THE SPARROW-HAWK. 
65 
riabilis), a male sparrow-hawk dashed through the smoke the 
moment after the discharge, poised himself beautifully, so that he 
might not be wetted by “ the stoop,” drooped his legs, and with 
the talons of both feet seizing one of the victims from the surface 
of the water, bore it off to the trees on the shore. He was within 
a near shot of the fowlers in the boat, but, fortunately for the 
bold pilferer, no second gun was charged, or he might have paid 
the penalty with his life. This species has been shot on the 
zostera banks of the bay, at low water, when in pursuit of prey. 
Boldness about houses , 8fc . — In October, 1833, Dr. J. D. Mar- 
shall received an old female sparrow-hawk, which, in pursuit of 
a thrush ( Turdus musicus ), followed it into a cottage in the neigh- 
bourhood of Belfast, where both were secured. On some stuffed 
birds being placed near this hawk, she dashed fiercely at them. 
Bent on spoliation, the sparrow-hawk scruples not to enter even 
the church itself ; a male bird having, some years ago, been caught 
by the sexton in Newtownbreda church (co. Down), whither it 
had pursued a robin.* 
A correspondent once received a fine female bird which w T as 
shot in a little garden in the centre of the town of Clonmel, where, 
some doves in a cage attracting her attention, she had made at- 
tempts to tear one of them out through the bars. To kill a little 
bird in its cage, remarks Mr. Evatt, is, with the sparrow-hawk, a 
very common practice. Even within a room with closed windows, 
caged birds are not free from its attacks. Some years ago, at 
Springvale, county of Down, one dashed through a pane of the 
drawing-room window at a small bird caged within, to the no 
little alarm and astonishment of several members of the family. 
An observant friend, when one day driving into Belfast, remarked, 
almost immediately in front of the vehicle, a sparrow-hawk to 
dash down at a fieldfare, and strike the ground with so much vio- 
* The peregrine falcon, though much more powerful, does not carry its boldness 
to such extremes as the sparrow-hawk. An instance may be given : — One day in 
the middle of August, when on the elevated downs above Steephill Castle, 
Isle of Wight, I was astonished by a sudden rush of wind near me, and on turning 
my eyes instantaneously to the quarter whence it came, saw an old male peregrine 
falcon swoop at a wheatear on the ground, about ten paces from me ; but he did not 
seize the bird, evidently from being deterred by my proximity. 
VOL. I. 
F 
