THE GOSHAWK.

Western Star, Issue 1385, 31 August 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE GOSHAWK.

That fine bird the goshawk is almost extinct in this country now: he was common enough once. According to the old works on falconry the very qunlities which made hiai highly prized in thoa° days have been the cause of his destruction in modern times. He is a bird of most determined disposition, large and powerful. Hares, rabbits, grouse, and other creatures of the woods, moors, hillsides, and heath*, found in him a most ferocious enemy. He looks exactly what he is, a free booter. Those I have had the opportunity of observing brought over from the Continent, where the woods and forests are more suited to his particular method of capture than ours, are. He is very swift for a short chase; in comparison, that is, with flight of the jer and the peregrine falcons. He has a knack of striking sideways at his quarry, so as to catch it under the wing when in full flight; a most deadly kind of proceeding.

HARES HE GRAPPLES and clings to with the grip o£ a vice. Pass may jump and rush with frantic mad calls of "Aunt! auut! aunt!" —the cry of the hare in fear and pain —but it is to small purpose, for the bird bites at the Deck, and it is all over. Sometimes if the hare is near thick cover the hawk gets the worst of it, for she rushes into thick stuff and the hawk is knocked off and has a job to get free from the tangl . He is in use at the present time by tne few gentlemen who have revived the ancient sport of falconry Next on our list comes that dwarf of a goshawk, the well-known sparrow-hawk. If anyone curious in the matter will compare them together, he will see at a glance how very like they are in all points with the exception of size ; their habits and hunting localities are very similar, too. In one point they differ; the goshawk being very rare, whilst the sparrow-hawk is a very common bird. Tou will find him about everywhere, and certainly more free than welcome. It is feeding time for the poultry at the farm, which lies snugly between the hills and close to the woods. What a commotion ! The geese sound their cackling trumpsts, ducks quack, guinet-fowls scream, "Came back ! come back !" turkeys gobble, aad the hens cackle, while their iorl and master, bold chanticleer, claps his wings and crowa his loude3t.

MASTER HAWK HAS HEARD THE ROW as he was hunting for his early evening maal, and he intends, if possible, to profit by it. He does not come flying up openly, for caution is very necessary here; but he glides from tree to tree and hedgerows, until he perches on one of the boughs of an old ash close to the trunk, that leans over the cartshod in the yard. Here comes the dame calling to her feathered charges. "What a fluttering ensues ! She gets the hens that have chicks just in front of her, she begins to feed—threw ing first to the larger poultry behind. Very choice the old dame is about her chicks, for they ar« the last she will have tbia seasoD. They are a nice size now and strong, and she can reckon on a nice little sum when she sells them as fine chickens in the beginning of the year. She calls them her pretty creaturs and praises their mother, as they run about her faet, for doing so well by them. Swieh! comes something, almost brushing the old lady's nose. A chick is clutched from before her very feet, and that something in the shape of a sparrow-hawk is away as;ain.—From "Birds of Prey" in the Cornhall Magazine.