Page:Bird-lore Vol 06.djvu/78

 A Massachusetts Duck Hawk Aery s3

gladly would those who care pay for all the damage done b_\‘ Peregrines each year in the New England and Middle States. in order to keep the few remaining aeries tenanted! True, the birds are not \‘et in imminent danger of extermination—perhaps they are not much rarer than they always have been—but think how scarce they are relatively to any of our other Hawks, and how easily their few acties in the civilized part of ottr country could be abolished! Surely all true ornithologists should refrain from molesting breeding pairs. whether for eggs or skins. Surely. too, all true ornitholo- gists should be willing to spare them many Kingfishers and Jays and Flickers and Robins: ior the wide lands of New England harbor untold myriads of thCSe minor birds. while the known Falcon aeries of that same region could almost. figuratively speaking, be counted on ten fingers!

The Peregrine Falcon-is, perhaps, the tnost highly specialized and superlativer well-developed flying organism on our planet today, combining in a marvelous degree the highest powers of speed and aiirial adroitness with massive, warlike strength. A powerful. wild, majestic. independent bird, living on the choicest of clean, carnal food, plucked fresh from the air or the surface of the waters, rearing its young in the nooks of dangerous mountain cliffs, claiming all the open atmosphere as its domain, and fearing neither beast that walks nor bird that flies, it is the very embodiment of noble rapacity and lonely freedom. It has its legitimate and important place in the great scheme of things; and by its extinction, if that should ever occur, the world would be impoverished and dulled.

Vlkt‘lNlA RAIL ox xes’r

Phtitnzraphrd It) Tahm, Mmmm A, \' i May 1: um