THE SPARROW-HAWK 157 
ing-ground, it wings its easy way to the nearest hedge, darts along 
by the side, turns sharply to the right or left through an opening 
caused by a gate or gap, and woe to any little bird which it may 
encounter, either perched on a twig or resting on the ground. Un- 
erring in aim, and secure of its holdfast, it allows its victims no 
chance of escape: one miserable scream, and their fate is sealed. 
And even if the prey detects its coming enemy, and seeks safety in 
flight, its only hope is to slip into the thick bushes and trust to con- 
cealment: resort to the open field is all but certain death. Nor 
is it fastidious in its choice of food—leverets, young rabbits, mice, 
partridges, thrushes, blackbirds, sparrows, larks, pipits, and many 
others are equal favourites. It resorts very frequently to the home- 
stead and farmyard, not so much in quest of chickens, which, by the 
way, it does not despise, as for the sake of the small birds which 
abound in such places. There it is a bold robber, little heeding the 
presence of men, suddenly dashing from behind some barn or corn- 
rick, and rapidly disappearing with its luckless prey struggling in 
its talons, pursued, perhaps, by the vociferous twitter of the out- 
raged flock, but not dispirited against another onslaught. This 
coursing for its prey, though the usual, is not the only method of 
furnishing his larder pursued by the Sparrow-Hawk. He has been 
known to station himself on the branch of a tree in the neighbour- 
hood of some favourite resort of Sparrows, concealed himself, but 
commanding a fair view of the flock below. With an intent as 
deadly as that of the fowler when he points his gun, he puts on the 
attitude of flight before he quits his perch, then selecting his victim, 
and pouncing on it all but simultaneously, he retires to devour his 
meal and to return to his post as soon as the hubbub he has excited 
has subsided somewhat. At times he pays dear for his temerity. 
Pouncing on a bird which the sportsman has put up and missed, he 
receives the contents of the second barrel ; making a swoop on the 
bird-catcher’s call-bird, he becomes entangled in the meshes; or 
dashing through a glazed window at a caged Canary bird, he finds 
his retreat cut off. 
As is the case with most predaceous birds, the female is larger 
and bolder than the male, and will attack birds superior to herself 
in size. Though a fierce enemy, she is an affectionate mother, and 
will defend her young at the risk of her life. She builds her nest, or 
appropriates the deserted nest of a Crow, in trees, or if they be 
wanting, in a cliff, and lays four or five eggs. The young are very 
voracious, and are fed principally on small birds, the number of 
which consumed may be inferred from the fact that no less than 
sixteen Larks, Sparrows, and other small birds, were on one occa- 
sion found in a nest, the female parent belonging to which had been 
shot while conveying to them a young bird just brought to the 
neighbourhood of the nest by the male; the latter, it was conjec- 
tured, having brought them all, and deposited them in the nest 
