Probably the commonest fault in young falconers of the modern school is that of keeping too many hawks. Almost every writer on the subject has warned them over and over again against this rage for being “over-hawked”; and yet it is still the cause of endless failures, disappointments, and disasters. “Don’t you know, if I lose one I like to have another to fall back upon.” Such is the excuse, and a very bad one it is. If a beginner can manage to keep one hawk of any kind in flying order he may consider himself exceptionally clever; and the sole charge of a cast of hawks is quite as much as any amateur ought to undertake, unless he is blessed with a great deal more leisure time than is usually the case. An experienced professional falconer, with a boy to help him, and with nothing else to occupy his time, may manage an establishment of three short-winged hawks, or about five long-winged, or one of the former and three of the latter, short-winged hawks, when in flying condition, requiring about twice as much attention as their nobler cousins. But if it is desired to keep up a larger establishment, there should be, counting in the head falconer, one man, or at least one boy, to every two hawks.

A falconer who attends properly to his charges will find that they monopolise a very large portion of every day—at anyrate from the time when the eyesses arrive, in early summer, to the end of the rook-hawking season in spring. His duties may be divided into those which we may call normal or permanent, and which relate to the hawks which are already in flying order, and only require to be flown and kept in working condition, and exceptional or special duties, such as the hacking of eyesses, and the manning and reclaiming of hawks which are newly caught, newly taken up, or newly removed from the moulting-place. Thus, as in other professions, there are ? 171 ? times of extra pressure, when every hour in a long day has its full complement of busy work, and times of comparative rest, when the labour is a good deal lighter. But at all times the falconer, if he is to excel, must be possessed of certain qualifications, either innate in him or carefully acquired, which will enable him to become a favourite amongst his winged pupils and servants.

Among such qualities the foremost is prudence. A moment of carelessness, or even inattention, may almost every day entail the loss of a valuable hawk. A knot insecurely fastened, a door inadvertently left open, a leash or jess that has become unsound,—all these are examples of small imprudences, some one of which many a falconer will bitterly remember to have been the cause of a catastrophe. Cleanliness and tidiness are virtues none the less desirable in a professional falconer because they were, and still are, a little rare. It is not so easy a matter as it may at first be supposed to keep a hawk-house clean and neat; and the very first aspect of many such places speaks volumes for the character of the owner or his servants. The person who has to manage hawks should be gentle in all his dealings with them. He should have the touch of an organist rather than of a pianist; the hands of a sculptor rather than of a wrestler or quoit-player. Any hurried or sudden movement is offensive and alarming to hawks; and rough treatment of any kind disgusts and makes enemies of them. Patience and a good temper are quite as necessary to a falconer as to an angler—probably more so, as the difficulties and injustices with which the falconer is confronted under modern conditions exceed those which are met with in any other kind of sport. He must be a good judge of the characters of animals, and of their moods and fancies, for there is as much difference in the dispositions of hawks as of human beings, and no two of them, except by a rare accident, can be treated successfully in exactly the same way. His sight and hearing must be good, for much depends upon his ability to keep a long flight in view, and to distinguish the sound of a hawk’s bell in a high wind, amidst the rustle of leaves and grass, the murmur of a stream, or the pattering of rain.

In the golden age of falconry great weight was attached to the possession of good lungs. The “falconer’s voice,” for which Juliet fondly wished, was used not only to lure the tassel-gentle back again, but to encourage him in his efforts, and to cheer his successful or brilliant strokes. A modern trainer is not so ? 172 ? demonstrative. We have—wrongly, I think—almost abandoned the use of calls and cheers to animate our winged friends in the air. But even now a loud voice is a merit in a falconer, if only as enabling him from afar to warn the field and any chance intruders not to meddle with a flight or run in to a hawk that has killed. Those few who still make a practice of “giving their voice” to their hawks are, I think, well repaid for their trouble. For no one can doubt how attentive hawks are to sounds, especially of the human voice, or how thoroughly they become convinced, when well handled, that they and their followers on foot or horseback, and the dogs, when there are any, are all friends and comrades engaged, each in his different way, in the same campaign against the same quarry.

