56 FALCONUXffi. 



ting intently on them. The eggs were of large size, and as vivid 

 in colouring as those of wild individuals. This bird had not the 

 company of any other kestrel during its captivity. Being pur- 

 chased in the market, its age is not known .* 



Although the kestrel is the most common of the Falconidee in 

 Ireland, I have not met with it so abundantly anywhere in this 

 island, as it is said by Sir William Jardine and Mr. Waterton to 

 be in Scotland and England. The former author observes : — 

 " We know several glens where, within a quarter of a mile, there 

 may in April and May be found from ten to twelve eyries ; and, 

 in one situation, eight or nine can be perceived at once."t Mr. 

 Waterton remarks: — "Last summer [1835] I visited twenty- 

 four nests in my park, all with the wind-hover's eggs in 

 them."J 



In an extent of glen such as that noticed, we should not, in the 

 north of Ireland, find more than one or two nests. The reason of 

 the species being less numerous in this island than in Great 

 Britain, may perhaps in some degree be accounted for, by the 

 circumstance, that there are comparatively few of the smaller 

 Mammalia on which the kestrel chiefly preys. Of the Arvicolce, 

 or short-tailed mice, for instance, of which four species are found 

 in Great Britain, none have yet been detected in Ireland ; and of 

 the Sorices, or shrew-mice, we have as yet in Ireland met with 

 but two, (or one-half of the British species,) one only of which 

 is common. 



Willoughby says of the kestrel : — " In the stomach we found 

 beetles and fur of mice;" Mr. Waterton also writes to the same 

 effect, adding that it lives " almost entirely on mice." Mr. Hep- 

 burn, an attentive observer and a contributor of much interesting 

 matter to Macgillivray's History of British Birds, remarks, that 

 " birds constitute no part of its food," vol. iii. p. 335. These 

 gentlemen are doubtless correct with regard to the food of the 

 kestrel, in the districts from which they have written ; — but their 



* Mr. Kobert Warren, junr. f Brit. Birds, vol. i. p. 140. 



% Essays Nat. Hist. vol. i. p. 261. 



