50 Bird -Lore He continued to occupy his box at night until January 29, when he was absent again. On February 2, 3 and 4 he went to roost as usual. On February 5 the proprietor of the hotel, feeling that something radi- cal must be done to keep the piazza floor clean, had the Hawk's box neatly boarded up. About six o'clock that afternoon the bird attempted to enter. He mounted to the box from the capital of the pillar and clung there for a moment. Unable, of course, to enter, he descended again to the capital. He repeated five times the procedure of attempting to enter and descending to the capital, once in the meantime perching upon an electric -light wire and scrutinizing the box with outstretched neck. Then he flew away. In a few moments he was back again upon the capital. Once more he at- tempted to enter the box, and once more he perched upon the wire and gazed long and fixedly at his former roosting-place. At ten minutes past six o'clock he gave up and left for the night. But the next day, February 6, at five o'clock P.M., he made repeated and energetic efforts to get into the box. He further showed his preference for it as compared with other roosting-places by returning at six o'clock on the afternoon of February 9 and again at about the same hour on February 10. I continued to see him about the hotel just as often as before, and regularly until such a late hour that he must have had another roosting- place not far away. At another corner of the hotel piazza, distant, I am told, three hundred and twenty feet from the Hawk's preferred box, is a somewhat similar box. The board here, however, is decidedly narrower and the hole in the bottom is twice as large. On February 16 the condition of the piazza floor showed that the Hawk had passed the previous night in this second box. That evening he went in about six o'clock, while I stood near him. He did not alight on a wire, but made a short halt on the capital of a pillar, — not the corner pillar. He entered the box through the hole in the bottom, instead of through the opening at the side. He immediately took up a crouching position inside, without putting his tail and wings through the hole in the bottom. How late in the season he continued to roost here I cannot say, for about this time my observations of his habits came to an end. When well filled, the Kirkwood harbors more than two hundred persons. It stands, with its outbuildings, in an enclosure of a few acres which supports only scattered trees and which is entirely surrounded by a golf links, a polo field and the grounds of a country club. The club-house is within a few yards of the corner of the piazza where the Hawk chose his first roosting-place. It is a much frequented corner. The second corner is scarcely less so.
