WOOD AND WASTE 117 



proportionately good supply. As the nest- 

 lings develop they begin to wander, and 

 long before fit for flight have ventured yards 

 away from the original site, hopping and 

 scrambling with great agility. For several 

 weeks, and long after becoming fully 

 fledged they are still tended, and probably 

 partly fed by the old birds. 



The young, when molested, throw them- 

 selves upon their backs and strike fiercely 

 with their talons, uttering the while a 

 yelling Mephistophelian laughter. The beak 

 is not at first used in defence; it is still 

 too soft, but the claws of a half-grown 

 Falcon will start blood. 



Probably not many Falcon's nests are 

 taken, and probably, too, not many broods 

 destroyed. The eyries are often inaccessible, 

 and the parent birds too fierce and devoted 

 to allow the approach of vermin. 



Even to them, however accidents do 

 occur, and this season a brood under 

 observation, when about half-grown, were 

 destroyed. At first I believed it to have 

 been the work of a neighbour's rabbiter, 

 for in my diary I find the brief, vindictive 



