The Sparrow Hawk. 277 



headlong dash, but, alas, it is to knock its brains out against 

 the supposed gap in the shrubs. 



Sparrow hawks pair for life — the very brief life that game 

 preservers allow them. Their courtship is a curious one. It is 

 reminiscent of an old adage still sometimes heard amongst 

 country people — " Nippin' and scartin' are Scots folks' wooin'." 

 To watch a pair of hawks engaged in wooing is to see a couple 

 ■of birds that the casual observer might well think were fighting. 

 Dashing at and buffeting each other, uttering short cries, while 

 wheeling about in the air, their demeanour is suggestive of 

 anything rather than love. By and by they settle down in some 

 tree, where, after a good deal of preliminary sparring the 

 female will ultimately condescend to allow her little lover to 

 stroke her feathers with his bill — a duty he performs very 

 gingerly and warily, and with one eye always watching for a 

 sudden assault from her sharp talons. 



In April a spot is chosen for the nest, a favourite site being 

 some 15 to 18 feet up an old spruce tree, and close to the trunk. 

 They always build their own nest, but now and then will use 

 an old squirrel's drey or a wood pigeon's old nest for a founda- 

 tion. By the middle of May the full clutch of eggs is laid upon 

 the shallow saucer-shaped hollow over the twigs that form the 

 nest. The eggs vary to a great extent from bluish-green, almost 

 spotless specimens, to others that are quite clouded over with 

 reddish brown of several shades. 



The young are attended to with great assiduity, and at this 

 period the parents are most relentless in their pursuit of prey of 

 all kinds. The small birds suffer most at this time, and a visit 

 to a sparrow hawk's eyrie at the time the young have begun to 

 scramble out of their nest along the branches is most instructive. 

 All the food lying about the nest will be found to be mostly 

 warblers, and no game birds at all. As happens with all the 

 birds of prey, the young when able to take care of themselves 

 are driven off their parents' beat and are never allowed to 

 return to their birthplace. 



In the days when falconry was the prevailing sport this 

 species was held in a higher reputation than it has any hope of 

 enjoying amongst sportsmen of the present day. The female, 

 under the laws of falconry, which assigned different kinds to 

 ■different ranks, was entitled to be carried by a priest, while the 



