WOODCOCK, SNIPE, AND PLOVER. 261 



m 



that I possess, I read how the owner of a favourite 

 falcon went out with it to fly at the woodcock. Find- 

 ing him at last in the glade — the bird's action of 

 flirting up his tail having betrayed him — he flushed 

 him, and threw off his falcon. One bird tried to 

 mount right above the other until both were mere 

 speckSj and soon lost to sight, then both came to 

 earth together, the falcon fast bound to her quarry. 

 The flirt of the tail still betrays the woodcock to the 

 eager sportsman ; and when his breech-loader has 

 laid the bird dead on the turf, he plucks a feather 

 from the wings and tail as a trophy. 



As to myself, I have no design on the pretty 

 creature ; I carry only a good field-glass, with which 

 I have been watching his movements from a hiding- 

 place in the low tangle, on a dull afternoon. At the 

 first rustle, as I move, he is up and off, diving, twist- 

 ing, and dipping in and out of the network of bare 

 twigs without touching one of them, in a wonderfully 

 adroit fashion ; then he vanishes — a mere streak of 

 grey and brown. 



One is often asked what is the best way of watch- 

 ing the creatures : my answer is, " A suit of grey, a 

 good field-glass in hand, and the quietest of move- 