As the huntsman in his kennels, and the trainer in his stables, so the good falconer should take a pride in his mews, or in the place, whatever he calls it, where his hawks are lodged. We have abandoned for the most part the old name of mews—long ago degraded to a new signification—and with it the fashion of building proper quarters for the accommodation of our feathered friends. The modern hawk-house is often a poor substitute for the substantial buildings which our ancestors called mews. Nowadays almost any outhouse seems to be thought good enough for the purpose; and the trained hawks of several amateurs who are justly reputed good falconers are housed in what are little more than shanties, barely able to keep out the rain and wind, and not at all proof against that insidious enemy, the damp. There can be no doubt that the excessive prevalence in our times of the horrible disorder called “croaks” is largely due to the want of care with which our hawks are housed in winter.

A hawk-house should have solid walls, and a floor well raised above the ground, so as to be impervious to damp. It should have a loft or room above it, which will help to save it from extreme variations of temperature by day and by night. In such a place all hawks, except merlins and those which have come from any hot climate, may be kept through all ordinary weathers, care being taken, of course, that the ventilation is sufficient, but in winter not excessive. In times of severe frost or excessive damp a very moderate amount of artificial heat should be introduced. A very good arrangement, when it can be adopted, is for the back wall of the hawk-house to be also the back wall on the other side of a warm conservatory or well-heated room. In such cases it is unnecessary, unless in ? 173 ? exceptional winters, to have any heating apparatus in the hawk-house itself. Merlins and the tropical hawks, such as shaheens, barbarys, and also the desert falcons, should, in cold or damp weather at least, be placed in a room which is over a very well-warmed apartment, and has the flue of one chimney at least running along one of its sides. A room immediately above a kitchen is pretty safe in all weathers for all hawks if the fire is kept up all night, but not otherwise. Where the room is unavoidably isolated, there must be a stove or some heating apparatus; but the heat thrown out must be very moderate indeed, or the hawks when taken out for weathering, or even when left stoveless by day, are nearly sure to catch cold. Changes of temperature in our islands are sudden and severe enough when due to natural causes only, but if they are produced by artificial means no hawk can be expected to endure them with impunity, and least of all gers, merlins, and the denizens of the sunny south. The hardiest hawks are peregrines and hobbies, but these, too, must be given a fair chance, even if it entail upon their owner some inconvenience and expense. Whenever the weather is very wet or damp, with penetrating fogs, opportunity should be taken, when the hawks are all out on their blocks or being carried, to warm the hawk-house thoroughly by artificial means, and purge it of all suspicion of damp.

Adjoining the hawks’ apartment should be another small room, where lures and spare “furniture” can be kept. Meat and food of all kinds should be rigorously excluded from the first-mentioned room, but may be kept, if it is quite fresh, on an emergency in the other, where blocks and bow-perches when taken in out of the rain can be deposited. On the walls in either room may be hung on small pegs or nails the hoods for each kind of hawk; but it is well to mark clearly above each peg a description of the sort of hood which is intended to be there hung, so that in a case of hurry one may not be mistaken for another, and a tiercel’s hood crammed on to a falcon, or a female hobby’s be found wobbling about on the head of a jack-merlin. Every falconer should have in his cupboard a tin box containing a supply of imping needles suitable for the hawks which he keeps, and some spare feathers ready for imping. The same box will hold other small paraphernalia and odds-and-ends, such as waxed thread, pincers for “coping” or blunting the beak and talons, tweezers for putting on jesses, punches for making holes in leashes, scissors, files, and a scrap ? 174 ? of thin leather for making jesses and bewits. Or there may be a compartment where ready-made jesses, bells, swivels, and spare leashes are stored. The lures, well cleansed from all food that has been attached to them, and the hawking gloves, can have their proper place in the side-room.

If the building inhabited by the hawks is large, the upper part may be used as a loft wherein to moult them. If there are hawks of different kinds to be moulted, it must be divided into separate compartments, so that no two of very different size may be together. And each individual goshawk must have a room for itself. It would not be safe to turn falcons and tiercels loose together, nor a female with a male sparrow-hawk. Merlins and jacks may be left together, and in the same place with male hobbies; and probably peregrine tiercels with female shaheens, lanners with lannerets, and perhaps barbarys. But it is not very wise to risk the chumming together of any dissimilar hawks at a time when they are all kept in specially high condition, with no work to do, and ready for the mischief which Dr. Watts assures us is a natural concomitant of idleness. Of course if there is a living-room above the hawks, or above the furniture-room, it may serve most conveniently for a falconer’s or under-falconer’s bedroom, enabling him to be at hand by night as well as day in case there should be anything wrong, such as a hawk hanging by her jesses from the perch, or a scuffle amongst hawks moulting in the same compartment.

