The ornithology of Francis Willughby of Middleton in the county of Warwick Esq, fellow of the Royal Society in three books : wherein all the birds hitherto known, being reduced into a method sutable to their natures, are accurately described : the descriptions illustrated by most elegant figures, nearly resembling the live birds, engraven in LXXVII copper plates : translated into English, and enlarged with many additions throughout the whole work : to which are added, Three considerable discourses, I. of the art of fowling, with a description of several nets in two large copper plates, II. of the ordering of singing birds, III. of falconry / by John Ray ...

A SUMMARY OF FALCONRY, Collected out of several Authors.

FAlconry is usually divided into two parts: The first concerning the re∣claiming and managing of Hawks: The second concerning the diseases of Hawks, their signs, prevention, and cures. Which method I shall also observe.

In the first part I shall give 1. An Exposition of some words and terms of Art. 2. Some general observations. 3. I shall proceed to the managing and reclaiming of 1. Long-winged Hawks, viz. The Falcon, Ger-falcon, Lanner, Merlin, and Hobby. 2. Short-winged Hawks, viz. The Goshawk, and Sparrow-hawk.

CHAP. I. Terms of Art used in Falconry explained.

B.

• BAting, is endeavouring to fly off the Fist or Pearch to which the Hawk is tied: from the French word Battere.
• Bathing needs no explication.
• Bowsing is when a Hawk drinks often, and seems to be continually thirsty.
• A Brancher, Vide A Ramage Hawk.

C.

• CRabbing is when Hawks, standing too near, fight one with another.
• A Creance is a fine small long line of fine and even twined Packthred, which is fastned to the Hawks Lease.
• The Cere is that skin which covereth the base of a Hawks Bill, from the Latine word Cera, signifying Wax, because it is in most birds of prey of the colour of Bees Wax; The skin of the Legs and Feet, as far as it is bare of feathers, is also so called.
• Check, or to kill check is when Crows, Rooks, Pies, or other Birds coming in the view of the Hawk, she forsaketh her natural flight to fly at them.
• Casting is any thing you give your Hawk to cleanse her gorge with, whether it be Flannel, Thrums, Thistle down, Feathers, or the like. What ever you give them of this kind, over-night, or at any other time, it is the nature of these Birds to cast it up again the next morning, or after a convenient time, made up into a lump or pellet.
• A Cadge is that on which the Falconers carry many Hawks together, when they bring them to sell.
• To Cope a Hawk is to cut her Beak or Talons.

D.

• DIsclosed is newly hatcht.
• Dropping is when a Hawk mutes directly downward, and jerketh it not long ways from her.

E.

• TO Endew is when a Hawk digesteth her meat, not only putting it from her gorge, but cleansing her pannel.
• An Eyas or Nyas Hawk is a Hawk taken out of the Nest, or brought away in the Nest.
• The Eyrie is the Nest, or place where Hawks build and breed their Young.

G.

• THe Gorge is that part of the Hawk which first receiveth the meat, called in other fowls the Craw or Crop.
• Gurgiting is when a Hawk is stuft or suffocated with any thing, be it meat or ought else.

I.

• THe Ink, whether it be of Partridge, Dove, or any other prey, is the Neck from the Head to the body.
• Intermewd is from the first exchange of a Hawks coat, or from her first mewing till she come to be a white Hawk.
• Jesses are those short straps of leather, which are fastned to the Hawks Legs, and so to the Lease by Varvels, Anlets, or such like.
• To Imp is to put a feather into Wings or Train, instead of one lost or broken: from the Latine impono.

L.

• THe Lease is a small long thong of leather, by which the Falconer holdeth his Hawk fast, folding it many times about his finger.
• The Lure is that whereto Falconers call their young Hawk, by casting it up in the air; being made of Feathers and leather, in such wise that in the motion it looks not unlike a fowl.

M.

