Sas Pee C EUS COnNo eB ULL EST EN o 
blue-black penciling below; the immature again brown with heavy 
dark-brown streaks below. Both have a long, heavy, nearly square tail. 
A friend of mine in Canada, a farmer, one spring went out to 
inspect a pasture with a view to seeing what he should do with it 
that year. He had not gone far into it when a large hawk came toward 
him and with threatening beak, claws and wings made him turn around. 
Thinking such a strange thing could happen only once, he tried it 
again the next morning. The hawk again came with the same ferocity 
and stopped him short. The third day the farmer took his gun along, 
but in spite of that the bird came again and was shot. The bird no 
doubt had its nest in the adjoining woods and thought the man had 
evil intentions toward it—a tragic end to parental devotion and 
courage. 
Marsh Hawk 
We now come to the aristocrats of hawkdom, the falcons. For 
swiftness of flight, for fearlessness, dash and courage, they have no 
equal among wild things. They are more streamlined than the accip- 
itrines, have narrow, pointed wings and the same narrow tail as the 
latter. 
Here the situation is very simple. The smallest one, the sparrow 
hawk, is almost entirely useful. It could not take chickens even if 
it wanted to, being only the size of a blue jay. In summer it feeds 
almost exclusively on grasshoppers and other sizable insects, otherwise 
on mice and small birds, notably English sparrows. It is the only 
hawk nesting in cavities, such as flicker holes, also in bird houses, 
