FOOTNOTES:
[528] Rām kardan, “to tame, to man.”
[529] Baʿd az garm-i t̤alab shudan.
[530] —t̤ā īnki mag͟hz-i ustuk͟hwān-ash siyāh bi-shavad; an unusual idiom.
[531] Naw-rūz, the Persian New Year’s Day about the 21st March.
[532] “And make it play with the head:” bāzī mī-dihand.
[533] Dakl.
[534] I know of two instances in India of a saker trained to hare taking a very small fawn of a “black buck.”
[535] The author (vide next paragraph but one) means seven or eight altogether.
[536] Bi-qānūn-i maẕkūr du si āhū barā-yash mī-kushand.
CHAPTER XXXVI
TRAINING THE “SHĀHĪN”[539]
Now, my son, let me instruct thee in the training of the Shāhīn so that thy falcon may in the field excel those of other sportsmen, and thou thyself be acknowledged a master. First, thou must thyself be a shāhīn, and thy horse, too, must be like one.
Falconers have compared the Shāhīn to a rifle bullet, and what an expert marksman expects from his weapon you must expect from your falcon; she must not miss when cast at quarry within her compass.
Now know that the nature of the Shāhīn somewhat resembles that of the Goshawks; it does not require many “hand-birds” and “trains.”[540] Amongst falcons[541] it is the hero.
Should a young[542] shāhīn come into your possession, set her on a perch, and feed and fatten her[543] up till the rising of Canopus.[544] Then slightly reduce her food for a day or two, just enough to induce her to step off her perch on to your fist. About half an hour after dark, fit her with a soft part-worn hood[545] that cannot, by hurting her, make her hood-shy; for hood-shyness, in a shāhīn, is a vice that can, by no manner of means, be cured.[546] If the back of the hood be too tight, her ears will be hurt, and she will develop the incurable disease of “ear-ache.”
Every half hour or so, unhood her near the lamp, stroke her on the head and breast, and then replace her on the perch. Then again take her up and hood her, and continue doing this for three or four hours. After that remove her hood and place her on her perch in the place that she is accustomed to sleep in every night. Early next morning take her up, hood her, and give her a small quantity of meat washed in warm water, and then set her on her perch till mid-day. After mid-day take her on the fist and carry her in the shade. At sun-down give her a few pigeon’s or chicken’s feathers washed in warm water, so that she may “cast” early and rid herself of glut and slime.[547] As soon as she has lost some flesh, procure a lure made of the wings of a common crane, and firmly bind a piece of meat on to it. If she jumps to this from the falconer’s fist, even the length of her jesses, it is sufficient.
It is not necessary to teach the shāhīn or the eyess saker to recognize its name.[548] Especially is such teaching improper in the case of the passage shāhīn; for if you have taught the latter to know its name like a passage saker, and should call her by it when she is hooded, she will make her carrier impotent by tearing at his glove,[549] or by “bating,” or hanging head downwards with her claws convulsively fixed in his glove. It is sufficient to teach the shāhīn to come to the luring cry of coo coo.[550]
XXI
STONE-PLOVER
Now as soon as she is thoroughly trained to the lure of crane’s wings, i.e., as soon as she will come eagerly and unhesitatingly to it from the falconer’s fist the moment that it is swung, you must, in the following manner, give her one or two live chickens on the lure. As soon as the hawk binds to the lure, insert the head and neck of the chicken through the wings of the lure, and let the hawk grasp it in her claws. Then, cut the chicken’s throat and feed up the hawk. Give her several chickens in this manner, one in the morning and one in the evening. In the morning, take care that your hawk eats no feathers with her meat, but in the evening give her a “casting” of feathers. Recollect, too, that the higher the condition in which you train and enter a shāhīn the better.
The next step is to fly your shāhīn at a blue rock[551] with eyes partially “seeled” so that it can see out of the top only of the eyes. Go out into the open country; show the pigeon to the hawk and then let it fly. When the pigeon has got away a little distance, cast off your shāhīn so that she may take the pigeon in the air. Cut the pigeon’s throat and feed up the hawk, giving her sufficient food to last her for twenty-four hours. Then carry her home, and with warm water wash away any blood stains, and also carefully cleanse her nostrils from congealed blood. Give her two or three pigeons in this manner.
