352 Wild Life in Wales 



its place. The injured feather "withers" and falls, being, 

 perhaps, pushed from its socket by the new one rising to 

 replace it ; but the energy of renewal, thus roused, goes no 

 further than to make good the loss, and, that accomplished, 

 becomes dormant again until the proper season of moult 

 comes round. 1 The fact is beyond dispute, but I am not 

 aware of any probable explanation having been suggested 

 to account for it ; though it may be that the bird hastens 

 the fall of the feather by continually tugging at it (she could 

 hardly, if she would, pull out a healthy quill) and that 

 Nature steps in to fill up the vacuum. When a tame 

 hawk's feathers, having been damaged, are artificially 

 repaired, the same course would not seem to be followed. 

 The falconer makes good the loss of flying power by 

 imping them, and it is said that they are not then cast 

 before their ordinary time ; yet it can scarcely be seriously 

 supposed that the bird is deceived by the splicing, or that 

 Nature should take cognisance of any such artificial means 

 of supplanting her aid. It were easy enough to put the 

 matter into syllogistic form ; but though the conclusion 

 arrived at might be the same, the premises stated by any 

 two persons would almost assuredly be widely different, and 

 readers must, therefore, be left to formulate their own argu- 

 ment, and supply the best solution to it that they can. 



There is another mystery which the actions of a Sparrow- 

 Hawk often bring prominently to our notice, and that is the 

 mesmeric power which the would-be captor seems sometimes 

 to be capable of exercising over its intended victim. Time 

 and again I have seen a party of Sparrows, or other small 

 birds, flee to the nearest shelter, with the cries that signify 

 "'ware hawk," and are so well understood by all birds, 

 irrespective of the species that gives them utterance. More 



1 In connection with this occasional renewal of feathers, it may be useful 

 to recall the fact that the Japanese more subtle than Europeans in their 

 attention to minutiae in regard to both plants and animals by some method 

 at present unknown to us, are able, by checking the moult in their domestic 

 poultry, to induce a sort of continuous growth in the feathers of the tail, and 

 adjacent parts of the body, resulting in the abnormally long-tailed cocks 

 sometimes seen at exhibitions in this country, or in museums, the tail 

 feathers in which may be eight or ten feet in length, and the "hackles" 

 on the rump proportionately elongated. 



