Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/360

336 hunting-hawks, which seemed the genuine descendants of the ' falcon gentle,' which was wont to afford such rare sport to our ancestors in the Middle Ages.****The hawk used for this purpose is not the ordinary large Egyptian one, which hovers over the city of Cairo, poised in air on its wide wings, or circling arouud in search of quarry, but a smaller and fiercer bird, desert born and bred, with keen eyes and sharp talons, of which the larger brother stands in wholesome awe. These birds, trained much as were the mediaeval falcons, seem to love the chase as much as their master, although their quarry be not the Heron, but the Gazelle. Their services were only brought into requisition after the chase had continued some time, and as an adjunct to the pursuit of men, dogs, and horses, all concentrating their energies against the life and liberty of the most lovely, graceful, and inoffensive of wild creatures, almost the sole tenants of these arid waters. After advancing a few miles into the desert, which presents one flat, dead, unbroken level of hard gritty soil (not sand), unrelieved by any shrub, grass, flower, or tree, bounded only by the horizon, and producing almost the illusion of a sea view, suddenly half a dozen slender, shapely forms spring up, and stand in bold relief against the sky, with heads erect, like statuary, some half mile distant. The sight seems at once to infuse new fire and vigour into the horses, dogs, and men, all of whom are immediately launched like thunderbolts in the direction of the quarry, which, pausing motionless for a moment, break into full flight the next, hounding marvellous distances each spring, and soon leaving even the fleet greyhounds toiling hopelessly in the rear ; the distance between them visibly increasing, as the tireless Gazelles almost fly forwards, inspired by fear. The scene now becomes most animated, exciting, and picturesque, with the floating burnouses of the Bedouin or Egyptian riders, and the gay attire of horse and man, and the gallant Arab coursers stretching out to full speed with expanded nostrils and protruding eyes, and the feathery tails of the Syrian greyhounds waving like banners as they bound after the flying Gazelles. But vain are the efforts of all their enemies to gain upon, or even to keep pace with, the graceful children of the Desert. Horses, men, and dogs are falling rapidly behind; and even the forms of the Gazelle's are becoming indistinct, and with difficulty discernible, except to the eagle-eyes of the prince and his Bedouins, when a new ally is summoned to the assistance of the hunters, and a new foe launched at the heads of the triumphant fugitives. Rising in his shovel- stirrups, in full career, with the grace and dexterity of an Eastern rider. Prince Halim, slipping off the hood from the head of the hawk he carries on his right hand, with a peculiar shrill cry launches the bird into the air in the direction of the fast disappearing quarry. Thus released, the hawk circles rapidly upward until almost lost to sight, a mere speck suspended in blue ether, and seemingly motionless in the cloudless sky, blazing under