44 FALCONID^. 



and most magnificent of the many works relating to the 

 subject — quotes (p. 77) from Madox's ' History of the Ex- 

 chequer ' (London: 1701, p. 186) a passage to the effect 

 that in the fifth year of King Stephen's reign, about 1139, 

 one Outi of Lincohi had to pay a fine of one hundred 

 Norwegian Hawks, and one hundred " Girfals," of which 

 last it was stipulated that six were to be white ; and later, 

 as appears from several passages in Rymer's ' Foedera ' 

 (Londini: 1705, pp. 1071, 1075, and 1087), Norwegian 

 and white Falcons formed royal gifts. Thus, in 1279, Magnus 

 King of Norway writing from Bergen to Edward I., sends 

 him " aliquos Grerofalcones ; " and this same Magnus on his 

 death-bed, in 1280, left his sons to Edward's care, accom- 

 panying the bequest with a present of two noble white 

 Falcons and six grey ones. While King Edward, in 1282, 

 writing to Alphonso of Castillo, transmits him four grey 

 Falcons, of which two were trained to Cranes and Herons, 

 and apologizes for sending no white ones, having lately lost 

 nine, but adds that messengers had already gone to fetch 

 some more from Norway, of which he himself would by-and- 

 bye be the bearer. In the last century, we learn from 

 Horrebow that the falconers of the King of Denmark, who 

 were annually despatched to Iceland, paid the natives who 

 caught the birds from twice to three times as much for white 

 as for grey ones. This same writer also mentions that "in 

 winter whole flights of Falcons come over from Greenland [to 

 Iceland] and are chiefly white." The adult specimen of the 

 Greenland Falcon, now in the Museum of Newcastle-on-Tyne, 

 from which Bewick's woodcut was drawn, was given to Mr. 

 Tunstall by the then Lord Orford, a great falconer, who 

 obtained it from Iceland or Greenland, and had used it for 

 many years in taking Hares and Rabbits ; but these large 

 Falcons were most valued for flights at Cranes and Herons. 



The preceding remarks on the difi"erent characters of the 

 Greenland and Iceland Falcons render any minute descrip- 

 tion of the former unnecessary ; but it should be observed 

 that in both forms the plumage is subject to great variation in 

 markings and tint, and this variation is, subject to the rules 



