216 BIRD-LAND ECHOES. 



to meet all your ideas as to nobility among birds. 

 Its loss of liberty arouses every dormant element 

 of its nature, and it will assert itself very forcibly 

 if opportunity offers. This bird resents any approach 

 to familiarity, and woe betide you if its sharp talons 

 are fixed in your hand. That it is courageous 

 has been often demonstrated. I speak from expe- 

 rience. Nuttall says that the young are readily 

 tamed. 



It would be of interest to know whether, in addi- 

 tion to the guttural kek-kek, like the chatter of a 

 king-rail, which all large hawks utter when surprised 

 or wounded, the harriers and other species of equal 

 size have a series of cries, alarm-notes, signals, and 

 low-toned coaxings, such as are characteristic of 

 other birds. We know that the crow has a con- 

 siderable vocabulary ; but in winter, with the excep- 

 tion of the red-tail, which is often very noisy, our 

 hawks do not seem to express their emotions by 

 voice as well as by action, though I suspect that at 

 times they mutter a good deal to themselves and to 

 one another. On several occasions I have heard, or 

 thought I did, sounds that I attributed to one of 

 these harriers, as if talking to itself; and, while 

 concealed, have heard no end of strange mutterings 

 from captive goshawks, winter falcons, and black 

 hawks, a low clicking sound, rapidly uttered and 

 with extensive variations, somewhat like the chatter 

 of a hen when she is said to "want to lay." Con- 

 siderable difficulty is experienced in determining 

 points like these because of the untamability of 



