46 EGGS STOLEN BY RAVENS. 



often be found upon the downs above, and naturalists pro- 

 foundly assert that stoats and weasels are the aggressors : 

 thus assigning to those lithesome quadrupeds a marvellous 

 extent of cliff-scaling capability. 



The RAVEN has no less taste for willock's eggs than the 

 gull, but his manoeuvres are somewhat different : he never 

 pierces the egg, but seizes it suddenly and darts off to the 

 top of the cliff, amid the uproar of the colony. While on 

 the look-out, he traverses silently and slowly the face of 

 the cliff, making little circles, and returning again and 

 again to the same hunting-ground, but the moment he 

 spies an unprotected egg, he darts in, seizes it I suppose 

 with his feet, and makes off like an arrow to the summit, 

 there to enjoy his meal at leisure. You may mark him 

 down, and then by vociferous shouting and running to the 

 place, make him leave his booty, which is always sound 

 and whole. 



The PEREGRINE FALCON has had her eyrie here from 

 time immemorial : and these noble birds are often to be 

 seen soaring about the cliff, the terror of jackdaws, whose 

 young at this season constitute their favourite prey, or per- 

 haps the favourite food of their own young. The fisher- 

 men told me that this falcon always breeds here, and that 

 it is constantly following the kestrels,* which abound all 

 along the cliff, as if to drive them away from his tenitory. 



* " The parent birds are now well nigh considered sacred; or rather, if the 

 truth must he told, it has been found more gainful to preserve than to destroy 

 them ; seeing that the young birds bring in half-a-guinea each to the fortunate 

 possessor of the nest. It is unquestionably true, that if one of the old birds be 

 destroyed, the survivor will find another mate, and return at the period of incu- 

 bation to the wonted locality. Of the pair frequenting the Freshwater cliffs, what 

 particulars I am enabled to give, were learned from one of the cliffmen, named 

 Jackman. When I made his acquaintance, in the autumn of 1839, he told 