At six o’clock in summer, and as soon as it is light in winter, the falconer should be in the hawks’ room. If newly-caught hawks are there, they will be in a compartment from which all daylight has been excluded. Taking them one by one on the fist, he will put on their hoods, and then, lighting a candle, or admitting enough light, he will search for their castings under the screen-perch. If any one of them which has had castings the day before should not have yet cast, he must either put her back on the perch in the dark, or else, if she is far enough advanced in training for this, hand her over to an under-falconer to be carried till she has performed that operation. Under the place occupied by each hawk the pellet should be looked for and examined before it is thrown away with the sweepings of soiled sawdust collected under the perches. As the falconer ascertains that each hawk has cast up a healthy pellet, well-shaped and free from oily mucus, he will be doing no harm if he presents her with a mouthful or two of food, by way of a morning salutation, and just to show that there is no ill-will.

? 175 ?

Then if it is a fine morning, there will probably be a hawk or two which may with advantage be pegged out, either in the sunshine, if she is fond of it, or under the cool shade of a tree. At anyrate, there will be a hawk which will be none the worse for half an hour’s carrying; and if there are merlins, it will be none too early to fly them to the lure. Every falconer, each time he rises, ought to take note of the weather, marking especially the direction and strength of the wind, and should do his best to forecast how the day will turn out. If he sees reason to expect a stormy afternoon, he will prepare to fly the hawks as early as he can; whereas, if it is already blowing or raining hard, he may think it best to provide for the possibility of a late start, taking the chance of an improvement in the weather at midday, or later. He should decide betimes which hawks are certain not to be taken out to the field, and make sure that their allowance of food is ready to be given them early in the day. Such hawks may generally be put out early in the morning, and provided with tirings, at which they may pull away contentedly on their blocks till it is time either to fly them to the lure, or to give them their ration on the fist. In the game-hawking season there will be a consultation with the keeper as to the country to be visited and the dogs to be taken out; and the falconer, having an eye to the direction of the wind, will plan out provisionally the sort of tactics which it will be best to adopt in beating the ground. Beaters and markers should also be secured, and directed as to the order of the day’s proceedings, whether the business in hand is grouse-hawking, lark-hawking, or any other form of sport for which these attendants are required.

After breakfast, on sunshiny days, there will generally be candidates for the bath. Fresh water must be brought; and in very cold weather a cup or two of hot water may be added, to take off the chill. Each hawk, after bathing, should have an hour at least to dry and air herself in the sun and wind. In emergencies, on cloudy days, the old falconers used to dry their hawks after bathing by holding them with their backs to a fire. Hawks do not usually care to take a bath much before eleven o’clock; and they should not be indulged with one after half-past twelve. Those which have bathed will, of course, not be ready to fly till well on in the afternoon, especially as they will have had a very light feed in the early morning, as it is not good to let a hawk bathe on a quite empty stomach. The falconer will generally like to be present while the hawks bathe, ? 176 ? so that he will not be ready to start for the field, even with those that have not bathed, much before noon. This hour, moreover, is full early for peregrines and most of the larger hawks, which are apt to be slack in the pursuit of their quarry when they have, or at least think they have, the best part of the day before them in which to provide themselves with their one daily solid meal.

Hawks which are not yet thoroughly accustomed to the hood should be hooded up with care, so as to avoid any trial of their temper just as they are about to be called upon to do their best. Hawks, of course, ought always to be good at the hood; but some manifest an obstinate repugnance to it, as for instance Vesta, the very excellent game-falcon trained for the Old Hawking Club. The duties of the falconer in the field are referred to at length in the next chapter. As soon as he has returned—which will usually not be much, if at all, before dark—he must be satisfied that each hawk has had the full allowance of food which he had decided to be good for her, that her beak and talons are fairly clean, her feathers in good order, and her swivel and leash properly attached. Then each will be put in her accustomed place on the screen-perch, the leash being securely tied round the perch itself, as described in Chapter III., and the hood, if she is hooded, removed and hung up.

