Notices of New Books, 8619 



quels. This assertion is corroborated by the fact of my having first 

 obtained a specimen of the Alexandrine paroquet by the agency of a 

 shahin, which pounced on a flock crossing a glade of a forest in 

 Malabar, and carried one off, but dropped it on my firing at it. Very 

 lately, too, one belonging to me having lost a partridge, at which 

 it was flown, took a long though unsuccessful flight after some 

 paroquets it spied high up in the air. One I shot in Travancore, just 

 after sunset, was busily devouring a goatsucker it had captured. 

 The shahin breeds on steep and inaccessible cliffs. I have seen 

 three eyries, one on the Neilgherries, another at Untoor, and a third 

 at the large waterfall at Mhow. It lays its eggs in March and April, 

 and the young fly in May and June, when they are caught by the 

 falconers. The royal falcon of the East (as its Indian name 

 implies) is very highly prized by the natives for hawking, and it is 

 esteemed the first of all the falcons, or black-eyed birds of prey (as 

 they are called in native works on falconry), the large and powerful 

 bhyri (the peregrine) even being considered only second to it. Al- 

 though hawking is now comparatively at a low ebb in India, yet 

 many individuals of this species are annually captured in various 

 parts of the Peninsula, and taken for sale to Hydrabad and other 

 places where the noble sport of falconry is yet carried on, and they 

 sell for a considerable price. The shahin and other falcons are 

 usually caught by what is called the Eerwan. This is a thin strip of 

 cane, of a length about equal to the expanse of the wings of the bird 

 sought for. The ends of the stick are smeared with bird-lime for 

 several inches, and a living bird is tied to the centre of it. On 

 observing the hawk, the bird, which has its eyes sewn up to make it 

 soar, is let loose, and the falcon pounces on it and attempts to carry 

 it off, when the ends of its wings strike the limed twig, and it falls to 

 the ground. The birds usually selected for this purpose are doves, 

 either Turtur risorius or T. humilis. The shahin is always trained 

 for what, in the language of falconry, is called a standing gait, that is, 

 is not slipped from the hand at the quarry, but made to hover and 

 circle high in the air over the falconer and party ; and when the 

 game is started it then makes its swoop, which it does with amazing 

 speed. It is indeed a beautiful sight to see this fine bird stoop on a 

 partridge or florikin which has been flushed at some considerable dis- 

 tance from it, as it often makes a wide circuit round the party. As 

 soon as the falcon observes the game which has been flushed, it 

 makes two or three onward plunges in its direction, and then darts 

 down obliquely, with half-closed wings, on the devoted quarry, with 



