THE PEREGRINE FALCOX. 149 



on the best authority, however, that it sometimes constructs 

 a bulky nest of sticks and other coarse materials. 



In the timber lands along the Neosho River, Kansas, Mr. 

 N. S. Goss found these birds breeding in trees. In the first 

 instance, February, 1875, "the nest," he says, "was in a 

 large sycamore, about fifty feet from the ground, in a 

 trough-like cavity formed by the breaking off of a hollow 

 limb near the body of the tree." He continues: " I watched 

 the pair closely, with the view of securing both the birds 

 and their eggs. March 27th I became satisfied that the birds 

 were sitting, and I shot the female, but was unable to get 

 near enough to shoot the male. The next morning I hired a 

 young man to climb the tree, who found three fresh eggs, 

 laid on the fine, soft, rotten wood in a hollow worked out of 

 the same to fit the body. There was no other material or 

 lining, except a few feathers and down mixed with the 

 decayed wood, 



" March 17, 1876," he adds, " I found a pair nesting on the 

 opposite side of the river from the above-described nest, in 

 a cotton-wood, at least sixty feet from the ground, the birds 

 entering a knot-hole in the tree, apparently not over five 

 or six inches in diameter." 



Thus we see that along the rivers in prairie lands, where 

 mountains are wanting, the Duck Hawk, wholly apart from 

 its usual habit, nests in tall trees, appropriating something 

 like a cavity The eggs three or four, 2.20-2.32 x 1.65- 

 1.71, are grayish ocher or chocolate-brown, dotted, spotted, 

 and blotched with reddish-brown, sometimes continuously 

 colored with the same either about the large or small end. 



"The flight of this bird," says Audubon, " is astonishingly 

 rapid. It is scarcely ever seen sailing, unless after being 

 disappointed in its attempts to secure the prey which it has 

 been pursuing, and even at such times it merely rises with 



