38 FALCONIDA. 
Tue great docility of the Peregrine Falcon, and the 
comparative ease with which the birds are procured, has 
rendered them the most frequent objects of the falconer’s 
care and tuition, and it is this species which is the most 
commonly used at the present day by those who still oc- 
casionally pursue the amusement of hawking. Formerly 
this sporting diversion was the pride of the rich, and these 
birds, as well as their eggs, were preserved by various 
legislative enactments. So valuable were they considered 
when possessed of the various qualities most in request, 
that in the reign of James I. Sir Thomas Monson is said 
to have given one thousand pounds for a cast (a couple) of 
Hawks. The qualities of a good Falcon have been so 
aptly described by Walton in his Complete Angler as 
addressed by Auceps to his companions, that illustrating 
the powers and habits of the bird, it is here in part intro- 
duced. ‘In the air my noble, generous Falcon ascends 
to such a height, as the dull eyes of beasts and fish are 
not able to reach to; their bodies are too gross for such 
high elevation ; but from which height, I can make her 
to descend by a word from my mouth, which she both 
knows and obeys, to accept of meat from my hand, to own 
me for her master, to go home with me, and be willing the 
next day to afford me the like recreation.” 
How much the former predilection for this particular 
sport has now subsided, may be learned from the follow- 
ing paragraph in Sir John Sebright’s Observations upon 
Hawking, published in 1826. “The village of Falcon- 
swaerd, near Bois-le-Duc, in Holland, has for many years 
furnished faleoners to the rest of Europe. I have known 
many falconers in England, and in the service of different 
princes on the Continent ; but I never met with one of 
them who was not a native of Falconswaerd. It has been 
