GLIMPSES OF WILD LIFE 



Any glimpse of the wild and savage in na- 

 ture, especially after long confinement indoors 

 or in town, always gives a little fillip to my 

 mind. Thus, when in my walk from the city 

 the other day I paused, after a half hour, in a 

 thick clump of red cedars crowning a little hill 

 that arose amid a marshy and bushy bit of land- 

 scape, and found myself in the banqueting-hall 

 of a hawk, something more than my natural 

 history tastes stirred within me. 



No hawk was there then, but the marks of 

 his nightly presence were very obvious. The 

 branch of a cedar about fifteen feet from the 

 ground was his perch. It was worn smooth, 

 with a feather or two adhering to it. The 

 ground beneath was covered with large pellets 

 and wads of mouse-hair; the leaves were white 

 with his droppings, while the dried entrails of 

 his victims clung here and there to the bushes. 

 The bird evidently came here nightly to devour 

 and digest its prey. This was its den, its re- 

 treat; all about lay its feeding-grounds. It 

 revealed to me a new trait in the hawk, — its 

 local attachments and habits; that it, too, had 



