262 
WILD WINGS 
Now let us go “ hawking.” Middle April opens the season, 
when the Red-tailed and Red-shouldered Hawks have just 
laid their eggs. It is the twelfth this time, and we start out 
early from North Middleboro, Massachusetts, in the buggy, 
behind my s]Deedy little mare. Never was there a more beau¬ 
tiful early spring day. The songs of Robins, Bluebirds, Song 
Sparrows, Pine Warblers, the newly arrived Chipping Spar¬ 
rows, and others hll the air. Barn and Tree Swallows add 
grace to the quiet scenery of the gently rolling landscape of 
the Pilgrim county. The loud honking of a passing wedge 
of Canada Geese on their way north rings out now above the 
other sounds. 
Our hrst quest shall be the huge nest of a Red-tail on an 
enormous white pine on the edge of a swamp, to which on 
the twenty-second of March I happened to see the hawk Hy 
with a stick. We drive up the sandy old New Bedford turn¬ 
pike, three miles or more, to North Lakeville, near the tack 
factory, and turn down the lane to the old abandoned ” her¬ 
mitage,” where we hitch the horse and follow a path. It leads 
almost to the tree, and there is the nest. Now watch while 
I pound, and start the hawk. Nothing stirs. Is it possible 
that I was mistaken in my former observation? No, there 
she spreads her wings, and away she goes over the tree-tops! 
A good sixty feet it is, and no branches near the base, so 
the climbing-irons must be buckled on. Shall I guess at the 
contents of the nest? Three eggs. For a wonder I am right, 
for the Red-tail in New England seldom lays more than two. 
Meanwhile the female has returned and is protesting. Her 
harsh screams have been compared, not inaptly, to the squeal¬ 
ing of a ]3ig,— ” pee-eh-h, pee-eh-h-h,” they sound like, to 
me. The male has heard, and he follows, though rather far 
off. It is fascinating to sit here in the sun and see them soar, 
but we must be off to other adventures. 
