HACKING 259 



one by one to the ground, and soberly settle down to the serious 

 business of the evening meal. 



Strict punctuality must be observed in feeding young 

 hawks : six o'clock morning and evening are good hours to 

 appoint. 1 They will not go far away at so late an hour, and 

 will drop down from their roosting- places for their morning 

 feed before they attempt to leave the place for the day ; conse- 

 quently every hawk goes away with its crop full, safe from getting 

 into mischief for the present. Care must be taken to fasten the 

 meat securely to the hack-board, so that it cannot be carried 

 off by any hawk, and for feeding at this stage very tough beef, 

 alternated with rabbits, skinned partially and cut into four 

 quarters, is as good as anything. 



As long as each young hawk appears regularly at the 

 morning and evening feed, it is in no danger of being lost by 

 its own fault, however far it may roam from home, and a careful 

 watch must be kept to see that all have attended. But directly 

 a hawk absents itself at feeding-time it is a sign that it is killing 

 for itself, and, should it be missing a second time, it should be 

 caught at once. Probably, however, this will not happen until 

 the hawks have been at large for a fortnight or three weeks. 



In order to secure them the bow-net must be used. This 

 is a plain, circular, or oval net about three feet in diameter ; for 

 half of its circumference it is fastened to a light hazel-rod, bent 

 into a semicircular or ' bow ' shape. To the centre of the 

 bow is attached one end of a line fifty yards long. To set the 



1 Hawks that are irregularly fed, or are allowed to go for any protracted 

 length of time while their leathers are growing, are apt to develop a serious 

 defect in their plumage known as ' hunger traces. 1 Sir John Sebright in his 

 work on falconry describes it thus : ' The defect when strongly marked may 

 be seen in some degree on every feather of the body, but it is especially ob- 

 servable on the expanded wing or tail, in a line crossing all the feathers. On 

 the shaft of each feather the mark may not only be seen but felt as a ridge 

 slightly projecting. It may also be seen as a line of imperfection across the 

 web of every feather neatly marked as if a razor had been lightly passed across 

 the wing. The injury from this cause is sometimes such as to occasion the 

 feathers to break off at the hunger-trace, and it is not improbable that the 

 razor-mark seen on the web is in fact owing to the breaking off of all the fine 

 fibres of the web in the line of the trace. ' 



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