Page:Once a Week June to Dec 1863.pdf/471

 . 17, 1863.] fair friend scraps of crimson silk velvet and gaily-dyed ostrich plumes for his home-made hoods. He must also provide himself with a russet-coloured stout buckskin gauntlet, called a hawking-glove, and a leathern bag like a courier’s, called also a hawking-bag. Elegant and very ancient old English specimens of each are now exhibiting at the Kensington Museum. The glove, worn on the left hand, on which hand a falcon should always be perched, and never on the right, reaches nearly to the elbow, and is necessary to protect the sportsman’s flesh from the formidable talons of his bird, and to feed her upon. In the hawking-bag are stored various nick-nacks useful in the chace, amongst which two or three dead small birds, or a portion of flesh, should not be omitted.

And thus having sufficiently dwelt on all essential preliminaries, we proceed to the main business of training. The sportsman begins by fitting her with jesses, hood, bewits, and bells, the use of which has been already explained. She must be carried continually on the fist for a certain period, and if stubborn and disposed to bate, i. e., to struggle to get away, the old falconers plunged her head into cold water. I can recommend a better mode of curing this shyness, natural to all her species. It is to carry her day by day to the village smithy, where, perched upon your hawking-glove, she will have to endure the bustling concourse, the noise, and clouds of fiery sparks flying everywhere about. It is also well to set up a perch and leave her there for a brief period. Thus, by assiduity and watching, she is brought to submit to have her head covered with the hood—in which, be it remarked, she will afterwards greatly delight, as a feeding signal. This troublesome employment, fatiguing to both trainer and bird, continues for a week at least; but it rarely happens but at the end of this, her necessities, and the privation of light, make her lose all idea of liberty, and tame down her natural wildness. The master judges of his success when her head can be covered without resistance, and when, uncovered, the meat presented is seized and eaten with avidity and contentedly. The repetition of these lessons by degrees ensures success. Her wants being the chief principle of dependence, it is endeavoured to increase her appetite by giving little balls of flannel and feathers, which are greedily swallowed. Having thus excited the appetite, care is taken to satisfy it, and thus gratitude attaches the bird to her tormentor.

When the first lessons have thus succeeded, and the falcon shows signs of docility, she is carried out upon some green, the head uncovered, and by tempting her with food at intervals, she is taught to jump upon the fist and continue there. It is now necessary to study the character of the bird; to speak frequently to her if she be inattentive to the voice, to stint the food of such as do not come kindly or readily to the lure, and to keep her watching, if not sufficiently familiar.

When the docility and familiarity of the bird are sufficiently confirmed on the green, she is then carried into the open fields, but still kept fast by a string about twenty yards long. She is then unhooded as before, and the falconer standing some paces off shows her the lure; when she flies upon it, she is permitted to take a large morsel of the food tied thereon. She is, lastly, shown the game itself, alive but tame, which she is designed to pursue. After having seized this several times with her string, she is left entirely at liberty, and carried out for the purpose of pursuing that which is wild. At that she flies with fierceness; and having seized or killed it, she is brought back by the voice and lure.

Let us here describe the hood above spoken of. It is a head-piece formed of leather and crimson velvet, surmounted by a stem, bearing aloft a plume of particoloured feathers. The hood is very becoming and ornamental to the brave bird, and an essential aid to the falconer in training: being put off and on at pleasure, its properties as a restraint are very great. Wearing this, the hawk, whether at home or abroad, can be kept perfectly quiet; without it, our control over her wild and timorous disposition is very limited. Varvels are silver rings, sometimes attached to the ends of the jesses, bearing the owner’s name, crest, and address.

Modern falconers encourage or call the attention of their hawks to the springing quarry by some distinct cry, the usual modern one being “Hoo-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” Upon killing, the cry is “Whoop!” and that to give notice to the field upon viewing a lost hawk, “Upho!”

Hawking at the brook—i. e., at waterfowl, such as ducks, teal, widgeon, &c.—was one of that royal Nimrod James the First’s prime diversions, so much so indeed that my MS. describes him often rising abruptly from the council-table, saying “that he had worked long enough, and would fain go see his hawk fly a mallard at the brook.” More than