Many minutes will elapse between the time when the quarry has been taken and the moment when the hawk has completely finished her repast. Accordingly, the search may be prolonged for at least half an hour before the chance of success is given up and the hawk pronounced “lost” for the time being. Some hawks when in high condition will not break in to their quarry or even plume it before their master or some other person comes up, but, after killing it, stand expectant, looking round about them, and apparently in a sort of brown study, forgetful that such a thing as hunger exists. Some are even so little eager to begin upon the excellent meal which is before them, that they will jump from it to the fist as soon as it is within reach. I have known a merlin fly her best at a mounting lark, take it after a hard flight, and descend with it to a heap of stones. Lighting a cigar, and sitting down beside a neighbouring rick to wait for her to break in, I have seen her presently go off unconcernedly to another resting-place with nothing in her feet, and, walking up to the heap of stones, have found the lark lying there, dead and unplucked. The hawk must have been flying almost uniquely out of love for the sport, and not with a view to satisfying any hunger which she felt at the time; nor is this the only time that I have known such a thing occur.

As a rule, however, trained hawks in high fettle are very far from preferring a journey to the fist or the lure to devoting their attention to wild quarry. Much more often the difficulty is to persuade them that for the moment they must return to their place on the hand in order that they may be provided with what they are hankering after—another flight. Almost all hawks which are in the habit of constantly killing and being fed up upon wild birds develop a passion for sport, and will not easily, when once they have been thrown off, abandon the idea that they are to kill something before they come back. It is for this reason that I have advocated the frequent practice of flying merlins to the lure and sparrow-hawks to the fist, not only when the hawk is not to be used in the field, but when she is. Few things are more vexatious than the delay which occurs when a hawk, however good in other respects, is bad at the lure, and keeps the whole field waiting until it is her good pleasure to come down. Such performers as Queen and Sis, and the famous rook-hawk Bois-le-Duc, which fly for a week or more, killing daily without any miss, are in danger of quite forgetting what a lure is like, unless they are exercised to it for mere practice from time to time. Here, again, the question of dieting will be found to be of much importance. A hawk may be ready enough to fly wild quarry long before she is ready to come to the lure. An extra hour of fasting on the one hand, or an extra ounce of food on the other, may make all the difference in the alacrity of the hawk when required to come down.

In spite of all the falconer’s care, there will be times when a hawk stands obstinately at perch, refusing contemptuously to come, or perhaps even to look, at the dead lure. On such occasions, if time is valuable, it may sometimes be expedient to resort to the live lure. This, however, should always be regarded as a last resource. If reserved for special occasions it will never fail to bring down the most disobedient offender, but if live lures are commonly used they lose part of their efficacy, and are apt to become almost as much despised as the ordinary dead ones. Of course when live lures are used pains will be taken to make the process as little disagreeable as possible to the creature whose life is risked. When a pigeon is employed, as it almost always is for any of the big hawks, a pair of soft and broad jesses should be attached to its legs, and the ends of those to a strong but fine cord or creance, or a noose of soft cord may be passed round each leg by means of the double-ring knot shown in Figs. [26], [27].

When the pigeon (or lark or other bird) is thrown up it should be allowed to fly a short distance, then gently stopped by the creance and allowed to alight on the ground. As the hawk comes at it, it can be jerked away with a steady pull, and, as the hawk throws up, it can be secured and hidden, while a dead pigeon of the same colour is thrown down in its place. No great amount of dexterity is required to execute this little manœ]uvre. The hawk will be taken up on the dead bird, and the live one liberated or returned to its dovecot none the worse for its perilous adventure. It is only when the falconer bungles his part of the business that the live lure is struck and either killed or hurt.

