Birds. 517 



The Peregrine Falcon. This fine British bird is to be found more 

 frequently along the southern shores of our Isle than is commonly sup- 

 posed. Mr. Yarrell, in his ' Bistory of British Birds,' has mentioned 

 its building on the Freshwater-cliffs; but it is in fact known to breed 

 regularly at four different points along our coast: on Main Bench, 

 between Freshwater-gate and the Needles, as mentioned by Mr. Yar- 

 rell, its eyrie has been established for many years : and the same may 

 be said of the Culver cliffs, at the eastern extremity of the island. On 

 the cliffs to the westward of Shanklin chine, it has been observed for 

 seven or eight years ; and a fourth pair has been long settled in the 

 neighbourhood of Black-gang chine. A fifth eyrie is, I think, to be 

 found in Chale bay ; but I cannot positively assert it. 



That the peregrine is no recent settler on our coast, may be inferred 

 from the fact that Sir Richard Worsley, in his ' History of the Isle of 

 Wight,' published in 1781, mentions that the Culvers were once cele- 

 brated for a breed of hawks; and in the Appendix to his work, he has 

 given a copy of the warrant of the Lords of the Privy Council to Ri- 

 chard Worsley, Esq., the Captain of the Island, as the Governor was 

 then called, to search for Queen Elizabeth's hawks, which had been 

 lately stolen in the Isle of Wight, from the place where they bred on 

 Her Majesty's own land. 



The parent birds are now well nigh considered sacred ; or rather, if 

 the truth must be told, it has been found more gainful to preserve than 

 to destroy them ; seeing that the young birds bring in half-a-guinea 

 each to the fortunate possessor of the nest. It is unquestionably true, 

 that if one of the old birds be destroyed, the survivor will find another 

 mate, and return, at the period of incubation, to the wonted locality. 

 Of the pair frequenting the Freshwater cliffs, what particulars I am 

 enabled to give, were learned from one of the cliffmen, named Jack- 

 man. When I made his acquaintance, in the autumn of 1839, he told 

 me that for fourteen years successively he had robbed these birds of 

 their young. He had never known more than one pair to frequent 

 that neighbourhood ; yet though robbed every year, they have never 

 left it. They build no nest, but deposit their eggs, four at most, on a 

 ledge of the cliff, always the most inaccessible ; never however a se- 

 cond time on the same spot, but seldom more than a hundred yards 

 from the spot selected by them on the preceding year. The young- 

 are hatched about the first week in May, and the parent birds make 

 ample provision for their wants. From ten to twenty yards from the 

 eyrie is found a store well supplied, consisting usually of puffins, 

 young jackdaws — their " daintiest bits " according to Jackman, and 



