BIRDS. 
331 
quarry on tlie ground, where ifc miglit be able to make a 
stout resistance, since so large a fowl as a pheasant could 
not but be visible to the piercing eye of a hawk, when 
hovering over the field. Hence that propensity of cower- 
ing and squatting till they are almost trod on, which na 
doubt was intended as a mode of security : though long 
rendered destructive to the whole race of Gallince- by the 
invention of nets and guns/ 
GEEAT NORTHERN DIVER, OR LOON. 
As one of my neighbours was traversing Wolmer Forest 
from Bramshot across the moors, he found a large un- 
common bird fluttering in the heath, but not wounded^ 
^ Of the great boldness and rapacity of birds of prey, when urged on 
by hunger, I have seen several instances; particularly when shooting in 
the winter in company with two friends, a woodcock flew across us 
closely pursued by a small hawk ; we all three fired at the woodcock 
instead of the hawk, which, notwithstanding the report of three guns 
close by it, continued its pursuit of the woodcock, struck it down, and 
carried it oflf, as we afterwards discovered. 
At another time, when partridge shooting with a friend, we saw a 
ring-tail hawk [the female hen-harrier. — Ed.] rise out of a pit with 
some large bird in its claws ; though at a great distance, we both fired 
and obliged it to drop its prey, which proved to be one of the par- 
tridges which we were in pursuit of And lastly, in an evening, I shot 
at and plainly saw that I had wounded a partridge, but it being late 
was obliged to go home without finding it again. The next morning I 
walked round my land without any gun, but a favourite old spaniel 
followed my heels. When I came near the field where I wounded the 
bird the evening before, I heard the partridges call, and seeming to be 
much disturbed. On my approaching the bar-way they all rose, some 
on my right, and some on my left hand ; and just before and over my 
head I perceived (though indistinctly, from the extreme velocity of 
their motion) two birds fly directly against each other, when instantly, 
to my great astonishment, down dropped a partridge at my feet ; the 
dog immediately seized it, and on examination I found the blood flow 
very fast from a fresh wound in the head, but there was some dry 
clotted blood on its wings and side ; whence I concluded that a hawk 
had singled out my wounded bird as the object of his prey, and had 
struck it down the instant that my approach had obliged the birds to 
rise on the wing : but the space between the hedges was so small, and 
the motion of the birds so instantaneous and quick, that I could not 
distinctly observe the operation.^ — Markwick. 
