Swollen Palate.—If your hawk’s palate becomes swollen—and I have seen a hawk’s palate so swollen that she could not close her beak—then:—Treatment: cast your hawk and examine her mouth. If the swelling is red, brand it lengthways, in two places, with a packing needle, so that pus[669] may form and she may be cured. If the swelling is white and hard, it is an indication that it is of long standing, although it may hitherto have escaped your notice. You must make a long slit in the swelling and then remove the congealed white substance from its inside. After that rub the wound with black pepper, that it may not refill with matter. You must further feed the hawk on the hot lights[670] of a hare, and let her eat this flesh with the blood. Once a day wash out her mouth with either sumac juice or pomegranate syrup.
FOOTNOTES:
[666] Qūsh: a term applied to any large bird of prey, and especially to the goshawk.
[667] This disease is “the frounce i the mouth” of old English falconers. It is said to resemble thrush in children and to proceed from damp. The Boke of St. Albans tells us that “The frounce commyth when a man fedith his hawke withe porke or cattis flesh iiij days to geyder.” In India this disease, though not uncommon amongst the short-winged hawks, does not seem to attack the long-winged hawks. I have never seen or heard of any falcon being afflicted with it. Bert, however (page 82, Harting’s edition), says that the long-winged hawk is more susceptible to it than the short-winged.
[668] Ḥawṣala, “crop.”
[669] Jarāḥat, “wound,” in m.c. is “pus, or matter from an open wound”: mādda is pus inside a swelling before it is opened.
[670] Jigar-i safīd, “white liver,” i.e., “the lungs, the lights.”
CHAPTER XLV
DISEASES OF THE NOSE
Should your hawk be unable to “tire” with force, and should she draw her breath with difficulty and her crop become filled with air, it is a sign that the air passages of her nostrils are blocked. Treatment: for one or two days, give her, as “tiring” and food, the tough thigh of a fowl; for the exertion of pulling at this will induce a flow of water from her nostrils. Should this fail, pound some sneeze-wort[671] very fine, and put it in a fine reed; place one end of the reed on the hawk’s nostril, and blow into the reed so that the powder enters the nostril. After a few sneezes, there should be a flow of water from the nostrils, and the ailment should disappear. Item: mix the juice of coriander seed with the juice of a turnip-radish, and drop this into her nostrils, and she will be cured. Item: with a stick of log-wood, brand her skull from the base of the yellow cere of her beak, upwards, for a length of three barley-corns: if the brand be longer than three barley-corns, it will reach the brain-pan and be injurious. This is a last resort; for, as the Arab proverb has it, “The last of remedies is the cautery.”