PRACTICAL FALCONRY. 41 
on well, They will take hares fairly, especially with the assistance 
of a rather slow and well-broken dog, just to keep tho hare going ; 
any mongrel will do.* They are magnificent birds—powerful of 
course from their size, fairly tractable, swift, and moderately 
successful. I am told the fault is in » want of quickness in the 
turn, but they go very fast straight on end. I may have done them 
injustice, but I speak of nothing of which I know nothing ; and I 
am blindly bigoted: I am altogether for the peregrine. 
Of merlins I know a great deal; I can’t be modest here, for I have 
flown them year after year with very considerable success. I have 
killed quantities of wild skylarks, many thrushes, a very few black- 
birds, some ring-ouzels, and a great many house pigeons with them, 
besides accidental pipits and such like. It is fortunate for me 
that Ihave said a good deal about these little hawks in the first 
@echapter of ‘How I became a Falconer.” They are treated during 
hack just as the peregrine is treated; not allowed perhaps to 
to remain at liberty quite so long, and taken up either by hand 
or with the bow-net. They are delicate, and should be fed twice 
a day—never on tough food ; neither must they be allowed to bolt 
their food in large pieces. I have seen even a great screaming pere- 
grine, always hungry, though eating half as much again as another, 
lose her digestion for a whole day through bolting immense pieces 
of beef. Beef chopped to a paste, with u little water, is excellent 
for all hawks. Merlins, however, should have plenty of birds, alive 
or dead ; if alive, take care they are not of a sort likely to draw the 
hawk from the quarry at which she is in the habit of flying ; if dead, 
beware of shot te them. Merlins need not be hooded much; itis 
better that they should not be. Great care must be taken to prevent 
* Lord Lilford tells me that he dislikes the Iceland birds: the Green- 
landers are the second best; the Norwegian best of all, Icelanders he 
considers sulky, and anything but clever. 