As for the hawks, if any, which, not being destined for the field, have been left at home, either at blocks on the lawn, or indoors, some person will have been left to shift their blocks as they become exposed to the sun, to carry them for a specified time, and perhaps to fly some of them to the lure. Every trained hawk, unless she is put down to moult, or is being flown at quarry, should be exercised daily to the lure or the fist—merlins twice, and all others once. The methods of giving exercise have been already described; but it must be remembered that when once a hawk has been entered the more real flying in the field she gets the better. Otherwise you are between the horns of a dilemma. If you give no exercise the hawk grows heavy, stale, and lazy. If you fly her too much to the lure she may grow too fond of it, and less keen at wild quarry. Good practical falconers are thus rather averse to a too free use of the lure with peregrines and lanners. On the other hand, I have found that merlins cannot well have too much stooping at the lure. Rook-hawks, and others which are never expected to wait on at a height, may often be made to do ? 177 ? a large amount of pretty fast flying when stooping at the dead lure. This sort of practice is of course not to be encouraged in the case of game-hawks or duck-hawks, as tending to lower their pitch, which it is the chief desire of the falconer to keep as high as possible. But long-winged hawks, even in the mere act of waiting on, especially in a strong wind, get a good breather and a good stretching of their wings, if they are always allowed to be uncertain in their own minds whether in the end it will be a partridge or a pigeon that they will have to come down for, or merely the dead lure.

As for the short-winged hawks, and for such others as will not keep on the wing willingly without going to perch, they must be exercised chiefly by the device known as calling off. The most effective plan is that mentioned in Chapter VI., where two men go out, and, standing at a distance from one another, alternately bring the hawk across the intervening space by showing the lure or the outstretched fist. If two men are not available the hawk may be deposited on a railing, gate, or post, and the falconer may walk away, hiding his hands, and when he is as far off as he likes, or as the hawk will allow him to go, may call her and reward her with a few morsels, and then put her down again for the operation to be repeated. A trained hawk will often follow the falconer about for a long time, as he walks along, waiting a while in expectation of being called, and, if disappointed, flitting to a nearer resting-place, or coming right up to him on the chance that his hand will be held out; and if it is not, betaking herself to a neighbouring tree or other convenient place. Such excursions as these, in a park or on the downs, with a favourite hawk always in sight, either in the air or on a conspicuous perch of her own choosing, afford an opportunity of indulging her with the best possible sort of weathering. It is the nearest approach which can safely be made to giving trained hawks their liberty.

It is a common thing with writers on hawking to recommend their readers, when a trained hawk is out of sorts, to put her on a pair of hack-bells, and turn her out to hack for a while. I desire to speak with all respect of a practice which has doubtless been often attempted with success; but I am compelled to say that my own experience is altogether unfavourable to any such experiment. Attempts that I have known made to keep trained hawks at hack have not only failed, but have over and over again entailed the loss of the bird operated upon, sometimes for a time, and sometimes permanently. A strong and ? 178 ? clever hawk, even if she is a bit unwell, and even if she is weighted heavily, will manage to kill something, if she has a real mind to it; and even if she does not, her wanderings may lead her first out of sight, and then into some neighbouring field or place, where a stray gunner may make an end of her. I am not able to advise beginners to turn their hawks loose for any longer time than they themselves or some agent can be near at hand, unless it be in the case of a kestrel or hobby, or other hawk which has never killed wild birds regularly in fair flight.

No ordinary bad weather should deter a falconer from taking his long-winged hawks out to exercise. Rain, unless it is very heavy, will do a hawk no harm during the short time she is flying to the lure or being called off. Even if the rain is heavy, an umbrella can be held over the hawk as she is carried to the exercise-ground and back. Wind must be very high indeed before the trainer should hesitate to fly his hawks at exercise. When they are to be merely called off, they will, when sharp-set, if in good condition, face half a gale of wind. But the two men should, in this case, post themselves rather across wind, and not one exactly down-wind of the other; otherwise the hawk of the up-wind man will have her head always turned directly away from the other, and moreover, if she comes fast towards the latter, may be carried so far past him that she will not take the trouble to fetch up again, and struggle up-wind to a lure of which she has once been disappointed. A game-hawk, especially if it is a passager, should not be kept waiting on very long on a boisterous day. Should she, while in the air, catch sight of a wood-pigeon or house-pigeon down-wind, and give chase, she may be out of sight in a moment, and, if the quarry takes the air, may go miles before you can run or ride five hundred yards. The best hawks rather enjoy flying in a very high wind, and seem to take an obvious pride in exerting their mastery over it. Their stoops at the lure in such weather are often exceptionally fine; and the tremendous pace at which the wind enables them to come down, evidently affords them much inward satisfaction.

