It formed, and perhaps still forms, one of the so-called ‘happy family,’ to be seen, or which was lately to be seen, in London. The Kestrel has frequently been taken by its pursuing small birds into a room or building. It does infinitely more good than harm, if indeed it does any harm at all, and its stolid destruction by gamekeepers and others, is much to be lamented, and should be deprecated by all who are able to interfere for the preservation of a bird which is an ornament to the country.
These birds appear to be of a pugnacious disposition, J. W. G. Spicer, Esq., of Esher Place, Surrey, writing in the ‘Zoologist, pages 654-5, says, ‘all of a sudden, from two trees near me, and about fifty yards apart, two Hawks rushed simultaneously at each other, and began fighting most furiously, screaming and tumbling over and over in the air. I fired and shot them both, and they were so firmly grappled together by their talons, that I could hardly separate them, though
KESTREL. 93
dead. They were both hen Kestrels. What could have been the sudden cause of their rage? It was autumn, and there- fore they had no nests.’ In the next article, the following is recorded by Mr. W. Peachey, of Northchapel, near Petworth: —‘A few weeks ago, a man passing a tree, heard a screaming from a nest at the top. Having climbed the tree and put his hand into the nest, he seized a bird which proved to be a Kestrel; and at the same instant a Magpie flew out on the other side. The Kestrel, it appears, had the advantage in being uppermost, and would probably have vanquished his adversary, had he not been thus unexpectedly taken.” Two instances are related by the late Frederick Holme, Esq., of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, the one of a male Kestrel having eaten the body of its partner, which had been shot, and hung in the branch of a tree—‘a piece of conjugal can- nibalism, somewhat at variance with the proverb, that ‘hawks don’t poke out hawks’ een;’ and the other as a set off, he says of ‘six of one, and half-a-dozen of the other,’ a pair of Kestrels in confinement having been left without their supper, the male was killed and eaten by the female before morning.’
In Yorkshire, the Kestrel is a common bird, as in most parts of England. In Cornwall it appears to be rare. One, a male, was shot, Mr. Cocks has informed me, at Trevissom, in January, 1850, by Master Reed; and others at Penzance and Swanpool, in 1846. In Scotland it is likewise generally distributed. In Ireland it is also common throughout the island.
The debateable point respecting the natural history of the Kestrel, is whether it is migratory or not. Much has been written on both sides of this ‘vexata questio; and as much, or more, one may take upon oneself to say, will yet be written on the subject. My own opinion is against the idea of any migration of the bird beyond the bounds of this country. Stress has been laid, in an argument in favour of such a supposed movement, on the fact of the departure of the broods of young Kestrels from