106 HISTORY OF 



and celerity. Being less courageous, they are 

 more patient ; and having less swiftness^ they are 

 better skilled at taking their prey by surprise. 

 The kite, that may be distinguished from all the 

 rest of this tribe by his forky tail and his slow 

 floating motion, seems almost for ever upon the 

 wing. He appears to rest himself upon the bosom 

 of the air, and not to make the smallest effort in 

 flying. He lives only upon accidental carnage, 

 as almost every bird in the air is able to make 

 good its retreat against him. He may be there- 

 fore considered as an insidious thief, who only 

 prowls about, and when he finds a small bird 

 wounded, or a young chicken strayed too far 

 from the mother, instantly seizes the hour of ca- 

 lamity, and, like a famished glutton, is sure to 

 show no mercy. His hunger, indeed, often urges 

 him to acts of seeming desperation. I have seeri 

 one of them fly round and round for a while to 

 mark a clutch of chickens, and then on a sudden 

 dart like lightning upon the unresisting little ani- 

 mal, and carry it off, the hen in vain crying out, 

 and the boys hooting and casting stones to scare 

 him from his plunder. For this reason, of all 

 birds the kite is the good housewife's greatest 

 tormentor and aversion. 



Of all obscene birds, the kite is the best known ; 

 but the buzzard among us is the most plenty. He 

 is a sluggish inactive bird, and often remains 

 perched whole days together upon the same 

 bough. He is rather an assassin than a pursuer ; 

 and lives more upon frogs, mice, and insects, 

 which he can easily seize, than upon birds which 