For sparrow-hawks or merlins, when they decline to come down, and stand waiting for the chance of another flight, another device may sometimes be employed with a view to saving time. There has been an unsuccessful flight, and the little hawk goes to perch upon a rick, neglectful of the proffered fist or lure. She came out, as she has made up her mind, to taste blood, and blood she means to have, if she has to wait for it till sundown. As you cannot afford to wait her good pleasure till then, you may settle the matter by a sort of compromise. Leave her to herself upon the rick, and walk the surrounding country until you put up the quarry of which she is so much in want. By driving the fields or hedges constantly towards her you may beat a considerable extent of ground. If you draw it blank go on a little farther. As the hawk sees you beginning to beat that farther country, ten to one she will come on after you and take up her position on a fresh resting-place nearer the scene of your operations. You may go on thus sometimes for quite a long walk, the hawk not, indeed, standing on your fist in orthodox style, but keeping in a place where she can start at anything you put up with a fair chance of overtaking it. As soon as anything so put up has been taken, you pick up your rebellious hawk in the same way as if she had flown from the fist, and, if you are wise, you do not give her a big crop. In the case of merlins there is another plan: you may fly another hawk while the first is sulking or fooling away her time on her self-selected perch. The latter will indubitably join in when you throw off the hawk on your fist, and you will have a double flight, after which, if it ends in a kill, you will be able to take up both hawks easily enough.

In theory, after every unsuccessful flight the hawk ought to observe certain fixed rules of conduct. Peregrines and almost all other long-winged hawks ought first to throw up over the place where the quarry has put in, and then wait on a while for the falconer to come up. Short-winged hawks, and often lanners, should take perch as near as they conveniently can to the quarry’s place of refuge; and merlins will get still nearer, very often waiting on the ground within a few feet of the hidden lark. From these various situations they ought, if in proper order, to be ready to come whenever the falconer wishes—to the fist if they are short-winged, to the lure if long-winged. It is also, alas! possible that they may have failed through being outflown—beaten fairly in the air. Directly the falconer sees, by the spreading of the hawk’s wings, that this sad event has occurred, he will begin to swing his lure, and in such case my lady ought—and generally will—at once rally to headquarters. The young falconer should endeavour from the first to keep his charges in such condition that they will always come to the lure. If, at the same time, they are keen enough to do this and high-fed enough to do themselves justice in a hard flight, they may be called really well trained. Here lies the real difficulty of hawking—to strike the balance justly between too servile obedience and too disdainful independence. Every day, and with every hawk, whether eyess or passager, the falconer is confronted with it, only in the case of passagers it is naturally more obvious. Wild-caught hawks are only brought by degrees, and with a good deal of trouble, to really like the dead lure, whereas to most eyesses their first notion of working for their living is connected with the slight trouble of flying either to the lure or to the hack board. Yet of the two it is much more essentially necessary that the passage hawk should come down quickly after failing in a flight, for if she does not, she will hang about for a more or less limited time near the spot where she lost her intended prey. And every additional minute that she stays out alone, especially if out of her master’s sight, she is being reminded more and more of her old life at large. Then, if even she does not go soaring or prowling about in the deliberate search for quarry, she may espy some passing wood-pigeon or other too tempting bird, and be off in pursuit before any of the hawking party are near enough to keep her in sight. And a passage hawk which has flown and fed herself on her own account is, of course, much less likely to be recovered than an eyess, to which real liberty is a blessing hitherto unknown. With the latter the balance of danger lies often on the side of making them too fond of the lure.

The falconer should have with him in the field a pencil and small notebook, or at the least a card, upon which he can jot down a brief note or record of each flight, so that on his return home he can enter in his quarry-book a summary of the day’s sport. The performances of each hawk should also be recorded in this book, as it is only by reference to this authentic volume, correctly kept day after day, that it can be known and remembered how she has acquitted herself. On the chance that it may be useful as a specimen, I give here an extract from the quarry-book which I keep, and which has been found to record pretty fully and in an exceedingly small space the chief points of interest in every day’s proceedings. The first column gives the month and the name of each hawk, the second and following columns give the numbers of the days of the month and the scores made by each hawk. The units mean that a flight was successful, the zeros that it was not. When a fraction, such as ½, occurs it signifies that the hawk flew double, in company with another, and that the flight ended in a kill. The sign ％ stands for a double flight in which the quarry escaped. L means that a hawk was lost or left out, and C that she was recovered. At the foot may be a short note as to the day’s weather.

September.1234
Eva...1 1 10 ½ 1 1 0 1 1 1
May...1 1 1 ½ 0 1 0 ¾ 0 1 1
Ruy Lopez0 L...C 10 0 ¼ 1
WindGale.½ Gale.High.Moderate.

It is convenient also, and not at all troublesome, to keep a daily record of the flights and kills up to date. Such a score will read as follows:—