120 --:BRITISH BIRDS. 
relieves the female at her duties. He tells me that, besides small mammals, 
the Buzzard will eat grasshoppers and other insects, reptiles, and occasion- 
ally small birds, if it gets a chance of catching them sitting. The spines 
of the hedgehog have been found in the stomach of the Buzzard; and Dr. 
Holland also mentioned an instance of a female bird having been found 
dead on the nest with a live viper under her. 
The Buzzard returns year after year to the same nest, but is said not to 
breed a second time the same year if the eggs are taken. When the 
eggs are much incubated she sits very close. Sometimes we could see the 
tail projecting beyond the edge of the nest, but were unable to drive the 
bird from her place by shouting, sometimes not even by hitting the trunk 
of the tree. Once or twice the sitting bird did not fly off until the climber 
was halfway up the tree. When she does take wing, she flies straight off 
and clears herself from the tops of the surrounding trees as soon as pos- 
sible. She sits on the nest head to wind, and flies off also head to wind, 
but, when she has a clear course, generally soon wheels round, and keeps 
up at intervals a melancholy cry like pe-e-i-o-oo. The Buzzard is said to 
breed in its first spring, in immature plumage. As soon as the duty of 
feeding the young is nearly come to an end, which is late in May or early 
in June, the moulting-season comes on. First the wing- and tail-feathers 
are renewed, but slowly, only one or two at each side at a time, so as not 
to interfere much with its power of flight. Durimg August and September 
the body-feathers are moulted. 
Dixon met with this bird in the north of Scotland, and made the follow- 
ing note respecting its nesting-habits there :—‘‘ Far in the deepest soli- 
tudes of the deer-forests the Buzzard ofttimes builds its nest. Its cradle 
is usually placed in some dense hoary pine tree, the patriarch of the forest, 
and the one most difficult of access too. It is here, but sometimes also 
just on the borderland of the forests, that the Buzzard finds the solitude 
of his choice, the seclusion which he loves. Nothing breaks the silence 
here save the occasional cry of a Blackeock or the light tread of the moun- 
tain-hare as it hurries off at your approach. The scenery around is grand, 
befitting surroundings to such an abode. The distant mountains come out 
in bold outline against the clear morning sky; and the sunlight glistens 
brightly on the red bark of the pines around you. ‘The nest is situated on 
a flat branch, some sixty feet from the ground. It is a large bulky struc- 
ture, indeed almost flat, and made of sticks. In the cavity which contains 
the eggs are a few bits of wool and down, similar to what are often found 
in the Sparrow-Hawk’s nest. Indeed the whole structure bears a very 
close resemblance to the nest of that bird; only it is situated further from 
the trunk of the tree, like the nest of the Heron. Since this nest was 
robbed, the pair of birds have commenced building another, choosing for 
their situation this time the face of an old ivy-covered cliff.” 