You must now mark down a “little-owl”[552] somewhere in open country where there are no wells near. Unhood your hawk and walk up towards the owl. As soon as it is on the wing and your hawk shows an inclination to give chase, let her go. If she takes the owl, feed her up. If, however, the owl gets into a hole, quickly cast the lure to your hawk and let her take it: on no account let her settle on the ground, for settling on the ground is in a shāhīn an odious vice.
If the Shāhīn when settled on the ground
Be gorged with delicate and dainty fare
’Twere surely then beyond all reason’s bound,
To hope she’ll take a quarry in the air.
Hood the hawk on the lure and feed her. Now go and pull the owl out of its hiding place and put it in your falconer’s bag for the evening. In the evening—provided your hawk has not been given too much food in the morning—mount your horse and go out into the open plain, to a place where there are neither holes nor wells. Unhood the shāhīn; let her see the owl and then let the owl fly. When it has flown about twenty yards, cast off the hawk. She is certain to take it. Kill the owl and feed up the hawk. You must now fly and kill with her two or three of these “little-owls.”
XXII
HERON STRUCK DOWN BY PEREGRINE (PHOTO TAKEN JUST BEFORE THE HERON TOUCHED THE GROUND)
The next thing to do is to fly her at a stone-plover.[553] You must cast her off with her breast to the wind, and then cut off the plover so that it squats on the ground.[554] If she takes it, feed her up on other food, saving the plover alive for another day in case of accident, for you must not let your hawk’s success make you overconfident. If she fail to take it, lure her and feed her.
If you have a made hawk, it is better to unhood her at the plover first, to show the youngster the way.
Here let me give you a word of caution. Should your shāhīn fail to kill, on no account must you in luring her back release the bagged plover as she comes towards you: do so only twice and she will never after be really good at the lure; she will contract a habit of “waiting on” in expectation of a live bird being thrown out for her, and will ignore the dead lure; then, if you have no live bird by you with which to lure her without delay, some eagle will be attracted to the spot, and she will to a certainty be lost.
Now a properly trained shāhīn should be obedient to the dead lure; she should not require live “hand-birds”[555] to call her down.
To resume; you must first take two or three stone-plover with her, and then two or three hubara.[556] After that, three or four mallard,[557] then a wild goose,[558] and then two or three common heron.[559] Fly her at this quarry in the order mentioned, for a shāhīn improves by degrees[560] and does not require to be entered to large quarry by “hand-trains.”[561] Should you, however, be in a district where all this quarry is not to be found, you must of necessity have recourse to “trains.” Next fly her at a raven.[562] If she take it, give her only a little meat and save the raven alive. On the morrow fly her at this raven from a good long distance: as soon as she takes it, cut the raven’s throat and let her just taste the blood, but feed her up on the flesh of a pigeon or of a chicken, for the flesh of the raven is not a suitable food for hawks.
XXIII
YOUNG PEREGRINE (ENGLISH BLOCK AND INDIAN HOOD)
On the following day take your hawk and go to some spot where only two or three half-tame undisturbed cranes[563] are accustomed to feed. Get close up to them and cast off your hawk. If your shāhīn “bind” to the quarry, get in as quick as you can and secure the crane’s wings;[564] cut its throat, rip open its breast, and feed your hawk.
If the shāhīn bind to the head of the quarry but let it go again after a slight struggle, call her to the lure and quickly feed her up on the warm flesh of a pigeon or of a chicken, and, on the morrow, she will not fail you.
If the shāhīn approach the crane close, but neither strike it nor stoop at it, act in the same way, i.e., lure her and feed her on warm flesh; for amongst falconers it is accepted as a fact that, if a shāhīn chase the quarry at which she is unhooded, only for the length of her leash, and be then quickly fed on warm palatable flesh, she will, on the morrow, chase the same quarry for double that distance.
Fly her, I say, on the morrow, and if she again chases and again fails, lure her and feed her up on warm flesh.
If you have patience and act as directed, she is certain, at the third or fourth flight, to take the quarry.
