Page:The Natural History of Ireland vol1.djvu/89

 riabilis), a male sparrow-hawk dashed through the smoke the moment after the discharge, poised himself beautifully, so that he might not be wetted by " the stoop," drooped his legs, and with the talons of both feet seizing one of the victims from the surface of the water, bore it off to the trees on the shore. He was within a near shot pf the fowlers in the boat, but, fortunately for the bold pilferer, no second gun was charged, or he might have paid the penalty with his life. This species has been shot on the zostera banks of the bay, at low water, when in pursuit of prey.

Boldness about houses, &c. — In October, 1833, Dr. J. D. Mar- shall received an old female sparrow-hawk, winch, in pursuit of a thrush (Turdus musicus), followed it into a cottage in the neigh- bourhood of Belfast, where both were secured. On some stuffed birds being placed near this hawk, she dashed fiercely at them. Bent on spoliation, the sparrow-hawk scruples not to enter even the church itself ; a male bird having, some years ago, been caught by the sexton in Newtownbreda church (co. Down), whither it had pursued a robin.*

A correspondent once received a fine female bird which was shot in a little garden in the centre of the town of Clonmel, where, some doves in a cage attracting her attention, she had made at- tempts to tear one of them out through the bars. To kill a little bird in its cage, remarks Mr. Evatt, is, with the sparrow-hawk, a very common practice. Even within a room with closed windows, caged birds are not free from its attacks. Some years ago, at Springvale, county of Down, one dashed through a pane of the drawing-room window at a small bird caged within, to the no little alarm and astonishment of several members of the family. An observant friend, when one day driving into Belfast, remarked, almost immediately in front of the vehicle, a sparrow-hawk to dash down at a fieldfare, and strike the ground with so much vio-

The peregrine falcon, though much more powerful, does not carry its boldness to such extremes as the sparrow-hawk. An instance may be given : — One day in the middle of August, when on the elevated downs above Steephill Castle, Isle of Wight, I was astonished by a sudden rush of wind near me, and on turning my eyes instantaneously to the quarter whence it came, saw an old male peregrine falcon swoop at a wheatear on the ground, about ten paces from me ; but he did not seize the bird, evidently from being deterred by my proximity. VOL. I