THE ROBBERS OF THE FALLS 



cackling. It took but a little time to find the nest in 

 the tip-top crotch of a chestnut, forty feet from the 

 ground, the twigs all around fairly bristling with down. 

 This was the twenty-first of May, and the amount of 

 down indicated that incubation w^as well under way. 

 Strapping on my climbing irons, I went up, and brought 

 down the four eggs to give to an egg collector. This 

 stopped the raids on the chickens, for the hawks 

 forthwith disappeared. 



Later that same season Ned and I found a nice nest 

 of the closely related Sharp-shinned Hawk, the second 

 one of this bird I have found on the fourth of July. 

 We were exploring a very wild mountainous region, 

 in a swampy tract of black spruce woods. We entered 

 it after skirting a typical wet sphagnum swamp, and 

 about the first thing I saw was a nest of sticks in a small 

 spruce, fifteen feet up. Ned and I climbed the tree, 

 and we stayed up there some time, enjoying the interest- 

 ing sight. Three little Sharp-shinned Hawks in white 

 dow^n, and two unhatched eggs were our prize in the 

 neatly built nest of small sticks. As we studied them, 

 the old hawk came dashing up, and from trees near by 

 made a great ado. The wind up there on the moun- 

 tains was blowing almost a gale, and the trees were 

 swaying like so many reeds. By waiting patiently for 

 momentary lulls in the wind, I finally accomplished it. 



These five species of hawks are the only ones that 

 we are liable to find in our woods in the nesting time. 

 The Bald Eagle is only a big hawk, but it is scarce 



52 



