SPRfNG AT THE CAPITAL. 175 



hawk ; never poise themselves on the wing, 

 never dive and gambol in the air, and never 

 swoop down upon their prey ; unlike the 

 hawks also, they appear to have no enemies. 

 The crow fights the hawk, and the king- 

 bird and crow-blackbird fight the crow ; but 

 neither takes any notice of the buzzard. He 

 excites the enmity of none, for the reason 

 that he molests none. The crow has an old 

 grudge against the hawk, because the hawk 

 robs the crow's nest and carries oft his young ; 

 the kingbird's quarrel with the crow is upon 

 the same grounds. But the buzzard never 

 attacks live game, or feeds upon new flesh 

 when old can be had. 



In May, like the crows, they nearly all 

 disappear very suddenly, probably to their 

 breeding-haunts near the sea-shore. Do the 

 males separate from the females at this time, 

 and go by themselves ? At any rate, in July 

 I discovered that a large number of buzzards 

 roosted in some woods near Rock Creek, 

 about a mile from the city limits ; and, as 

 they do not nest anywhere in this vicinity, I 

 thought they might be males. I happened 

 to be detained late in the woods, watching 

 the nest of a flying squirrel, when the buz- 

 zards, just after sundown, began to come by 



