JUNE JOYS 151 



mission. The mouse still stirs and' nibbles, 

 unconscious of danger ; but suddenly a swift foot 

 armed with sharp claws snatches him to instant 

 death. Up swings the bird, with the little 

 burden half-hidden in her under-plumage up to 

 the gaunt arm of a perishing tree ; and there she 

 has her meal. Let us not presume to condemn 

 that feast, which the universal mother has given to 

 one of her children, strengthening those marvellous 

 engines of speed, and energising those highly 

 specialised powers of sight and skill which enable 

 the kestrel to survive. 



My lost friend lived for a while in a little valley 

 called " Horns " not far from the town, afterwards 

 in a wilder spot, and later on a great arm of the 

 Cotteswolds, commanding glorious views of the 

 Severn valley. 1 I often looked for her at Horns, 

 and then sometimes saw a male kestrel which had 

 lived there for some time. In the early mornings 

 in November he could be seen darting forth for 



1 During six years this hawk came occasionally to the 

 garden where she was trained the only kestrel that ever 

 did so. Her portrait (from life) appears in the frontispiece, 

 sketched by my sister, Miss Lucy C. Witchell. 



