deserted nests of this Falcon, being too late to find any tenanted by the owners ; this was in the beginning 
of August; and from one of them be took an addled egg. The nest was composed of sticks and roots, and 
lined with wool, much resembling tliat of a Raven, to which bird it might have originally belonged. Strewn 
around it lay the remains of many Whimbrels, Golden Plovers, Guillemots, and Ducks. All the nests he saw 
were in cliffs forming the boundaries of freshwater lakes, but none of them so high in the mountains as 
he expected to find them. A similar account is given by Faber of a nest seen by liim in 1821. This, 
the only one he found, was in South-western Iceland ; it was large and flat, placed on the upper part of an 
inaccessible wall of rock. There were three full-grown young, two of which, on the 6th of July, had 
already left it and sat near by. The old birds flew around screaming, but did not attack him. Remains of 
various sea-fowl lay about. Faber adds, both young and old approach the homesteads, where they sit on 
elevations and often fight with the Ravens. Four seems to be the proper complement of eggs ; they are 
suffused or closely freckled with reddish orange or pale reddish brown on a didl white ground, which 
commonly is hardly discernible between the markings, though these are sometimes collected into blotches of 
considerable extent; specimens measure from 2*48 to 2T3 inches by from T91 to T72.” 
“ In the days when falconry stood first on the list of sports,” says Mr. Hoy, “ the Icelander was considered 
a present worthy the acceptance of a king. The King of Denmark sent a vessel annually to Iceland to bring 
all the Hawks of this kind it was possible to procure for the use of his falconers, and to be sent as presents 
to the different princes on the Continent ; they were even sent to the Barbary states and into the Eastern 
countries ; so much were they esteemed. An old falconer, lately dead, assured me that be had seen 
upwards of fifty Iceland Falcons at the same time in the care of persons who were about to start with them 
as presents to the different courts of Europe. A falconer who was in the hawking establishment of Louis 
XVI. of France informed me that they had several casts or pairs sent annually from Denmark. The 
Icelander was greatly prized, not only on account of its superior powers of flight, but its tractable, gentle 
disposition. It is not so difficult to reclaim and manage as the Ger Falcon ; there is also a decided difference 
in their flight and manner of striking their prey ; the Icelander, in the language of falconry, flies more 
nobly, pouncing his prey with more lofty stoops. The flight of the hare with the female, the male being 
used for the Heron, Kite, and Buzzards, was considered one of the finest sights the sport could afford. An 
open country is requisite to see this flight in perfection. The hare being started, the Falcon was immediately 
thrown off the fist, and, instantly catching sight of its prey, mounted to a considerable height ; a slow dog, 
well trained with the Hawk, was used to keep the hare running, as it Avould otherwise squat on being once 
stooped at by the Falcon. The Falcon kills the hare by repeated blows on the back and bead, coming in an 
almost perpendicular direction upon it from a great height and Avith wonderful velocity, the blow being 
almost imperceptibly given in passing, and the Falcon again rising, or, as they term it, shooting up steeple- 
high after every stoop ; occasionally the victim is killed the first stoop, and driven several yards by the 
Auolence of it. In a good flight seA'eral lofty stoops are made. Again, in the air the Icelander kills the 
Crane, Heron, or Kite by repeated bloAvs, the great interest taken in the flight being to Avatch the exertions 
of the Falcon to out-soar its prey and then precipitate itself Avith closed Avings and astonishing rapidity 
and force, its prey seldom reaching the ground without being mortally disabled. An instance has occurred 
of a male Icelander striking the head from the neck of a Heron by a single bloAv in the air.” — Mag. Nat. 
Hist. Ami. vi. 1833, p. 108. 
On comparing either sex of the present species Avith the corresponding sex of the NorAveglan or Gyrfalcon, 
it Avill be found to be of larger size, to have the upper and under surface much lighter in colour, the face 
and crown striated and Avitliout any Peregrine-like appearance in its countenance, the bars of the tail quite 
perfect and well defined, the feet and cere pale yelloAv and not orange-yelloAv as in the Gyr Falcon, and the 
head more bluff or less elegant in shape. 
I must not fail to mention that the markings of the under surface are of a striated form in the youthful 
birds, and that these marks become of a transverse or barred form in the adult. To illustrate these and 
the other remarkable differences betAveen the adult and young, I ha\x considered it necessary to give tAAm 
Plates, the one representing the former, the other a bird of the first autumn, both somewhat less than 
the natural size. 
