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Address to the Members of the Bermckshire Naturalists Clubf 

 read at the Anniversary Meeting held at Alnmcky September 

 22, 1847. By H. G. C. Claekb, Esq., M.D., President 



Gentlemen, 



In conformity with established usage, I proceed to 

 recapitulate the minutes of the year which is now closed. 



Our last anniversary was held at Chatton, which from its 

 central position in relation to the members on the English 

 side of the Border, and the beauty of the weather, was nume- 

 rously attended. There were present, — Dr. Johnston, Mr. Sel- 

 by. Rev. J. D. Clark, Mr. Donaldson Selby, Captain Carpen- 

 ter, Mr. Darling, Mr. Culley, Mr. Boyd, Rev. J. Parker, Mr. 

 Broderick, Mr. Murray, Col. Younghusband, the Rev. M. 

 Burrell, the Rev. Geo. Rooke, and Dr. Clarke. 



After breakfast the party proceeded to witness a flight of 

 Mr. Broderick*s hawks, but, to speak truth, in this the Club 

 were disappointed. The time for this sport seems to have 

 gone by. We can conceive few scenes so animated and bril- 

 liant as that of a hawking party in days of yore, when large 

 unenclosed tracts of country spread on every side, when the 

 hawk and its quarry, and 



" All the currents of their heady fight/* 



could be distinctly seen, and the gay cavalcade joyously 

 followed in pursuit. But now the land is almost everywhere 

 enclosed and cultivated, and the partridges, which we flushed 

 in the stubbles, betook themselves immediately to the shelter- 

 ing covert of the turnip fields, from which it was impossible 

 again to start them. The hawks themselves, however, with 

 their keen and restless eyes — their bills and claws, so aptly 

 symbolising their predatory nature — their jesses, hood, and 

 bells, were observed with great interest by the Club, and not 

 less so when they were let down the wind by their master — 

 the circles they described in the air, with the cheerful clang 

 of their little bells — their poise, self-balanced — their upward 

 gyrations and their downward swoop, were all eminently 

 beautiful, and we only required an open country and a heron 

 RN.a — ^VOL. II. NO. v. p 