Recollect that a shāhīn differs in disposition from all other hawks; in disposition it is the most noble. An eyess chark͟h on the contrary, if lured and fed after she has turned tail, will, from the ignobleness[565] of her nature, contract this habit of turning tail. Not so the shāhīn, for if she be rewarded on the lure after a chase of ten yards, she will on the second day chase for fifty yards; and will, on the third day, either take the quarry, or else make such an earnest stoop that she may be considered to have taken it.
If your shāhīn binds to the crane high up in the air, seizing it by the head, and then, when nearing the earth, unbinds and strikes it to the ground, you must be close up to render assistance by seizing the crane to prevent it, if not disabled, from escaping. You should, too, have with you an old made hawk, shāhīn or chark͟h, ready to fly at a quarry that is perhaps only partially disabled; for it is the habit of most shāhīns to unbind and altogether release the quarry before touching the earth.[566] A second made hawk is therefore necessary to secure the partially disabled quarry.
XXIV
INTERMEWED PEREGRINES (FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY LIEUT.-COL. S. BIDDULPH)
Should your shāhīn be buffeted by the crane and in consequence turn tail, you should fly her for a few days at crane just at sunset. Should this expedient fail, try the following remedy:—
Call her to the lure of crane’s wings for a day or two (flying her at no quarry), and kill for her under the lure some live bird. After that mount your horse, go out into the open country and fly her at a raven, an hubara, or a stone-plover, or, failing these three, at a little-owl.[567] Take one of these three with her and feed her on the warm flesh. Next evening fly her at a crane and she will not fail you, but will return to her former excellence. For a shāhīn that has been buffeted by a crane and therefore turns tail, there is no medicine like a flight at a raven or a stone-plover. Don’t, my son, think that you will remake her by flying her at a heron; for on the contrary, you will, by so doing, mar her for crane. Often have I seen a crane-hawk so spoilt.
You may argue that a heron closely resembles a crane in colour and in shape, while a raven does not. Quite so—but a heron is, compared to a crane, a small and feeble[568] quarry, one that your hawk will easily take.[569] Flown at a heron she will say to herself, “Hallo! there are two kinds of crane, one suitable and the other unsuitable; the former is the game for me; no more of the latter.” The raven and the stone-plover, however, have no resemblance to the crane; a successful flight at either, duly rewarded by warm flesh, strengthens a shāhīn’s courage.
If your shāhīn that slays the long-legged crane,
Fly at her prey, and haply fly in vain,
An your heart wish her to resume the chase,
On raven or stone-plover try her pace.
Then, when at length at crane she may be cast,
You’ll find this flight will far surpass the last.
But let her kill a heron—then goodbye!
For naught but easy quarry will she try:
She’ll say, “No strong tenacious crane for me!
So long as easy crane like this I see.”
Another remedy for a crane hawk that has turned tail is to fly her several times with[571] a made hawk, giving the latter a goodish start. When the “cast” has taken one or two cranes in this manner, reverse the process, that is, cast off, first the hawk that turned tail and then a little later the made hawk.
A shāhīn differs from other falcons.[572] Don’t fancy you can give her ten flights in a day without spoiling her. If you work her like this, she will become stale and will be spoilt. One to three flights with a shāhīn are permissible; more are unlawful.[573]
Good Hawking Districts.—Possibly you are wondering to yourself what district will produce for your shāhīn all this varied quarry. Let me tell you that there is first Sulaymāniyah in Kurdistān;[574] next, the province of Bag͟hdād, which has within a radius of two or three farsak͟h all the quarry you want; and lastly, the district of Shīrāz. These are the only three places I have ever come across in my life where all quarry suitable for a shāhīn is to be found.[575]
“Waiting on.”—For “waiting-on” flights, the peregrine[576] or the passage shahin[577] is better than the eyess shahin.[578] If you train your shāhīn[579] to “wait on” she will never take large quarry such as wild goose, common crane, ruddy shieldrake, common heron, etc.; but she will, however, show you excellent sport with small quarry. The beauty of the shāhīn lies in this, that when you gallop on to large quarry, unhooding her at it, she is off your fist like a bullet, to seize it. That his hawk should take unusual quarry that she does not kill in her wild state is the pride of a falconer, and it is in this he exhibits his skill. Pigeons, plover, duck and so on are, in a hawk’s wild state, her natural prey; these she takes without the falconer’s teaching.