A Few Feathered Fiends. 227 



show winged activity that is as creditable as it is 

 necessary, for a frightened mouse is never a laggard, 

 and can tax a hawk's ingenuity and skill by dodging, 

 if not by a straight-away course. 



The black hawk, or rough-legged falcon as it is 

 called in the books, is strictly a "local" bird. I 

 have known one to take position on a particular tree 

 and apparently never wander any great distance 

 from it, content, so to speak, with the mice that 

 came its way (for these birds seem to feed upon noth- 

 ing else) and letting all others go. As features of the 

 winter landscape they are as valuable, if we want 

 wild life represented, as the sportive snow-birds just 

 outside our window, and are equally harmless. I 

 well remember one of these hawks, of fullest black 

 plumage, — it might have sat as the original of Wil- 

 son's illustration, — that I saw daily from my west 

 windows for two whole months, and when the sun 

 was setting, ''feather-boots's" thoughtful pose, sil- 

 houetted against a crimson background, was a charm- 

 ing sight. At dusk it went the rounds of the 

 meadow ditches a-mousing, I suppose, but was 

 always back at its post in the early morning. More 

 than many others I have seen, it was an owlish bird, 

 but none the less, when it left us — shot by some 

 ''collector," perhaps — we all greatly missed it 



Though the black hawk may be slow, even when 

 dinner is at stake, this trait cannot be imputed to 

 our common, all-the-year-round, half tame and often 

 playful sparrow-hawk. It is a wicked rascal, to be 

 sure, when employed in killing birds, but it can turn 