• THe Mail of a Hawk is the Breast or Plumage of the Breast in reference to its co∣lour: So they say a Hawk changes the mail, or is white-maild, &c.
• To mail a Hawk is so to wrap her up in a handkerchief, or other cloth, that she may not be able to stir her Wings or struggle.
• Muting is the excrement or ordure that comes from a Hawk, and contains both dung and urine.
• A make-hawk is an old staunch flying Hawk, which being inured to her flight will easily instruct a younger Hawk.
• To make or manage a Hawk, is by Art to prepare, fit, and instruct her to fly at any game.
• The Mew is the place, whether it be abroad, or in the house, where you set down your Hawk during the time she changes her feathers. The word mew signifies to change, being derived of the Latine muto.

N.

• THe Nares, i. e. The Nosthrils: It is a Latine word.

P.

• PLuming is when a Hawk seizeth on a Fowl, and plucks the feathers from the body.
• Plumage are small downy feathers, which the Hawk takes, or are given her for casting.
• The Pelt is the dead body of any fowl however dismembred.
• ...

• The Pill and pelf of a fowl is that broken remains or refuse, which are left after the Hawk hath been relieved.
• The Plume is the general colour or mixture of feathers in a Hawk, which sheweth her constitution.
• A Pearch is that whereon you set down your Hawk when you put her off your fist.
• The Pannel is that part of the Hawk next her fundament. I take it, they mean the stomach [ventriculus] by this word.

Q.

• THe Quarry is the fowl which is flown at, and slain at any time, especially when young Hawks are flown thereto.

R.

• A Ramage-Hawk or Brancher is a young Hawk that hath just left the Nest, but flies not far from it, only leaping from bough to bough, and following the old one.
• Ramage is also said of a Hawk that is wild, coy, or disdainful to the man, and hard to be reclaimed.
• Reclaiming is to tame, make gentle, or bring a Hawk to familiarity with the man.
• A Rufter-hood is the first hood a Hawk wears, being large, wide, and open be∣hind.

S.

• THe Sarcel is the extreme pinion feather in a Hawks Wing.
• Seizing is when a Hawk takes any thing into her foot, and gripeth or holdeth it fast.
• Slicing, is when a Hawk muteth from her long-ways, in one entire substance, and doth not drop any part thereof.
• Stouping is when a Hawk being on her Wings at the height of her pitch, bendeth vio∣lently down to strike her prey.
• Summed is when a Hawk hath all her feathers, and is fit to be taken out of the mew.
• Setting down is putting a Hawk into the mew.
• A Sore-hawk is from the first taking her from the Eyrie till she hath mew'd her fea∣thers.
• To Seel a Hawk is artificially to sow up her Eyes, so that she may see but little.

T.

• THe Train of a Hawk is her Tail.
• Trussing is when a Hawk raseth a fowl aloft, and so descendeth down with it to the ground.
• To truss a Hawk is to tye her Wings so as she cannot stir them.

U.

• UNsummed is when a Hawks feathers are not come forth, or not come to their full length.
• Varvels joyning the Jesses to the Lease.

W.

• WEathering is setting abroad your Hawk to take the air either by day or by night, in the frost or in the Sun, or at any other season.

CHAP. II. Some general Rules and Observations for a Falconer or Ostrager to remark and practise, collected out of Carcanus and other Authors.

1. A Falconer out to learn and mark the quality and mettle of his Hawks, to know which he shall fly with early, and which late.

2. He must be fond of his Hawk, patient with her, and careful to keep her clean of Lice and Mites, &c.

3. He must rather keep his Hawk high and full of flesh than poor and low, being when poor much more subject to infirmities.

4. Every night after flying he must give her Casting, sometimes Plumage, some∣times pellets of Cotton, or the like: Sometimes also he must give her Physic, as by her casting and mewts he shall perceive her to need it.

5. Every night he must make the place very clean under her Pearch, that he may know assuredly whether she hath cast or not; and by her casting whether she needs scouring, Stones, or the like.

