THE Accipiter of the ancients, and the Epervier of the French, is a spirited, handsomely shaped bird, about as big as a large wood pigeon; his beak is short, crooked, and of a bluish tint, but very black towards the tip; the tongue black and a little cleft; the eyes of a mean size. The crown of the head is of a dark brown; above the eyes, in the hinder part of the head, sometimes are white feathers; the roots of the feathers of the head and neck are white; the rest of the upper side, back, shoulders, wings, and neck, of a dark brown. The wings, when closed, scarcely reach to the middle of the tail; the thighs are strong and fleshy, the legs long, slender, and yellow; the toes also long, and the talons black. The female, which is, as in other birds of prey, much larger than the male, lays about five eggs, spotted near the blunt end with blood-red specks. When wild, they feed only upon birds, and possess a boldness and courage above their size; but in a domestic state they do not refuse raw flesh and mice.

Is of the hawk kind, but of an ignoble class. He is easily distinguished from any other birds of prey by his forked tail, and the slow and circular eddies he describes in the air, whenever he spies, from the regions of the clouds, a young duck or a chicken, strayed too far from the brood; which, pouncing on it with the rapidity of a dart, he seizes in his talons, and carries up to destroy without mercy. He is larger than the common buzzard; and though he weighs somewhat less than three pounds, the extent of his wings is more than five feet. The head and back are of a pale ash colour, varied with longitudinal lines across the shafts of the feathers; the neck is reddish; the lesser rows of the wing feathers are party-coloured, of black, red, and white; the feathers covering the inside of the wings are red, with black spots in the middle. The eyes are large, the legs and feet yellow, the talons black.

THE FALCON

Is a predaceous bird, of which there are several species. The Gerfalcon is found in the northern parts of Europe; and, next to the eagle, it is the most formidable, the most active, and the most intrepid of all voracious birds, and is the dearest and most esteemed for falconry. The bill is crooked and yellow; the irides of the eye dusky; and the whole plumage of a whitish hue, marked with dark lines on the breast, and dusky spots on the back.

The Peregrine Falcon is as large as the moor buzzard. The bill is blue at the base, and black at the point; the head, back, scapulars, and coverts of the wings, are barred with deep black and blue; the throat, neck, and upper part of the breast, are white, tinged with yellow; the bottom of the breast, belly, and thighs, are of a grayish white; and the tail is black and blue. They breed among the rocks of Caernarvonshire, and in the north of Scotland.

Is about the size of the Goshawk, but of a thicker body. The head is covered with cinereous feathers, mixed with black; the throat and part of the breast are spotted with ash colour; and the body is of a dark reddish brown, marked with small white lines.

The Red Indian Falcon is about the bigness of the Mountain Falcon. The bill is cinereous, the cere yellow; the back and wings of a reddish hue; the breast and belly of a mixture of ash colour and brown; and an oblong reddish spot proceeds from the interior corner of each eye. It is a handsome bird, and he shares with all the kind that keenness of sight, which is so useful to them, in singling out their devoted prey from the regions of the air, down to the darkest thickets of the woods. Several of the Falcons and Hawks were formerly trained to kill birds for their keepers; and different names were given to the same species at

different ages, as is still practised with respect to other domesticated animals.

In Syria there is a small variety of the Gentil Falcon, which the inhabitants call Shaheen, and which is of so fierce and courageous a disposition, that it will attack any bird, however large or powerful, which presents itself. "Were there not," says Dr. Russel, in his Account of Aleppo, " several gentlemen now in England to bear witness to the fact, I should hardly venture to assert that, with this bird, which is about the size of a pigeon, the inhabitants sometimes take large eagles. This Hawk was in former times taught to seize the eagle under the pinion, and thus depriving him of the use of one wing, both birds fell to the ground together; but the present mode is to teach the Hawk to fix on the back, between the wings, which has the same effect, only that the bird tumbling down more slowly, the falconer has more time to come to his Hawk's assistance; but in either case, if he be not very expeditious, the Falcon is inevitably destroyed. I never saw the Shaheen fly at eagles, that sport having been disused before my time; but I have often seen him take herons and storks. The Hawk, when thrown off, flies for some time in a horizontal line, not six feet from the ground; then mounting perpendicularly, with astonishing swiftness, he seizes his prey under the wing, and both together come tumbling to the ground."