FALCONRY 281 



College. Moreover, I had a dog also ! but the 

 Magdalene dons were kindly folk, and looked the 

 other way when my dog was in the court. As 

 to hawks, there was no law against them, and I 

 had a perch, with the necessary flooring, put 

 across the corner of my rooms, where my 

 hawk could sit very comfortably. But I always 

 blamed the loss of a beautiful little passage 

 tiercel, that Mr. Newcome gave me, to the old 

 cat of a bedmaker, who, no doubt, thought 

 hawks "nasty messy things," and I have good 

 reason to suspect that she untied the leash and 

 left the window open. Professor Alfred Newton, 

 whose rooms were in the same court as mine, 

 saw him in the distance as he took flight, but 

 I never heard of him again. In 1869 Mr. New- 

 come died, and the Hawking Club was broken 

 up, and the hawks divided amongst the members. 

 Cecil Duncombe gave me the falcon that fell to 

 his share, and Robert Barr took service with the 

 Marquis of Bute. 



In the following spring he went with what 

 hawks he had to enter and fly them at rooks 

 on the Wiltshire Downs. I took the falcon I 

 had had given to me, and another one of my 

 own, and went down to join him at Market 

 Lavington. On my way thither I stayed a day 

 in London, and at Tattersalls speculated in a 



