IN THE NEST HAUNT OF THE KITE 275 



in number, more pointed and altogether larger and 

 bulkier than those of the Buzzard, and were of a 

 dirty white ground colour, the one scratched and 

 speckled very sparingly with rust colour, the other 

 splashed and flecked with light yellowish red, with a 

 good many very small dots of a darker shade and a 

 line or two of lilac-red. This latter was the larger 

 e gg of the two. Both were much dirtied by the 

 parent bird, and the first described had a crack in it, 

 which I then thought was a " chip, " but I did not 

 examine them too closely, as we wished to get away 

 from the spot quickly, so as to allow the parent bird 

 to return to her treasures. 



The next time I visited this locality was on May 

 2Qth, Messrs. Owen and Pike accompanying me. 

 The keeper met us at the usual rendezvous, the 

 village inn, and he told us that he was nearly sure 

 there were young in the nest, for a few days back the 

 old Kite had attacked his retriever savagely, making 

 it howl again, as he was going close past the nest. 

 We got into the wood from above, and when about 

 forty yards distant the Fork-tail left her charge. 

 From higher up in the wood we thought we could 

 make out one young one moving ; but on climbing 

 to the nest this proved to be but a mat of wool 

 waving in the breeze, and there were still eggs. The 

 nest had been added to in many ways. Firstly, more 

 sticks had been added, whilst round the rim especially 

 more wool had been put, making the eggs appear to 

 be lying in a deeper cavity ; and sure proof of this 

 was that the eggs could not be seen from higher up 

 in the wood (for it was a " hanging " wood), whereas 



