IN THE NEST HAUNT OF THE KITE 267 



great size. This wood boasts a Heronry (between 

 twenty and thirty pairs), and by this most had young. 

 The nests were built on the tops of the Scotch firs. 

 In this very wood last spring a pair of Kites made a 

 nest in the fork of a giant oak, but blasting operations 

 drove them away, and they had not returned this 

 year. The keeper told me that at the end of 

 January he saw six Kites in the air together and a 

 pair repeatedly since. Accordingly, he piloted me to 

 a wood (the very one that Dr. Salter and myself had 

 looked upon as a likely place for a Kite's nest on 

 April 8th), where he said that a pair of these splendid 

 Hawks had nested regularly for the last thirty 

 years. 



When still a great way from our point we both 

 saw two enormous birds over the wood which looked 

 for all the world like Kites, and in this we were 

 justified, for getting down to the valley, in addition to 

 three Buzzards, a beautiful Kite came sailing over- 

 head. His mate did not put in an appearance. We 

 now hunted the wood, which was chiefly composed of 

 oaks, many of which were overgrown with ivy. The 

 keeper showed me a two-year-old Kite's nest from 

 which some brute shot the hen, for she was found in 

 a decomposed state at the top of the wood. 



No fresh Kite's nest was forthcoming, but I in- 

 spected a Buzzard's, built in the fork of an ivied oak. 

 There were no eggs in it ; but quantities of fresh ivy 

 leaves had been brought as a lining. As we left the 

 wood the same or another Kite was on view, soaring 

 over the valley. It soon vanished over the opposite 

 hill, but I went away feeling sure that a pair of Kites 



