A Massachusetts Duck Hawk Aery 51
material were to be found on the littered ledge. and no egg-shells; but these would inevitably have been trodden down and covered up, The youngsters had their crops distended. and fresh. bloody dove-feathers under their feet revealed the Character of the food they contained. Their cries were very like their mother‘s. but weaker; and when they all screamed together. as they did almost incessantly, the racket produced sounded. as I have said. almost like the cackling of a flock of Guinea-fowl.
I made three subsequent visits to the nest. with several trusted comA panions, all sworn to refrain from molesting the birds or revealing their whereabouts to other people. We used up two rolls of ltodak films on the seated young and the attacking mother; but, owing to our inexperience. and the fact that the sunlight was then deeply obscured by forest-fire smoke, none of the pictures proved very good.
The parents were usually away hunting when we reached the aery in the afternoon, and only once or twice did we see them at home together, On one of these occasions we watched them angrily put to rout an unfor- tunate Red-tailed Hawk, who had wandered too near their young. Sev» eral times the female appeared over a farm-house three miles from her hill. flying rapidly in the other direction; and I once saw her returning with booty over the same route. This is in keeping with the habits of Falcons as reported by other observers. who say that the birds do most of their hunting at some distance from their aery. however plentiful the game in its immediate vicinity. On Isola Rossa, a beautiful little bird-island off the west coast of Sardinia (much resorted to. among other species, by the rare Audouin's Gull). my father and I found Peregrines breeding practically in the midst of a large colony of Rock Doves. though the one we shot was crammed full of Black Starlings (Srurmu unitulorl. from the mainland. But I have wandered from my narrative. On the single occasion when we found the male alone on guard, he acted very timid, and hurried away. after a few feeble circlings and squealings. Perhaps he went to seek his wife. She, whenever she returned during one of our Visits. began screeching in the distance. having apparently detected us from afar. and hardly ever ceased to fly back and forth past us and her charges. screaming furiously. as long as we were in the region. When I sat on the ledge beside the babies. photographing them. her agitation became so extreme that she very nearly attacked me outright. It was a most majestic and pathetic spectacle. More than once I felt the breath of her powerful wings upon my face. and often she approached within five yards before swerving aside. Her huge yellow feet were sometimes menacingly extended. and sometimes retracted. as she hurtled back and forth beside the cliff. Once. after we had been some time with the youngsters. the mother returned with a quarry. which she quickly deposited on a rock high up the hillside. [0 be unencumbered for her attack on the intrudersi I went and found the thing—which
