SPARROW HAWK. 359 



When formed by itself, its nest is nearly flat, composed of 

 sticks and slender twigs, rudely put together, with some grass, 

 moss, or wool in the central small depression. The eggs, from 

 three to five in number, are very broadly ovate or roundish- 

 elliptical, bluish-white, blotched and irregularly spotted, some- 

 times sparingly, sometimes profusely, with umber-brown of 

 various shades ; the largest in my collection is an inch and 

 eight-twelfths long, an inch and four-twelfths in breadth, the 

 smallest an inch and seven-twelfths in length, and an inch and 

 a quarter in breadth. 



" In one of the plantations on Boghead," Mr Weir writes, 

 " for several years past a pair of Sparrow Hawks have 

 reared their young, either in the deserted nest of the Carrion 

 Crow or JNIagpie. They were uncommonly bold, and with the 

 rapidity of an arrow skimmed over the ground. Amongst 

 partridges, pigeons, and other smaller birds, they committed 

 great destruction. With almost unerring aim they pounced 

 upon their prey. From a hut formed of the branches of trees 

 I watched for several hours the habits of a pair of these vora- 

 cious birds whilst they were engaged in feeding their young, 

 which were nearly half fledged. During the time that I re- 

 mained in it, the female continued to sit upon them. The 

 male, sometimes at shorter, and at other times at longer inter- 

 vals, alighted upon the top of a tree, at the distance of about 

 forty yards from the nest, with a bird in his talons. The fe- 

 male always took it from him, and divided it amongst her nest- 

 lings. Sometimes he arrived with a blackbird or a thrush, 

 but more frequently with a lark, a yellow bunting, or a chaf- 

 finch. Being anxious to know whether the male is in the 

 habit of feeding his offspring, I one morning, in a place of con- 

 cealment, watched another pair of them for four or five hours. 

 The male always alighted, as in the former case, upon the top of 

 a tree at some distance from the nest, with a bird in his claws, 

 and called upon his mate, who came and caught hold of it in her 

 bill. I shot her as she was carrying it to her young. About 

 nine o'clock in the morning I went home. At six in the even- 

 ing I returned with a boy, who climbed the tree to see what was 

 in the nest. He had no sooner looked into it, than with asto- 



