198 
SHRIKES. 
easily tamed, but tlieir pugnacious disposition, which 
does not appear in their own family circle when 
wild, is often fatally conspicuous when they are con- 
fined in a cage. Mr. Montague, who kept several, 
found, that at about the end of two months, violent 
battles ensued, to such a degree, that he was obliged 
to separate the survivors, and chain them in the 
manner Goldfinches are frequently confined, when 
they became very docile,— would come when called, 
for the sake of a fly, of which they were remarkably 
fond, though they would also eat mice or birds, spit- 
ting, or fastening them,— or pieces of raw flesh, on 
their cage, in order to tear them; disgorging the 
feathers, fur, and bones, in pellets, like Hawks and 
Owls. 
Of two thus kept for some time, the deaths were 
rather singular ; one choked itself by swallowing 
too large a quantity of mouse-fur, which it could 
not disgorge,— the other, by eating to such a degree, 
that it actually died of fat and repletion, expiring in 
Mr. Montague's hand, in a fit, when in the act of 
feeding on insects. In some countries, the young of 
the species of Shrike found there, are trained for 
hawking or other purposes. 
In Russia, they are sometimes used for the former 
amusement ; in Bengal, they are taught to fight, — a 
cruel diversion— one being held up opposite to an- 
other, in the hand of a man, to whose finger the bird 
is fastened by a string, sufficiently long to enable it to 
fly at and peck its adversaries. By others, it is so 
well trained, that, at a given signal, it will seize 
and carry the small golden ornament usually worn on 
the head of young Indian females, and convey it to 
