274 FALCONRY 



Magpie hawking, though not one of the higher branches of 

 falconry, is nevertheless most excellent sport, and possesses 

 this charm, that the field, one and all, may take an active part 

 in the chase, for their assistance is necessary to bring about a 

 kill. It is a flight well within the powers of either eyess tiercels 

 or falcons that do not mount high enough to kill game well. 

 Passage tiercels are also very good, and if they become well 

 entered to the quarry are, from their superior dash and style, 

 rather more deadly than eyesses. Two tiercels should be 

 flown together, as the magpie shifts so rapidly from the stoop, 

 and avails himself so cleverly of every possible covert that 

 might protect him, that a single hawk has not much chance 

 with him, and the whole beauty of the flight consists in the 

 pretty double stooping in which the one tiercel takes up the 

 chance that the other has missed. 



A partially open country devoid of trees is the best for the 

 purpose. The best sport we have seen is in Ireland, where 

 the sport was ever heartily welcomed and cordially joined in. 

 Great sport has been seen in co. Kildare in the neighbourhood 

 of Sallins and of Kildare, and in Wexford, near Enniscorthy. In 

 Tipperary, near Fermoy, Captain Salvin l records that in 1857 

 he killed in four months 184 magpies, killing as many as eight 

 in one day with his excellent tiercels * The O'Donoghue ' and 

 ' Dhuleep Singh.' In 1873 the same gentleman, together with 

 the author of this volume, took twenty-eight magpies, three 

 sparrow-hawks, and about the same number of rooks and other 

 quarry in one month's tour in Ireland ; and in 1879 certain 

 other members of the Old Hawking Club had a most suc- 

 cessful trip of three weeks in Kildare and Tipperary, killing 

 fifty-eight head. Of this number ' Buccaneer' and ' Meteor,' 

 two excellent eyess tiercels, killed in thirteen days forty- four 

 magpies. 



The great object in flying the magpie is to cut him off from 

 his point, and to drive him into the open at the moment when 

 the hawks are well placed for a stoop. Cunning to the last 



1 See Falconry in the British Isles, p. 68. 



