FALCOXID.E — THE FALCOXS. 219 



feeding the young. Their nests are variously constructed as to materials, 

 usually chietiy of hay somewhat clumsily wrought together into the form 

 of a nest, but never very nicely interwoven ; occasionally, in more northern 

 localities, they are lined with feathers, in some cases with pine-needles and 

 small twigs. 



Eichardson states that all the nests of this Hawk observed by liim were 

 built on the ground by the side of small lakes, of moss, grass, feathers, and 

 hair, and contained from three to five eggs, of a bluish-wjnte color, and un- 

 spotted. The latter measured 1.75 inches in length, and were an incli across 

 where widest. The position and manner of constructing the nest correspond 

 with my own experience, but the size of the eggs does not. The nests have 

 been invariably on the ground, near water, built of dry grass, and lined with 

 softer materials. 



JMr. Audubon gives a very minute account of a nest which he found on 

 Galveston Island, Texas. It was about a hundred yards from a pond, on a 

 ridge just raised above the marsh, and was made of dry grass; the internal 

 diameter was eight, and the external twelve inches, with the depth of two 

 and a half No feathers were found. This absence of a warm lining in 

 Texas really proves nothing. A warm lining may be required in latitude 

 65° north, and the same necessity not found in one of 29°. A nest observed 

 in Concord, Mass., by Dr. H. 11. Storer, was on the edge of a pond, and was 

 warmly lined with feathers and fine grasses. Many otlier instances might 

 be named. 



The eggs found in the Galveston nest were four in number, smooth, con- 

 siderably rounded or broadly elliptical, bluish-white, 1.75 inches in length, 

 and 1.25 in breadth. Another nest, found under a low bush on the Alle- 

 ghanies, was constructed in a similar manner, but was more bulky ; the bed 

 being four inches above the earth, and the egg slightly sprinkled with small 

 marks of pale reddish-brown. 



The prevalent impression that the eggs of this Hawk are generally un- 

 spotted, so far as I am aware, is not correct. All that I have ever seen, 

 except the eggs above referred to from Texas, and a few others, have been more 

 or less marked with light-brown lilotches. These markings are not always 

 very distinct, but, as far as my present experience goes, they are to be found, 

 if carefully sought. In 1856 I received from Dr. Dixon, of Damariscotta, 

 a nest with six eggs of a Hawk of this species. The female had been shot 

 as she flew from the nest. With a single exception, all the eggs Avere very 

 distinctly blotched and spotted. In shape they were of a rather oblong- 

 oval, rounded at both ends, the smaller end well defined. They varied in 

 length from 2.00 to 1.87 inches, and in breadth from 1.44 to 1.38 inches. Their 

 ground-color was a dirty liluisli-wliite, which in one was nearly unspotted, the 

 markings so faint as to be hardly perceptible, and only upon a close inspec- 

 tion. In all the others, spots and blotches of a light shade of purplish-brown 

 occured, in a greater or less degree, over their entire surface. In two, the 



