THE BIRDS USED IN HAWKING 27 



liable to fall a victim to persecution by gamekeepers and natural- 

 ists, and has as a result been nearly exterminated in England. 



A wild hobby has been seen by credible witnesses to take a 

 swift on the wing in Bulgaria. A trained female has been 

 known in England to take house-pigeons. 



Merlin {Falco ccsalon) 



Female — Length, ii^ to 12 inches; wing, 8| to 9; tail, 5} 

 to 5f ; weight, about 8 oz. Male — Length, io| to 1 1 inches ; 

 wing, 8 to 8^ ; tail, 4f to 5 ; weight, 6\ to 6f oz. 



Females and young males have the whole upper plumage a 

 rich chocolate brown, with reflections of purplish grey, each 

 feather on the back and upper wing coverts tipped with a some- 

 what lighter brown, and crossed by a buff bar, which is usually 

 not to be seen except when the plumage is disarranged or ruffled. 

 Each feather also has a black shaft, which is conspicuous in 

 strong lights on a close view. The primaries and all the prin- 

 cipal feathers of the wing are very dark brown on the upper 

 surface, barred with several patches of light brown or buff. The 

 under surface of the wing is very light silvery grey, with numer- 

 ous bars and spots of brownish grey, each feather having a dark 

 grey shaft, which is white underneath. The tail feathers on the 

 upper surface are of a slightly lighter brown than the back, and 

 light grey underneath, barred with more or less oblique bands, 

 which are buff-coloured above, and light grey-brown underneath, 

 and are all tipped with white. The under plumage of the body 

 is creamy white, more or less tinged with light buff, especially 

 on the sides of the head and throat. It is liberally streaked with 

 longitudinal splashes of dark brown, which on the upper throat 

 are very small, but on the lower flanks are broad and large. 

 There is a facial patch and a moustache of dark brown, but 

 these are not so strongly marked as in the peregrine and 

 hobby. The beak is light blue, darkening to indigo, and at 

 the tip to black. The cere and eyelids, light bluish grey. The 

 legs and feet vary from light greenish or blueish grey to light 

 yellow. The toes are long, thin, and flexible. 



Adult females do not change, except that they lose much or 

 all of the purplish sheen of nestlings, and that the edging of the 

 feathers is less marked. Adult males undergo a very striking 

 transformation. The whole upper plumage changes from brown 

 to a rich bluish slate colour, deepening in the long wing feathers 

 to greyish black. Instead of the light bars on the tail, there 

 is a single broad grey-black band nearly at the extreme end. 



