10 The Study of Wild Birds 
of birds, so long as he had health and strength, was on an altogether 
higher plane than cage-birds. He was one of the band of falconers 
who during the years between 1845-60 practically revived the art 
of hawking in the British Isles. In the training of both hawks 
and falcons few surpassed him. His especial ally in this cause was 
the late Francis Henry Salvin who died in 1904. 
The late Lord Lilford who was ardently devoted to falconry, 
although debarred by his sad infirmities for many years before his 
death from personally taking part in the sport, told me how when 
a lad he was taken by his father to Edinburgh Castle to see Captain 
William Verner (my father’s) trained peregrines. This must have 
been about 1848. 
From my earliest days I can recall seeing Peregrines, Merlins 
and Sparrowhawks, sitting, the former on their blocks, and the latter 
on a perch, fitted with jesses, swivel, bells and leash in approved 
fashion and I was taught from the time I could walk how to carry 
a trained hawk on the wrist. 
I have dim recollections of a splendid Greenland falcon, of which 
I have a full-sized crayon portrait, drawn by a friend of my father. 
A trained Goshawk also figured largely in my early days and I well 
remember my father explaining to me how a sulky nature made it 
doubly hard to train this species. 
The last falcons trained by my father were a Peregrine and 
three Merlins. With the latter we had some famous flights after 
Skylarks and also the Crested Larks in the vicinity of Boulogne- 
sur-Mer. It is interesting to note that the trained Merlin 
is frequently unable to cope with the Skylark save when the 
latter is moulting, since it mounts rapidly and gets right away, 
whereas the Crested Lark has a much less powerful flight. I 
remember my father’s delight at finding in an old French book 
on Falconry in the days of Louis XIII., written early in the 
seventeenth century that the best and most sporting quarry at 
