KESTREL. 97 
—the habit of the other Hawks. Buffon relates that ‘when 
it has seized and carried off a bird, it kills it, and plucks it 
very neatly before eating it. It does not take so much 
trouble with mice, for it swallows the smaller whole, and tears 
the others to pieces. The skin is rolled up so as to form a 
little pellet, which it ejects from the mouth. On putting 
these pellets into hot water to soften and unravel them, you 
_ find the entire skin of the mouse, as if it had been flayed.’ 
This, however, is said by Mr. Macgillivray, never to be the 
case, but that the skin is always in pieces. Probably in some 
instances there may be foundation for the assertion of the 
Count, but only as exceptions to the general rule. 
Meyer observes, which every one who has seen the bird will 
confirm, as frequently, though not always the case, that ‘when 
engaged in searching for its food, it will suffer the very near 
approach of an observer without shewing any alarm, or desisting 
from its employment, and continue at the elevation of a few 
yards from the ground, with out-spread tail, and stationary, 
except the occasional tremulous flickering of its wings; then, as 
if suddenly losing sight of the object of its search, it wheels 
about, and shifts its position, and is again presently seen at a 
distance, suspended and hovering in the same anxious search.’ 
In the ardour of the chase, the Windhover has been known to 
drive a lark into the inside of a coach as it was travelling along; 
and another to brush against a person’s head, in dashing at 
a sparrow which was flitting in a state of bewildered entrance- 
ment in a myrtle bush. Mr. Thompson mentions his having 
seen a Kestrel after a long and close chase of a swallow 
through all its turns and twists, become in its turn pursued 
by the same individual bird. They are often followed and 
teased by several small birds together, as well as by Rooks, 
as hereafter to be mentioned when treating of the latter bird. 
The note of the Windhover is clear, shrill, and rather 
loud, and is rendered by Buffon by the words ‘phi, pli, pli,’ 
Of fpri, pri, pri.’ 
I am indebted to my obliging friend, the Rev. J. W. Bower, 
of Barmston, in the Hast-Riding, for the first record that I 
am aware of, of the breeding of the Kestrel in confinement. 
The following is an extract from his letter dated November 
30th., 1849, relating the circumstance:—‘A pair of Kestrels 
bred this summer in my aviary. The female was reared 
from a nest about four years ago, and the year after scratched 
a hole in the ground, and laid six or seven eggs, but she 
VoL. I. H 
