200 BEITISH BIRDS 



yellow, with deep orange -brown, longitudinal streaks and spots. 

 Length : male, eighteen inches ; female, twenty inches. 



This very handsome and graceful hawk was fairly common 

 within recent times in the British Islands. But the incessant 

 persecution of all birds of prey by game -preservers is having its 

 effect. It is plain to see that as British species they are being ex- 

 tirpated ; and the first to vanish are the harriers, owing to their 

 fatal habit of breeding in the open country on the ground. For while 

 most birds have a close time allowed them, the hawks are sought 

 out and destroyed, old and young, during the breeding season. 

 Thus the marsh-harrier, which should have come first in this place, 

 is now extinct in this country, and cannot be introduced into a work 

 on British birds which does not include the great auk, the bustard, 

 the spoonbill, and many other species which have been exterminated 

 in England. The hen harrier is at the present time very nearly in 

 the same case ; it is only included here because a few pairs probably 

 still breed on the wildest and most extensive moors in Wales, the 

 north of England, and the Highlands of Scotland. 



The nest is a slight hollow in the ground, scantily lined with a 

 little dry grass ; and the eggs are four or five, and rarely six, in 

 number. These are pale bluish white in colour, and in some cases 

 have pale brown markings. 



The male hen harrier, seen on the whig when quartering the ground 

 in quest of prey, keeping but a few feet above the surface, is certainly 

 one of our handsomest hawks. Its flight, although not wavering, is 

 as buoyant as that of the common tern, and the pale colouring soft 

 blue-grey above and white beneath seems in harmony with its 

 slender figure and airy, graceful motions. On account of its blue 

 colour it has been called the dove-hawk. It preys on small birds, 

 mammals, and reptiles, dropping suddenly upon them in the manner 

 of the kestrel, but from a less height. The origin of its name of hen 

 harrier is not known. Yarrell conjectured that it was on account 

 of its predilection for the produce of the farmyard ; which seems 

 unlikely, as the harriers are usually hunters of very small deer. 

 A more probable explanation is that the male bird was formerly 

 supposed to be the female of the ringtail-harrier ; but we know now 

 that the hen harrier is the cock bird, and the ringtail the hen. 



