24 THE BIEDS OF OXFORDSHIKE. 



account of which is here reproduced. 'On Sunday, the loth 

 October, 1847, near Tetsworth, in this county, we observed a 

 larg-e bird sitting in a field adjoining the turnpike road : on 

 a nearer approach it proved to be a very fine Gyr-Falcon, in 

 the act of devouring a Woodpigeon. He was in no way dis- 

 concerted by our attention to liim, but finished his meal, and 

 then flew up into a small tree, where he cleansed his beak 

 and talons with the utmost composure. We had been watch- 

 ing him for several minutes at the trifling distance of sixty- 

 five paces, and had enjoyed every oi:)portunity of seeing him 

 to advantage : he was in very fine condition, apparently in 

 the plumage of the second or third year. Unless he was 

 much pressed by hunger, it would be difficult to account for 

 his tameness on this occasion; for within a few days we 

 again met with him near the same spot, but he took good 

 care to keep beyond the range of our guns,' The distinctions 

 between the forms of northern white Falcons were not at 

 that date fully recognized, and the specimen in question 

 was recorded under the name Gyr-Falcon, but the Rev. A. 

 Matthews has recently informed me that it was an Iceland 

 Falcon. Dr. Kirtland gave the same writers information of 

 a specimen, in immature plumage, which was shot a few years 

 previously near Henley-on-Thames. [Zoologist, pp. 3594-5.) 



THE PEREGRINE FALCON". ^ 



Falco peregrinus. 



The Peregrine Falcon, so much prized for the sport of 

 Falconry in former days, is an occasional visitor from autumn 

 to spring. The Hon. T. L. Powys (now Lord Lilford), in the 

 Zoologist for 1852, records a fine young bird shot in Blen- 

 heim Park in the previous November, and in a note, dated 

 February, 1853, in the same periodical, he mentions having 

 lately seen two or three in the neighbourhood of Oxford. An 

 immature example was shot at Waterperry about the month 



