is likewise so at Seville, and all the cities in the south of Spain, and as far north as Toledo. He adds, that "a very moderate flight, to a bird accustomed as this is to remain the whole day on the wing, would waft it from the western coast of the Peninsula to the nearest part of Ireland;" and calls my attention to the subject, in consequence of my having, in a paper published a short time before, alluded to kestrels, as breeding in the towers of churches,-favourite haunts of F. tinnunculoides in Spain. In Ireland, however, this species has not yet been met with; and should it ever appear, "" a flying visit is the most that can be expected from it.

In the Morea, I have with great pleasure watched the elegant and playful evolutions of this interesting miniature of the kestrel. On the 28th of April, 1841, during my first delightful walk there, along the eastern side of the bay of Navarino, so grand in scenery and admirably rich in varied vegetable forms, this bird was met with. On visiting the island of Sphacteria (the scene of Byron's "Corsair"), the next day, eight of them appeared for a long time in company upon the wing, about a lofty cliff rising precipitously from the sea, and on the ledges of which they occasionally alighted, probably having eyries there. When riding in the neighbourhood of Smyrna, a month afterwards, I again saw this species, as I did in the month of June about the Acropolis at Athens, and above the ruins of the castle at Patras. At the last place, a party of six was for some time observed going through their graceful evolutions.* At Malta, I remarked,-but at too great a distance for the species to be determined,—either this bird or the kestrel; which the F. tinnunculoides does not wholly replace in the south of Europe, as both may occasionally be found in the same localities. Every place, too, in which the latter was observed by me, would have equally suited its more northern congener. We occasionally saw both species at one view, as, in a similar case, we did the Common and the Alpine Swift (Cypselus apus and C. melba). The two kinds of Kestrel were thus seen on the precipitous western side of

* As many kestrels will sometimes be seen disporting together about the fine cliffs at the Cavehill, near Belfast. Baron Von Waltershausen-a gentleman distinguished for his most elaborate scientific investigations at Mount Etna-when at the former locality with me, at the beginning of August, 1845, remarked, on seeing from M'Art's Fort, a kestrel hovering below, that he had once found a bird of this species lying dead, though without the appearance of having sustained any injury, within the crater of Mount Etna. May not the sulphureous fumes have caused its death? The F. tinnunculoides was obtained there, by ordinary means, on the same day.

the island of Sphacteria, where the peregrine falcon also presented itself. The small size of the F. tinnunculoides readily marks its species to the ornithologist, with whom it at once becomes a favourite, and courts his attention almost like a pet bird.

THE GOSHAWK.

Astur palumbarius, Linn. (sp.)

Falco

Cannot be included in the Irish Fauna with certainty.

"Goshawk:"

MR. TEMPLETON, in his MS., remarked under "I have seen a young one, got at the rocks of Magilligan, county of Londonderry," and "a specimen [is] in the Dublin Museum." He noted also, under "Gentil Falcon" (another name for the same species), "on the 25th of July, 1809, I saw at Carrickfergus a stuffed specimen that had been shot at the Gobbins."

I have no doubt that the peregrine falcon,* a bird to which both the names just used have occasionally been applied, and that still breeds at the Gobbins, is here meant. It likewise is probably the species alluded to, as at Magilligan, for nowhere are there rocks better suited to its eyrie. When I visited the locality, in the summer of 1833, the common buzzard had a nest there. It is not stated where the specimen in the Dublin Museum was obtained.

Bird preservers have told me of goshawks, killed in Ireland, having been sent to them to be set up, but the species has neither been seen by myself, nor by any of my correspondents throughout the island. It is not, however, by any means improbable that the bird may be an occasional visitant.

*For the peregrine falcon being called goshawk, see that species, p. 48, footnote. The latter term is applied by the peasantry and others, (who should be better informed, to any of the larger Falconidæ, such as the common buzzard, &c.

Is common, at all seasons, throughout the enclosed and wooded parts of Ireland.*

In such localities, we are often attracted by this beautiful creature, with the exception of the kestrel, the most common of the Falconidæ,-sweeping in silence past us, in a flight equally characterized by power and elegance. Approaching silently, it appears meteor-like, but for a moment, as a graceful sweep of wing bears it over the fence, and its flight onward being towards the ground, it is wholly lost to our sight. Its boldness is extreme; but this we almost forgive on account of its undaunted spirit. Many instances of this trait having been made known to me, the most striking shall be given, as illustrating the character of the species.

A keen-sighted friend has mentioned, what, indeed, is not uncommon with respect to the celerity of the flight of the sparrowhawk;-one sweeping closely past him towards a flock of wagtails, and bearing a victim away so suddenly, that he could not tell whether it was seized on the ground, or on the wing.

