384 Cameron, Swainson's Hawk in Montana. [july 



came her discretion. The consequence was that she just missed 

 the bird but collided with the fence, and, losing her balance, fell 

 over. The terrified bunting was the first to recover its wits, and 

 justified its name by soaring straight upwards like a true lark 

 before it flew swiftly away. To my great astonishment the 

 flustered hawk rose in the calm air and flapped after the now dis- 

 tant bunting. With steady beats of her long wings she appeared 

 to be making but slow progress, whereas, in reality, her speed was 

 more than double that of the fugitive, and she soon overtook it. 

 When, as it appeared to me, about a yard above her quarry, the 

 hawk made a sudden dash to seize the bunting in her claws, which 

 the latter cleverly evaded and then flew off in a different direction. 

 Being assailed only by a clumsy buzzard, which could not " throw 

 up" like a falcon, the little bird escaped rejoicing, although by a 

 narrow margin. The entire absence of wind greatly impeded the 

 hawk, and prevented her from sweeping up to her quarry in the 

 first instance, while causing her to flap heavily during all the time 

 of the pursuit, and when endeavoring to recover herself after the 

 attack. It was clear to me that, had there been a breeze, the 

 result would have been widely different, as Swainson's Hawk 

 is a bird of powerful flight — in some specimens the tips of the long 

 folded wings extending beyond the tail. Upon subsequent reflec- 

 tion I was not so much surprised by this valiant flight so contrary 

 to the usual accepted estimate of Buteo. Field naturalists often 

 generalize upon insufficient data, and the many misleading accounts 

 of the Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) which is only a large buz- 

 zard, at once come to mind. It has often been depicted as of a 

 cowardly nature, subsisting exclusively on carrion, or on small 

 mammals and birds which it always seizes on the ground. As 

 regards the charge of cowardice (if I may be pardoned a digression) 

 no one can read the accounts of this eagle in Turkestan and Russia 

 where it is flown at deer, antelope, wolves, and sometimes the 

 bustard, as given by Mr. J. E. Harting in his ' Hints on the Manage- 

 ment of Hawks' without being thrilled with admiration at the bird's 

 prowess. Mr. Harting gives the translation of a letter (op. cit. 

 p. 185) he received from the late Mr. Constantine Haller, President 

 of the Russian Falcony Club at St. Petersburg, who referring to the 

 flights of the eagle at wolves remarks : " It sometimes happens that, 



