THE MULLET HAWK. 47 



of level meadow-land reclaimed from the original 

 swamp, just before it passes through a wide gap 

 in the Downs, Bury Hill being on the right and 

 the ruins of Amberley Castle on the left. A little 

 farther to the south it waters the ancient and pic- 

 turesque town of Arundel, celebrated even in old 

 Isaac Walton's time for its grey mullets.* This 

 fish would appear to have peculiar attractions for 

 the osprey, which, indeed, in the adjoining county 

 of Hampshire is called the mullet hawk,f a par- 

 tiality which will account for the more frequent oc- 

 currence of the bird during the mullet season than 

 at other times of the year, and in localities where 

 that species of fish more particularly abounds. I 

 have an immature specimen which was shot dur- 

 ing the summer of 1836, near Amberley Castle, 

 by a man who rented the fishing on that part of 

 the river ; he had noticed it for several days, and 

 from an observation of its habits had come to the 

 conclusion that it was a very formidable rival in 

 his own trade ; he said that it had destroyed 

 a great quantity of mullets. 



About the same time another was killed at 



*" And just so does Sussex boast of several fish ; as 

 namely, a Selsey cockle, a Chichester lobster, an Arundel 

 mullet, and an Amberley trout." 



THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 

 f Yarrell's ' British Birds,' vol. i. p. 23. 



