134 LORD LILFORD ON BIRDS IN THE LILFORD AVIARIES. 
threw up one of my birds into the air on an open spot in her 
sight, and after a good look round she would come down upon it, 
and after filling her crop return to her original post of observation. 
She very soon discovered that I meant her no harm, and allowed 
me to pass continually within easy distance without taking wing. 
You will admit that I have good reason to love the Falcon, 
and, I trust, pardon this long rhapsody to her honour. In 
the Mediterranean, a small race of Peregrine is the prevalent 
resident form ; this race has been, in my opinion, most correctly 
referred by the late Mr. J. H. Gurney to Falco punicus of 
Levaillant jeune, ‘Exploration do l’Algerie’ ; and in the ‘Ibis’ for 
1882, Mr. Gurney has gone with so much accurate detail into the 
differences between this and allied races or species, that it is quite 
unnecessary that I should detain you with my private views on the 
subject ; I will only say that they agree, as far as my knowledge 
extends, entirely with those of the eminent ornithologist to whom 
I refer. I have met with this race, which for convenience I will 
call the Mediterranean Peregrine, throughout the shores of that 
sea from Gibraltar to Cyprus ; it is especially abundant in the 
islands of the Italian Archipelago and on the coasts of Sardinia. 
In the early summer of 1882, whilst yachting in Italian waters, 
we discovered no less than nine breeding-places of this race of 
Falcon, and obtained two fine young birds from a nest on the 
island of Maddalena (<•/. ‘Ibis,’ 1887, pp. 276, 277, pi. viii.) ; 
these birds I sent home with my yacht from Nice, and they 
reached Southampton alive, but in most miserable condition. 
However, under the able care of John Frost, falconer to the 
Old Hawking Club, they both recovered : the male, very docile 
and a beautiful flyer, was destroyed by another Hawk during a 
railway journey; the female lived for seven years at Lilford, but 
could never fly really well ; she was during the first two or three 
years of her existence quite the most spiteful and “ cranky ” 
tempered Falcon of the many with whom I have been acquainted. 
These Falcons in their native haunts seemed to me to live ex- 
clusively upon Roclc-Doves, but no doubt their diet is varied by 
wildfowl and waders in the winter season. I found this race 
breeding on the islands of Menorca and Iviza, and, curiously 
enough, obtained a fine adult male in the mountains of Asturias 
in May, 1876; this is, as far as 1 know, the only recorded 
