﻿50 Bird -Lore 



He continued to occupy his box at night until January 29, when he was 

 absent again. On February 2, 3 and 4 he went to roost as usual. 



On February 5 the proprietor of the hotel, feeling that something radi- 

 cal must be done to keep the piazza floor clean, had the Hawk's box neatly 

 boarded up. About six o'clock that afternoon the bird attempted to enter. 

 He mounted to the box from the capital of the pillar and clung there for a 

 moment. Unable, of course, to enter, he descended again to the capital. 

 He repeated five times the procedure of attempting to enter and descending 

 to the capital, once in the meantime perching upon an electric -light wire 

 and scrutinizing the box with outstretched neck. Then he flew away. 

 In a few moments he was back again upon the capital. Once more he at- 

 tempted to enter the box, and once more he perched upon the wire and 

 gazed long and fixedly at his former roosting-place. At ten minutes past 

 six o'clock he gave up and left for the night. 



But the next day, February 6, at five o'clock P.M., he made repeated 

 and energetic efforts to get into the box. He further showed his preference 

 for it as compared with other roosting-places by returning at six o'clock on 

 the afternoon of February 9 and again at about the same hour on February 

 10. I continued to see him about the hotel just as often as before, and 

 regularly until such a late hour that he must have had another roosting- 

 place not far away. 



At another corner of the hotel piazza, distant, I am told, three hundred 

 and twenty feet from the Hawk's preferred box, is a somewhat similar box. 

 The board here, however, is decidedly narrower and the hole in the bottom 

 is twice as large. On February 16 the condition of the piazza floor showed 

 that the Hawk had passed the previous night in this second box. That 

 evening he went in about six o'clock, while I stood near him. He did not 

 alight on a wire, but made a short halt on the capital of a pillar, — not the 

 corner pillar. He entered the box through the hole in the bottom, instead 

 of through the opening at the side. He immediately took up a crouching 

 position inside, without putting his tail and wings through the hole in the 

 bottom. 



How late in the season he continued to roost here I cannot say, for 

 about this time my observations of his habits came to an end. 



When well filled, the Kirkwood harbors more than two hundred persons. 

 It stands, with its outbuildings, in an enclosure of a few acres which supports 

 only scattered trees and which is entirely surrounded by a golf links, 

 a polo field and the grounds of a country club. The club-house is within 

 a few yards of the corner of the piazza where the Hawk chose his first 

 roosting-place. It is a much frequented corner. The second corner is 

 scarcely less so. 



