Field and Covert Poachers. 225 



Let us follow these poachers of the field and 

 covert to their haunts, and there observe them 

 in their wild home. The sparrow-hawk is 

 a roving arab of the air and the most arrant 

 of poachers. Ask the keeper to detail to you 

 the character of this daring marauder, and he 

 will record a black and bloody list of depre- 

 dations against the bird. He knows nothing, 

 however, of the laws which govern the economy 

 of nature, and if he did, or would, what are they 

 compared to the shilling per head for those he 

 can display on the vermin-rails. 



The kestrel or windhover acts in quite a 

 different fashion to the sparrow-hawk. It is 

 persecuted less, and confidently approaches human 

 habitations. And yet at certain seasons the kes- 

 trel is as destructive in the covert as its congeners. 

 When the pheasants represent little more than 

 balls of down he clutches them from out the 

 grass as he clutches a mouse or cockchafer. 

 Coming from out the blue, one hears the pleas- 

 ant cry of kee, kee, keelie, and there he hangs 

 rapidly vibrating his wings, yet as stationary as 

 though suspended by a silken thread. Presently 

 down he comes, plump as. a stone, and without 

 touching the ground sweeps a "cheeper" from 

 off it, and soars high above the covert. The 

 depredations are only committed, however, when 

 the game is exceedingly small, and the benefit 

 which the kestrel confers on the woods by its 



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