506 CIRCUS CYANEUS. 



kestrel, and sparrow hawk, they would find reason to 

 suspect that they had been deceived by the fanciful de- 

 scriptions of men whose sources of information are on 

 their book-shelves. The hen-harrier, in fact, might be 

 said to be a very near-sighted bird ; the height at which 

 the kestrel hovers does not generally exceed forty 

 feet ; the sparrow hawk flies at an elevation of from 

 ten to twenty or thirty feet ; and even the golden eagle, 

 as I have often observed, seeks for live prey at a small 

 height over the surface, although it can perceive a car- 

 cass, or the ravens that are hastening towards one, from 

 a great distance. 



Nor is it true that the common harrier never seizes 

 its prey in open flight. Two young friends of mine, 

 while collecting insects on the Pentland Hills in the 

 summer of 1835, saw two of these birds flying low over 

 the heath, evidently in search of prey, when a red 

 grous rose and flew oif, but was overtaken by one of 

 the hawks, who drove it to the ground, and alighted 

 to devour it, in which it was joined by the other. Mr 

 Martin, gamekeeper to the Earl of Lauderdale, shot a 

 male of this species in the end of September of the 

 same year, as it flew past him carrying a red grous, 

 which he found to have been torn on the head. This 

 circumstance brings to my mind a,nother error common 

 to most of the fireside philosophers, as well as to some 

 of the peripatetics, who allege that the true falcons, in 

 devouring their prey, always begin with the head, 

 whereas the " baser sort" commence their repast by 

 tearing up any part that comes first in their way. The 

 peregrine falcon, who is among the noblest of the noble, 

 is not so nice or discriminate, but generally prefers a 



