252 ART AND PRACTICE OF HAWKING 



unwilling patient in the rather sanguine expectation that it will 

 cure and not kill. A simpler treatment is preferred for producing 

 a result which is, after all, simple enough. The problem is to get 

 rid of that accumulation of fat which, in a time of almost com- 

 plete inactivity and overfeeding, has encumbered the heart and 

 liver and other internal organs of the hawk, and until it is 

 removed will make her dull, sluggish, and unmanageable. This 

 should certainly be done by medicine of some kind ; and the 

 sooner it is done, after the flight feathers are fully down, the 

 better. Any attempt to reduce the superfluous fat, or to pro- 

 duce an appetite by means of mere hunger, would be a great 

 mistake. The hawk would lose in strength and weight much 

 more than she gained in condition ; and it would be a long 

 time before, by dieting alone, you could get rid of the mischief 

 which a couple of doses would almost put an end to immediately. 

 A simple purge and a simple emetic should be administered in 

 any case ; and if the hawk is of a vivacious disposition, and has 

 not grown dull in the mews, this may be found a sufficient 

 physicking. For the former nothing seems to be better than 

 rhubarb. A convenient mode of dosing a peregrine is in the form 

 of a Cockle's pill, which may either be wrapped up in tissue paper 

 and pushed down the throat with a small stick, or concealed in 

 a tough morsel of meat which the hawk swallows bodily. A 

 merlin or female sparrow-hawk should not have more than half 

 one of these pills for a dose; and a jack or musket even less 

 than this. Goshawks may have more than the small hawks, 

 but not so much as a peregrine. For those who want a more 

 orthodox and time-honoured prescription, the following may 

 serve : — " Take Aloes Cicotrine and graines of Filander, otherwise 

 called Stavesaker, and Cassia Fistula, as much of the one as of 

 the other, to the mountenance of a beane, togither, and when 

 ye have beaten it into powder put it into a henne's gut of an 

 inch long, tied fast at both ends : then convey it into hir in the 

 morning, so as she may put it over, and that must be after shee 

 hath cast, if she had any casting at al. Then set your hawke 

 by the fire or in the sunne, and feede hir with a quicke chicken, 

 or some other live warme meate two houres after." Even in 

 those days, however, it is plain that there were some misguided 

 heretics who rebelled against the long-winded precepts of the 

 esoteric school of hawk-doctors. " Neverthelesse, in stead of 

 the sayd aloes, ye may at youre discretion use common pilles, 

 such as Potecaries give men to make them loose-bodyed. And 

 many are of opinion that they be much better than that other 



