162 ART AND PRACTICE OF HAWKING 



should be kept, as Turbervile recommends, as much as possible 

 to " big fowls." And there would always be more or less a risk, 

 unless the hawk was in first-rate condition, — in what is called 

 " screaming yarak," — that she would refuse at the critical 

 moment the carefully marked bird, and put her owner to an 

 everlasting shame. A falconer who is afraid of this, however, is 

 not the sort of man who will ever do much good with any kind 

 of hawk nowadays. 



The quarry par excelkfice of the sparrow-hawk is a black- 

 bird. Every female which is sound in wind and limb, and also 

 most males, ought to be able to take blackbirds, whereas it 

 must be an exceptionally strong and bold female which will be 

 good enough for the much more difficult flight at partridges. 

 The hawk referred to in the Merry Wives of Windsor seems to 

 have been an eyess musket. Unless, therefore, the falconer is 

 particularly ambitious and confident in himself and his hawks, 

 he had better lay himself out for blackbirds as the piece de 

 rhista7ice, with the chance of a few thrushes, starlings, water- 

 hens, and small birds to make up the bag. Peter Gibbs the 

 falconer told me that he had taken thirteen head of quarry, 

 varying in size from a partridge to a wren, in one day with a 

 female sparrow-hawk. 



One advantage of the flight at blackbirds is that the quarry 

 is easy to find. Few enclosed countries in England are without 

 a good supply of them ; and it is seldom that their haunts are 

 so secure that they cannot be dislodged so as to afford a flight. 

 Only a man must not go out blackbird-hawking all alone. He 

 should rather get as many people to join in the business as he 

 can. There is nothing unsociable or exclusive about a blackbird- 

 hawking expedition. The gardener, and the gardener's men, as 

 well as the keepers, the boys home for the holidays, and in short 

 everyone who is available, should all be encouraged to volunteer 

 as beaters, and help in the campaign against the plunderers of 

 the raspberry bushes. Formerly this sort of hedge-hunting was a 

 very popular amusement. Although in the fantastic apportion- 

 ment of hawks to different ranks and degrees, the sparrow-hawk 

 and musket were appropriated to ecclesiastics, it was a common 

 thing for yeomen and small landowners to keep and fly this 

 familiar and serviceable little creature. When Mr. Page says 

 that he has a "fine hawk for the bush" {Merry Wives of Windsor, 

 Act iii. scene 3), he means that he has a sparrow-hawk which 

 will afford sport for a whole company of country-folk ; and 

 when he and his friends go out the next morning after breakfast 



