210 EEMIXISCENCES OF A SPORTSMAX. 



warmth which her resentment has kindled in her breast. 

 Now, now, they are no higger than wrens ! now they 

 vanish, now the falconer and his company, prostrated on 

 the ground, with reverted looks, in vain search for them 

 in the expanse of air. The cock, no longer able to urge 

 his upward flight, stretches away in a gentle declining 

 direction, while the hawk takes the opportunity which 

 fatigue compels him to give her of mounting above him, 

 and then they again appear to the longing sight of gaz- 

 ing spectators. How rapidly the hawk stoops — how 

 nimbly the cock buckles ! See the hawk, hoAv quickly 

 she regains the sky ! there she stoops like a thunderbolt : 

 but the cock has once more eluded the blow of death. 

 He makes for the cover, and, ah ! will certainly escape 

 her. No I no ! do\^^^ she comes, souse, on him again. 

 His good fortune has deserted him, he drops dead near 

 the thicket, which the instant before he viewed as his 

 refuge from his foe. The falconer and his company, 

 pleased with their diversion, take their way home, agi- 

 tated by the lively pleasure of such a noble and glorious 

 flight." 



The anxious desire of noblemen and gentlemen in 

 general to have their estates abounding with game, has 

 induced their gamekeepers to destroy the feathered and 

 fourfooted race with unceasing zeal and activity. Any 

 bird or beast who may be regarded in any way as an 

 enemy to game, from the eagle to the hedgehog, 

 cannot escape from the gun or trap of a gamekeeper. 

 In the hope of increasing the zeal in their game 

 preservers *, many gentlemen have regular books in 



* A gentleman sportsman, in the neighbourhood of Clonmel, in the 

 course of a fe^y weeks, in the winter of 1856, with a peregrine hawk, 

 destroyed 160 magpies and carrion crows, affording him excellent sport. 