As remarked by Robert Evatt, Esq., Mount Louise, county of Monaghan :

"When the flocks of linnets, chaffinches, and other little birds assemble of a winter evening to roost among the laurels and young spruce round the house, and their happy noisy chatter tells us what a fuss they are making about their perching-places, the sparrow-hawk comes through the midst of them, from some unexpected quarter, and scatters them like chaff before the wind. The first intimation of his presence is often his departure, and the death screech of his captive.

“The old birds are constantly seen darting through the woods after young thrushes and black-birds, then alighting on the bough

* I have, both in Ireland and Scotland, remarked it to be comparatively scarce in wild and unenclosed districts, though containing abundance of wood.

of a tree, and making another stoop. The rapidity of their movements, and the sudden turns which they make to avoid coming in contact with the branches, is truly astonishing. Although he glides like an arrow through the wood, the sparrow-hawk falls more frequently before cock-shooting parties than other birds of prey. True, his quick perceptions give him full notice of the sportsman's advance with his noisy beaters; yet all the "feathered songsters of the grove" being just then in confusion, he hovers about to take advantage of their unguarded movements, until some sportsman brings him to the ground.

Very often, of a summer evening, the shrill whistle of some little bird directs attention to the sparrow-hawk as he returns home, flying high in air, with a bird in his talons. I am inclined to think they carry their prey considerable distances, having often watched them flying off with it, at a good height, and in a straight line, until they left my sight in the direction of some woods. Nor does the male bird always make his repast in peace, for in July last, while riding along a road through a wood, two sparrowhawks crossed me about twenty times. One had some small bird in his talons; the other hawk (a female, perhaps his own partner), followed him everywhere, while he twisted and turned in all directions, throwing her out at the turns. I watched them for a quarter of an hour, and then rode on.

"A sparrow-hawk robbed me of a little snow-white pea-fowl, a few days old,—the only white one in a brood of five,—singling it out from the others while they were all being fed by a lady at her hall-door steps."

As a gamekeeper at Ormeau, the seat of the Marquis of Donegal, near Belfast, was one day feeding young pheasants, a sparrow-hawk swept close past his feet, and bore off one of the innocents. On attempting, the next day, to repeat the same feat of dexterity, its life fell a sacrifice; the keeper, in expectation of another visit, having come armed with his gun to the feedingground.

At the end of October, 1840, as two shooters, in a boat in Belfast bay, had just fired at and killed a few dunlins (Tringa va

riabilis), a male sparrow-hawk dashed through the smoke the moment after the discharge, poised himself beautifully, so that he might not be wetted by "the stoop," drooped his legs, and with the talons of both feet seizing one of the victims from the surface of the water, bore it off to the trees on the shore. He was within a near shot of the fowlers in the boat, but, fortunately for the bold pilferer, no second gun was charged, or he might have paid the penalty with his life. This species has been shot on the zostera banks of the bay, at low water, when in pursuit of

prey. Boldness about houses, &c.-In October, 1833, Dr. J. D. Marshall received an old female sparrow-hawk, which, in pursuit of a thrush (Turdus musicus), followed it into a cottage in the neighbourhood of Belfast, where both were secured. On some stuffed birds being placed near this hawk, she dashed fiercely at them. Bent on spoliation, the sparrow-hawk scruples not to enter even the church itself; a male bird having, some years ago, been caught by the sexton in Newtownbreda church (co. Down), whither it had pursued a robin.*

A correspondent once received a fine female bird which was shot in a little garden in the centre of the town of Clonmel, where, some doves in a cage attracting her attention, she had made attempts to tear one of them out through the bars. To kill a little bird in its cage, remarks Mr. Evatt, is, with the sparrow-hawk, a very common practice. Even within a room with closed windows, caged birds are not free from its attacks. Some years ago, at Springvale, county of Down, one dashed through a pane of the drawing-room window at a small bird caged within, to the no little alarm and astonishment of several members of the family. An observant friend, when one day driving into Belfast, remarked, almost immediately in front of the vehicle, a sparrow-hawk to dash down at a fieldfare, and strike the ground with so much vio

* The peregrine falcon, though much more powerful, does not carry its boldness to such extremes as the sparrow-hawk. An instance may be given :-One day in the middle of August, when on the elevated downs above Steephill Castle, Isle of Wight, I was astonished by a sudden rush of wind near me, and on turning my eyes instantaneously to the quarter whence it came, saw an old male peregrine falcon swoop at a wheatear on the ground, about ten paces from me; but he did not seize the bird, evidently from being deterred by my proximity.