262 



WILD SPAIN. 



prey. This — mutatis mutandis — is practically what game- 

 preservation has accomplished in England ; but in Spain 

 the physical conditions are different, and it is more than 

 questionable if any similar measure of success could there 

 be attained. Not Don Quixote himself ever conceived 

 an enterprise more chimerical than the extermination of 

 the snakes in La Mancha or Andalucia. 



With the first of the daylight the eagles and most of the 

 larger raptores turn out for their morning hunt, and 

 during the heat of the day retire to enjoy a siesta on the 



THE EAGLE'S SWOOP. 



peak of some lofty oak or pine, where they remain con- 

 spicuously perched for hours together. Towards evening 

 predatory operations are generally resumed. It is curious 

 to observe their different methods of going to work ; the 

 Kites sweep about with buoyant, desultory flight, not 

 unlike large gulls ; the Circaetus wheels in wide circles 

 over the cistus-scrub ; Montagu's Harrier hunts with 

 impetuous flight, in long, straight bee-lines close over the 

 mancha, always appearing about to alight but not doing so. 

 But for systematic searching-out of a breadth of land, none 

 compare with the Imperial Eagle; usually in pairs, these 



