54 
that in the year 1842, the falcons of the Loo Heron Hawking 
Club numbered 44, and the herons taken 148; in 1843, 40 and 
200; in 1844, 36 and 100; about the same, until 1849, when 
it was 14 and 128; in 1850, 16 and 137 respectively. I have 
been unable to ascertain the annual expenses of this fine estab- 
lishment, but from the number of falconers, and men and horses 
required (the latter having to gallop their best on the sound, 
holding, dunes, of heath land, surrounding the vast heronry 
at Loo for miles) it must have been very considerable. Mr 
Clough Newcome, one of the Club English members, long flew 
herons at his home at Hockwold, and at Didlington, in Norfolk ; 
and in 1843 he had the best possible cast of passage hawks, for a 
heron flight, called “Sultan,” and “De Ruyter.” They were, of 
course, taken at Valkenswaard, and trained and used at the 
Loo, and during their third year they took at Hockwold and 
the Loo 54 herons, and in 1844 57 herons! 
The herons thus taken were, with few exceptions, released 
very slightly harmed, but adorned with a ring attached to a 
leg, with date of capture added, and (if they possessed them) 
minus the black pendant feathers at the back of a mature 
heron’s head—usually set with jewels and worn in the falconer’s 
cap. I have never myself seen a heron flight, nor has there 
been one attempted by the Old Hawking Club, which yearly 
meets on Salisbury Plain. Their quarry is the rook, which, in 
early spring on those open downs, with no mean powers of 
wing (witness its evolutions in a wind sometimes) and aided by 
a most sagacious brain, with plenty of law, makes a substitute 
to-day, though a very poor one, for the noble heron of the past. 
The hawks of the Old Hawking Club accounted for no less than 
258 rooks in the spring of 1890. They are taken about from 
place to place in a van, and the falconers are all well mounted 
and ride very hard. Rook-hawking is thus performed, to entire 
perfection :— 
The nearest approach to a heron flight that I have ever seen, 
occurred in this wise. In October, 1889, my old grouse hawk, 
“Lady Jane,” was waiting on at a height so great, that 
though she is upwards of three feet across from tip to tip of 
