74 
THE SPARROW HAWK. 
It is true that the reading of the folios here is stallion ; 
but the word wing , and the falconers’ term checks , abun¬ 
dantly prove that a bird must be meant. Sir Thomas 
Hanmer, therefore, proposed this correction, which all 
subsequent editors have received, as- justifiable. 
The origin of the word “ kestrel ” is somewhat Un¬ 
certain. By some it is derived from “ coystril,” a knave 
or peasant, from being the hawk formerly used by persons 
of inferior rank, as we learn from Dame Juliana Berners, 
in her “ Boke of St. Albans.” This opinion is strength¬ 
ened by the reading “coystril,” in Twelfth Night (Act i. 
Sc. 3), and “ coistrel,” in Pericles (Act iv. Sc. 6). A 
different spelling again occurs in “The Gentleman’s 
Recreation,” by Ric. Blome (folio, London, 1686), where 
the word is written “ castrell.” 
The sparrowhawk is only mentioned once by Shake¬ 
speare, and the passage is one which might be very 
easily overlooked by any one not conversant with the 
language of falconry. In the Merry Wives of Windsor , 
Mrs. Ford addresses Falstaff’s page with— 
“ How now, my eyas-musket ? ” 
“ Musket ”* was the name given by the falconers of old 
* The weapon of this name, the most important of small fire-arms, is said to 
have borrowed its ti£le from this the most useful of small hawks, in the same way 
that other arms—as the falcon, falconet, and saker—have derived their names 
from larger and more formidable birds of prey. Against this view it is asserted 
that the musket was invented in the fifteenth century by the Muscovites,'and ow'es 
its name to its inventors. See Bescherelle, “Diet. Nat.,” and “The Target: a 
Treatise upon the Art Military,” 1756. 
