102 THE BOOK OF THE OPEN AIR 



headlands which lend so much addi- or plant grown), (2) a big hole or 

 tional charm to many of our sea boards, wide slit, and (3) a basin formed by 

 The peregrine, except in winter when the main cliff and a sheltering pinnacle, 

 many migrate briefly to wooded realms, Nest there is none. A shallow 

 loves bare, treeless country the misty, scratching from 9-12 inches across 

 heathery moorland and barren, undu- scraped out in the soil and (if the soil 

 lating downs, where Nature's workings is not too dusty) plainly showing the 

 and occasional voices have matters imprint of the bird's talons, is the sole 

 all their own way, and where, save for receptacle for the thick-shelled eggs, 

 vagrant shepherd, gillie or ornitho- Some of the victims' bones and feathers 

 logist, the soil is well-nigh unsullied, and a few of the falcon's own feathers 

 But on the south coast the hunt- are often found in the eyrie, which 

 ing hawk often chooses its eyrie on sometimes smells atrociously, but little 

 a headland close to a coastguard or no down (rubbed off the falcons 

 station, a peculiarity which I ascribe accidentally) is present, which is with 

 to the fact that these stations are most of the raptors of usual occurrence, 

 situate in " gaps " which attract the Occasionally, a disused raven's or buz- 

 hordes of arriving and departing mi- zard's nest is requisitioned ; I have 

 grants, loving, as they do, to follow the seen one eyrie on the nearly level sum- 

 course of a valley. From these mi- mit of an ocean rock, and several only 

 grants, the murderous peregrines, hav- a few feet down a cliff, one, of special 

 ing chosen their look-out with no little curiosity, within a yard or two of the 

 cunning, reap many an ill-gotten meal, gap down which the village refuse is shot . 

 With one or two solitary exceptions When on a ledge, the eggs are laid 

 as for instance, the eyrie on Salis- in the middle of its broadest part ; 

 bury Cathedral the home of the pere- when in a hole, generally rather less 

 grine, in our islands at all events, than half-way in. And as most of 

 must be sought on a cliff, and gener- the holes in use seldom penetrate the 

 ally in the least accessible part of it, cliff more than four or five feet, they 

 frequently where it overhangs con- can be examined with facility, 

 siderably. One of three positions The eggs vary from one to four in 

 usually in the upper half, because of number. Three is perhaps most fre- 

 the commanding position is chosen : quent, but on the southern cliffs four 

 (i) a broad ledge or buttress (bare soil constitutes the usual clutch. Save 



