78 THE BIRDS OF CUMBERLAND. 



Genus FALCO. 



F. Peregrinus. Peregrine Falcon. 



The Peregrine is a resident species, about six 

 pairs nesting in the wildest districts of Cumberland, 

 despite the efforts of game preservers ; for though 

 the breeding birds are frequently destroyed, yet 

 the traditional breeding places, which for obvious 

 reasons we abstain from enumerating, are re-occupied 

 from time to time by successive pairs. Some females 

 are undemonstrative in the breeding season, but 

 others exhibit the greatest distress. When visiting 

 a Falcon's nest during the spring of 1885, we en- 

 joyed, on two successive days, a close study of the 

 birds, which happened to be a noisy pair. Long 

 before we had reached the nest, the cry of the male, 

 poised aloft, rang along the precipices, and the fe- 

 male, slipping off her nest in an overhanging cliff, 

 hastened to join her mate, and to unite her cries 

 with his. " Now she flies in magnificent circles over- 

 head, passing to and fro within gunshot, or stooping, 

 with a piercing wail, to caress the sea beneath ; 

 while he — the little partner of her choice — elects 

 to remain aloft, exhibiting beautiful evolutions. At 

 one moment he appears to hang in mid-air with 

 scarcely an effort, at the next he cleaves his way 

 for two hundred yards with a swift rush, and nearly 

 closed pinions." [Macpherson s Note-book, May 30, 

 1885.) 



The Peregrine Falcon is more widely distributed 

 during the winter months than at other times. In 



