140 Sport and Life in the Further Himalaya 



latter refuse to leave the water, and the hawks 

 will not attack them there. If, on the other hand, 

 the duck get well into their flight, they will 

 generally outfly the hawks unless a start is 

 obtained from well above them ; so to avoid 

 the double difficulty this ingenious method has 

 been evolved. The Mehtar has built a small 

 house on the river a mile or so above Chitral, 

 and during the duck-hawking season his falconers 

 remain there most of the forenoon, awaiting the 

 arrival of a flight of duck. About this spot there 

 are a number of bays and back-waters in the river, 

 all of which are flanked by walls built up of 

 round boulders, to afford the falconers cover in 

 approaching. 



The drive over, we descended and crossed the 

 river. Preparations had been made for a drive 

 on the other bank ; but owing to a report arriving 

 of a large spotted eagle that had been seen to 

 haunt the cliffs lower down in the direction the 

 driven birds would take, and which would have 

 made short work of any falcon coming his way, 

 the idea of a drive there was abandoned. These 

 spotted eagles (Spizoetus nipalensis) are very 

 common in Gilgit and Chitral, where they do an 

 immense amount of damage amongst not only 

 game birds, but the young of ibex, markhor, 

 and urial too. The late Mehtar, Nizam-ul-Mulk, 



