Page:Natural History, Birds.djvu/136

Rh the bird in its claws, and pulled it to pieces in the manner of the Hawks; but seemed to prefer forcing part of it through the wires, then pulling at it. It always hung what it could not eat up on the sides of the cage. It would often eat three small birds in a day. In the spring it was very noisy, one of its notes a little resembling the cry of the Kestrel. Bechstein, also, who has added to our knowledge so many particulars of the manners of birds in captivity, states of this species, that if it be captured when it is old, mice, birds, or living insects may be thrown to it, taking care to leave it quite alone, for as long as any one is present it will touch nothing; but soon becomes more familiar, and will eat meat, and even the universal paste. An ounce of meat at least is eaten at a meal, and there should be a forked branch or crossed sticks in the cage, across the angles of which it throws the mouse or any other prey, and then darting on it behind from the opposite side of the cage, devours every morsel. Repeated instances have occurred of its voracity inducing it to dart upon small birds hung up in cages.

The imitative power attributed to the Shrike may be not altogether a fiction: different authors ascribe very different notes to it; one resembling the cry of the Kestrel is noted above; Bechstein speaks of its warbling much like the Grey Parrot, the melody interrupted, however, by harsh discordant notes; and a writer in the "Naturalist" compares some strains which he heard it utter to the notes of the Stonechat. But while listening to these, to his surprise, they were discarded, and others adopted of a softer and more melodious