Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/151

Rh one of the serrated and hooked bill of the Smew—of course, reversed or turned upside d iwn. There was a kind of angular notch on the back, near the tail, as if a large piece had been at some time bitten out, but now quite healed and covered with skin similar to other parts of the body. This malformation of the mouth does not seem to have interfered with the animal's feeding, as it was in particularly good condition. A cast of the head has been taken and the skull preserved by Mr. Hearder, of Plymouth. — (Durnford Street, Stonehouse, Plymouth).

—I have read with much interest Captain Dugmore's article on "The Revival of Falconry," which appeared in your last number. May I say a word or two thereon? In the first place, I thank him for his kind and considerate mention of myself. It is not always that falconers remember my early struggles in the cause, and I should be sorry to think that my name had quite died out among them. I have been compelled to give up the sport, both this year and last, but have hardly yet lost my interest in it. For seventeen or eighteen years I flew grouse on a small moor in this manor, with a success to which my many friends will bear witness. In all that time but one year was missed. But changes come with years; and the present tenant of this extensive shooting (the acting, rather than the nominal, tenant, for there are two partners) has contrived to shut out me and mine from every, even the most trifling, privilege which he found us enjoying. He is a town man, of course; not a country man. Had it not been for this I should have seen last year, and probably for the last time, a falcon or two of my own training fly grouse. Were I a vindictive man I should glory in the certain knowledge that this person has not the smallest chance of preserving game upon the manor—not if he covered it with keepers. Well, sir, you see that my little existence as a working falconer is over. Let me turn for a moment to others. Captain Dugmore says that he knows no one in England, save Mr. Hancock, who can stuff a hawk properly. I am more fortunate. I know—and have known for thirty years—an amateur, even I think superior to Mr. Hancock in this matter,—my dear friend William Brodrick, the life and spirit of that excellent book, of which he is more than half author, "Falconry in the British Isles." And in speaking of old falconers Mr. Brodrick should never be forgotten: I can only Ray for myself that 1 am altogether indebted to him for the rudiments of the art, and that without his early kindness I should probably never have been able to write a word on Falconry, or to fly a single grouse. With regard to the Club itself, many well-known falconers object to it, on the ground that flying hawks in the Alexandra Park is a burlesque on the oldest and most romantic of our sports. I confess I do not agree with them; but I object to certain portions of my own essay on the mutter,