24 SPRING 



phalaropes. Nature is ingenious in utilising her own pecu- 

 liarities, but little primary purpose can often be detected in 

 her variations. 



Sparrow-hawks have almost as much spirit as peregrines 

 in proportion to their size, though they hunt their prey of 

 little birds in a more skulking manner. They flicker round 

 thickets and along hedgerows on their sharp wings, and often 

 snap up unwary birds in the first flash when they suddenly 



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'SPARROW-HAWKS 



FLICKER ROUND THICKETS' 



turn a corner upon them, or find them perched. When they 

 are not too shy to haunt the neighbourhood of farmyards, 

 they have a knack of slipping round the corner of the barn, 

 and making off with a chicken or duckling before the wariest 

 rooster has time to give the alarm. But they do not wholly 

 depend on tactics of surprise, and can often overhaul even 

 so large, swift, and wary a bird as the wood-pigeon in fair 

 chase. Here again the hen bird is much larger and more 

 powerful than the cock, and can make a match with a stronger 



