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immediate neighbourhood of the snows. Severtzoff states that it is resident in the south-eastern, 

 north-eastern, and north-western portions of Turkestan, being met with to an elevation of about 

 6000 feet, but is nowhere common ; and it is recorded from Siberia by the various travellers who 

 have collected there. Middendorff only observed it in the Baraba steppe late in the year, and 

 ' on the south coast of the Sea of Ochotsk in August. A specimen shot on the 17th February at 

 Udskoj, does not, he adds, differ in the least from West-European examples. Dr. Eadde only 

 obtained immature examples, and he says that it was very numerous in the Bureja Mountains in 

 October. Von Schrenck brought two examples from the Arnoor, one precisely similar to 

 European specimens, and the other belonging to the pale race or variety which occurs in the 

 east. Fere David speaks of it as being common in the mountains of Mongolia, and says that the 

 Chinese use it in taking hares. Mr. Swinhoe received an adult male from Pekin, and obtained 

 a bird of the year at Chefoo. 



Of all our European birds of prey the Goshawk is certainly one of the boldest and most 

 destructive marauders, and is therefore a terror to all the domestic poultry in the vicinity of the 

 locality it inhabits. It does not strike large game ; but Pigeons, small mammals, and especially 

 Partridges are most frequently destroyed by it. It affects wooded districts, and is seldom seen 

 far from the woods ; but where Partridges are to be met with in the vicinity of groves or forest, 

 a Goshawk is almost sure to put in an appearance if it inhabits that part of the country, and 

 will claim and take possession of a very large share of the game. On the wing the Goshawk, 

 though swift, is not so rapid as the Peregrine ; but in a wooded country, and especially in the 

 forest, it is extremely agile, and will thread its way amongst the close-standing trees when at full 

 speed in a manner that one would scarcely think possible ; hence, in the forest, a Pigeon stands 

 but a poor chance of escape. 



I have often, when in Germany, heard sad complaints of its rapacity from the peasant 

 women, who say that they cannot keep poultry near where the Goshawk is found ; for when once 

 one of these arrant robbers has found his way to the poultry-yard he returns again and again, 

 and is keen and wary enough to carry off chicken after chicken with impunity ; and should tame 

 pigeons be kept, he soon thins the cote to such an extent that the owner seldom has any pigeons 

 left for his own use. Speaking of its habits as observed by himself in Germany, Mr. Sachse 

 writes to me as follows : — " This terror of all birds not too large to withstand his attacks, as well 

 as of mammals up to the size of a hare, is held equally in detestation by both the game-preserver 

 and the peasant ; for it is equally destructive to the smaller game birds and to all tame poultry. 

 It is, so far as my experience goes, not a frequenter of mountainous districts, and is more often 

 seen in the level country than in the forests in the mountains. Hereabouts (in Ehenish Prussia) 

 it is, thank God, not common in the summer season; for I seldom find its nest, though I always 

 look closely for it ; but in the winter season it is tolerably numerous, and is exceedingly 

 destructive. It certainly possesses all the bad qualities of a true robber ; for it is cruel, wary, 

 treacherous, bloodthirsty, and insatiable to a high degree. The poor Partridges which frequent 

 the vicinity of the springs where, during the coldest winter, some verdure still remains, in order 

 to seek a hard-earned subsistence, if discovered by a Goshawk, soon become exterminated ; and 

 where he has once captured a chicken in a farm-yard he will return until almost all are destroyed ; 

 for, cruel as he is by nature, and made bold by hunger, he neither fears the sportsman's gun nor 



