Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: FALCON AND WILD FOWL. CHAPTER II. " Quam facile accipiter saxn, sacer ales, ab alto Consequitur pennis sublimetn in nube columbam, Comprensamque tenet, pedibusque eviscerat uncis : Turn cruor et vulsee labuatur ab sethere plumee." Virgil. Peregrine Falcon — Truthfulness of Virgil's Description— Haunts of the Peregrine — Hereditary Dominions — Extensive Geographical Distribution—Grouse and Peregrine—Incident in Ireland—Paradise for Wild Foxvl— The Falcon's Watch-tower—Disappointment—Change of Tactics—Attack and Pursuit—Unsuccessful Swoop— Chase continued—Death of the Mallard—The Rod and the Gun—Falcon and Teal. How obviously has ' the poet of nature' pointed to the peregrine in this passage; although certain learned systematists—in compliance, no doubt, with the imperious necessities and refinements of modern classification — have deprived him of one of his ancient titles (accipiter) and conferred it on the ignoble sparrowhawk, whose short wings and general conformation are better adapted to a denizen of the lower regions of the air and of the woods, than of the clouds or theprecipice. Indeed, the description will hold good even as regards the favourite prey (columba) of the peregrine as every falconer knows, and as I can myself testify from personal observation of his habits in a state of nature. On one of the most inaccessible ledges of a lofty maritime cliff on the north-west coast of Ireland a pair of these hawks have for many a long year been established: there have I frequently seen either of them plunge into the midst of a party of rock pigeons (columba lima), as they issued from a deep fissure in the face of the rock, and carry one off to their expectant family. Even the deadly clutch of the falcon at the moment that he grasps his quarry (comprensamque tenet...