Iii the Neig7ibour7wod of Salisbury. 



209 



sea stiore ; and therefore are not likely to be met with so far inland 

 as this. But, on referring to Mr. Hart about these species, he told 

 me that all three occur in and about the neighbourhood, and that, 

 of the three, he should certainly say the Rock Pipit was the least 

 frequently to be met with. Of the other newly-detected species the 

 Water Pipit — A sjnnoleUa, he could give me no information. 



CONIROSTKES. 



Alauda Arvensis. " The Sky Lark." It is impossible to pass by 

 this, the most characteristic of all our song birds, without a word of 

 passing eulogy. Who can help being cheered by the swelling notes 

 of praise that this little chorister gives forth, as, on untiring wing, 

 he mounts up and ever upwards, until you strain your eye in vain 

 to catch a glimpse of your little friend, whose notes seem to increase 

 in power the farther he leaves the earth behind him and the nearer 

 he reaches heaven. It would seem at times to be filled with a burst 

 of spontaneous and almost irrepressible praise, and to soar aloft as 

 though drawn upwards by some unseen and magnetic attraction. 

 It is happily one of our commonest birds, and needs no description. 

 This bird affords, as may be easily understood, one of the finest 

 flights in hawking that can be seen, the Hawk always flown at 

 them being the Merlin. But so strong, and powerful, and rapid, is 

 their ascent, that the hawker generally has to chose the time of their 

 moult for his purpose, that they may not be able to rise quite so 

 rapidly, as it is no uncommon thing for both Hawk and Lark to 

 mount entirely out of sight, and if the Lark after this should take 

 an oblique direction, the Hawk is not uncommonly lost. I myself 

 witnessed a very exciting chase between a hen Merlin and a Lark, in 

 Longford Park when I counted no less than fourteen stoops that the 

 Hawk made after his quarry, the end of the chase being hidden from 

 me by the trees. I once noticed a rather peculiar circumstance concern- 

 ing this bird. I heard a Sky Lark in full song, but could not perceive 

 from whence the sound emanated. It was apparently stationary, and 

 evidently not in the air ; and on looking round I at last saw my 

 little friend sedately perched upon a gate-post, and singing away 



