134 OTTER HUNTING, FALCONRY, SHOOTING 



home. Like other hawks, they may be taken as nestlings 

 or they mav be wild-caught. Colonel Delme RadclifFe 

 once warned me against having a hao^gard, but the bird 

 in its first plumage, although wild-caught, is very good, 

 and as a rule to be preferred to an eyess. In training, 

 a hood, so contrived that food may just be seen through 

 it (food and nothing else) can be used ; but the bird 

 should be accustomed very soon to feed ' from the fist ' 

 without it, and to endure the presence of strangers. 

 This part of the business is a trying time to the falconer, 

 for goshawks and sparrow-hawks have a fearful temper. 

 It is only to be overcome by time and constant attention, 

 the goshawk, at any rate, becoming at last very fairly 

 amiable. 



As with other hawks, the entering to quarry is done 

 by degrees : there is no greater mistake than hurry in 

 the training. At first a dead rabbit, opened so as to show 

 the flesh about the shoulder, may be given at the bow- 

 perch : a couple of days after, the hawk being very 

 sharp-set, a live rabbit in a short creance should be offered ; 

 on it being taken, the falconer will kill it, and allow the 

 hawk to feed from the shoulders as before — and so by 

 degrees the bird will fly wild rabbits. Half a dozen may 

 be taken in a morning's or afternoon's walk ; more in 

 fact, but it is well not to repeat large numbers day after 

 day. It was my custom at first to stab the rabbit 

 at once, but I think there is a better plan. Have a 

 man or boy behind you, carrying a dead rabbit, skinned 



