ANECDOTES AND ADVENTURES 283 



out with a pointer and a falcon named Black Lady. The dog 

 stood, but in a queer and rather doubtful way ; and Black Lady 

 was thrown off. When she had got to her pitch the men ran 

 in. But instead of partridges, there got up out of the swedes 

 the unexpected shape of Ruy Lopez, he having been quietly dis- 

 cussing there a lark which he had just killed. Down came the 

 falcon, better pleased, as hawks are, at such a chase than one at 

 a mere partridge. And the falconers describe the flight as 

 beyond measure exciting. They thought each stoop would be 

 the last, and declared that the small hawk saved himself several 

 times by a hair's-breadth. At length, however, he got in under 

 a stook of wheat. No doubt the falconers thought it was a near 

 thing. And possibly it was ; but as far as my own experience 

 goes, trained peregrines cannot get within a yard of a good 

 trained merlin. I have seen them try; and the merlin has 

 shifted with contemptuous ease. Major Fisher, however, as 

 already mentioned, had a tiercel which made it very hot for a 

 wild merlin, and, as he thinks, very nearly caught it. I have 

 seen one of his eyess tiercels take a kestrel with apparent ease 

 at the first stoop. But that is certainly quite a different matter. 



The already long list which has been given of mischances 

 and maladies which beset trained hawks is even yet not com- 

 plete. In India the wild eagles are a serious nuisance, coming 

 down from the high altitudes at which they soar, and obliging 

 the hawks to shift for their own safety just when they are 

 expected and expecting to give a good account of their own 

 quarry. In England, hawks which are pegged out in any but 

 a quiet private place are exposed to the attack of any chance 

 dog. I do not know that cats will deliberately attack even the 

 smallest jack, either by day or by night. But a tame cat which 

 had gone mad once made an onslaught on the trained peregrines 

 belonging to the O. H. C, and with such ferocity that quite a 

 large number of them died of their wounds. Mr. A. W. Reed, 

 an experienced and enthusiastic amateur falconer, had some very 

 valuable hawks, including a ger and some Eastern varieties, 

 pegged out on a lawn in Essex. A neighbouring householder, 

 being troubled by sparrows, laid down poisoned grain. The 

 sparrows took the grain, and, dying as they flew over the place 

 where the hawks were, fell down on the ground near the blocks. 

 Of course the hawks ate them ; and, equally of course, the hawks 

 were poisoned. And, advice being taken, it was considered 

 useless to take proceedings against the offender. 



Cases of deliberate hawk-murder are now punishable by 