In hot and sunny weather some caution is advisable in flying hawks to the lure, as well as in the field. For when in high condition, even if they are hungry, they are sometimes disposed to go soaring, and, as it were, forgetting all about mundane affairs, disappear in airy circles down-wind. Eyesses will, it is true, generally come back when they are tired of soaring. They are reminded, sooner or later, by an internal feeling that ? 179 ? there is such a thing as a garnished lure in the foreground. But suppose a passage peregrine, after stretching her wings for five minutes at a height of a thousand feet, to catch sight of a wood-pigeon crossing the open down. It would be almost too much to expect that she should resist the temptation. In the cool of the day, morning and evening, hawks very seldom soar if they are sharp-set, and have had the chance of a bath most fine days. It is from nine to four o’clock in summer that there is the most risk of it; and hobbies, which are greatly addicted to the habit, should not be flown during these hours in fine weather, unless the owner is prepared to wait twenty minutes, or even longer, for my lord or my lady to finish airing herself in the sky. Very special care must be taken of all hawks during the migration season—that is, for some weeks after the latter part of September and the beginning of April. At the former period, indeed, it is barely safe to let hobbies wait on at all; and the steadiest peregrines and merlins are apt to feel more or less strongly the restlessness born of migratory instincts. Many favourite hawks which seemed a few days ago to be as safe as tame cats, have been known at migrating time to develop quite suddenly an ungovernable wish to travel, and have cleared for foreign parts when they had an opportunity, without a moment’s warning or a word of leave-taking.

Each hawk, after flying to the lure, will be immediately fed up, usually on the way back to the hawk-house or the lawn. As a rule, the earlier a hawk can be fed up the better, for she will be the sooner ready for the field on the next day. Moreover, she will fly better, probably, to the lure if she is aware that that ordeal is often the precursor of a solid meal. The rather common practice of feeding all the hawks at about the same hour—generally late in the day—has nothing that I ever heard of to recommend it. How can a hawk which habitually dines at six o’clock or later be expected to be keen or to fly well when thrown off at her quarry at three or four o’clock? If a peregrine, when it has been finally decided not to fly her in the field that day, is fed at about eleven o’clock, she will be fit to fly on the morrow at any time after noon. The falconer should note in what order his hawks are fed, so that on the next day, unless any special circumstances prevent it, those which have been fasting the longest should be flown the first.

No hawk, after being fed up, should be disturbed, frightened, or shaken about. If the return journey from the field or exercise-ground is long, and the hawk inclined to bate off the fist, ? 180 ? she should be hooded just before or after she has finished her meal; and on returning home she should be put in a quiet place—either on a block where nothing can interfere with her, or on the screen-perch; and if given to bating off, she should remain hooded, or else in a darkened room, till nightfall. No hawk should be allowed ever to finish her meal within sight of another that is still hungry, or to be in a place where she can see a lure or any sort of food without being able to get at it. At no time should a hawk be pegged out in a position where she is exposed to a strong wind, or to a hot sun, except just before and for a while after her bath. Never should food be dragged or pulled away forcibly from a hawk, leaving her hungry on the fist or perch with nothing to eat. The falconer must play the part of a friend, and of a generous friend, not of a niggardly and tyrannical master, who makes use of his superior strength to rob his servant of the good things which she expected to enjoy.

In summer, when the weather is fine and the ground tolerably dry, peregrines, hobbies, and some of the hardiest of the big hawks may be left all night at their blocks on the grass. But the advantages, if any, resulting from such a plan are, I think, more than questionable. It is argued, of course, that wild hawks sleep in the open air, and therefore why not trained ones? But the wild hawk chooses his or her resting-place—almost always a tall tree or rock—far out of reach of the dews and mists which belong to the grass and the lower air. If the wild hawk gets wet, or feels cold at midnight, she has only the elements or herself to blame. If the trained hawk suffers, will she not blame the man who tied her down in a position where she could not escape from these discomforts? A perfectly clean and well-aired hawk-house is, to my mind, as good a place for hawks to sleep in as the finest lawn on the fairest night of the year. What good does a hawk get from bating at the block on to the wet grass from 3 or 4 a.m. till the falconer appears? If wild hawks did this, instead of keeping aloft in the clear air, would they not be likely sometimes to get the croaks?

I have reserved till as late a place as this the question of dieting, the most difficult, if not the most important, part of the falconer’s art. Condition in a trained hawk, as in a trained horse or hound, is the most essential requisite for really great success. Without it the very best hawk will make but a poor show; and with it even a naturally slow hawk can be flown with pleasure and credit. Condition must always depend chiefly upon two things, exercise and dieting. Now, as regards ? 181 ? exercise, it is impossible for a falconer to err on the side of excess. Wild hawks in their airy circlings, and in pursuit of their daily subsistence, traverse an almost incredible dis............