6. He must remember every day to weather his Hawk in the Evening; excepting such days wherein she hath bathed; after which in the Evening she should be put in a warm room, on a Pearch with a Candle burning by her, where she must sit unhooded if she be gentle, to the end she may trick her self, and rejoyce by enoiling her after the water, before she fly again. In the morning early he must also set her out to wea∣ther, where she may cast, if she hath not done it already, and there keep her hooded till such time as she goes into the field.

7. In feeding his Hawk he must beware of giving her two sorts of meat at one time; and have a care that what he give her be perfectly sweet.

8. If he have occasion to go abroad, let him not leave his Hawk tied on too high a Pearch, for fear of bating and hanging by the heels, whereby she may spoil her self. Two Hawks must not be set so near as to approach one another, for fear of crabbing.

9. He ought to carry into the field with him mummy in powder, with other medi∣cines; for frequently the Hawk meets with many accidents, as bruises at encoun∣ters, &c. nor must he be unfurnished with Aloes washt, Cloves, Saffron, Casting, Cryance, and such like necessary implements, as coping Irons to cope the Beak and Ta∣lons, if need be.

10. He must be able to make his Lures, Hoods, Jesses, Bewets, and other needful furniture.

CHAP. III. Of the reclaiming and managing long-winged Hawks, and first of the Falcon.

§. I. Of the reclaiming and making a Falcon, out of Turbervile, according to Tardiff, as I suppose.

A Falcon newly taken should be seel'd in such sort, that when the seeling begins to slacken, she may see forwards the meat that is streight before her, for she is better content when she sees it so, than if she saw it sideways, or looking back. And she should not be seel'd too streight.

Such a Hawk should have all new furniture, as new Jesses (maild) a Lease made with a button at the end, and new Bewets. You must also have a little round stick hanging in a string, with which you must frequently stroak your Hawk. For the more she is handled, the sooner and better will she be reclaimed and manned, she must have two good Bells, that she may the better be found and heard when she stir∣reth or scratteth. Her Hood must be well fashioned, raised and bossed against her Eyes, deep, and yet streight enough beneath, that it may better abide on her head without hurting her. You must also a little cope her Beak and Talons, but not so near as to make them bleed.

The Soar Falcon, which hath been timely taken, and already passed the Seas, is held by some to be the best Falcon, and also hard to be won and manned: Such an one you must feed with warm meat, as Pigeons, and such like quick birds, until she be full gorged, twice a day for three days. For you must not all at once break her off her accustomed diet, which was warm meat.

When you feed her you must whoop and lure as you do when you call a Hawk, that she may know when you will give her meat.

You must unhood her gently, giving her two or three bits, and putting on her Hood again give her as much more. Be sure that she be close seeled. After three days, if you perceive her feed with a good appetite, begin to abate her meat, giving her but little at once and often till Evening, and bear her late on your fist before you go to bed, setting her near you, that you may wake her often in the night. Be∣fore day take her on your fist again, with some quick bird. After two or three nights, when you find she begins to grow gentle, and feed eagerly on good meat, change her diet, giving her sheeps heart, often, but little at once.

Late at Even let her seeling thread a little loose, spouting water in her face, that she may jeouk the less, and watching her all night hold her upon your fist unhooded. But if she see any thing she mislikes, and makes shew of being afraid, carry her into some dark place, where you have no more light but to hood her again. Afterwards give her some beaching of good meat; and watch her divers nights together till she be reclaimed, and jeouk upon the fist by day. Although to let her jeouk also some∣times in the night will make her the sooner manned. In the Morning by break of day give her warm meat. When she begins to be acquainted you may unhood her in the day time far from company; at taking off, and after putting on the Hood, giving her a bit or two of meat. For to unhood her in a place where she may be frayed is enough to mar her at first. When she begins to be acquainted with company, and is sharp-set, unhood her, and give her a bit or two, holding her right against your face, for that will cause to dread no company. At night cut the thread wherewith she was seeled. You need not watch her, but only set her by you, and wake her two or three times in the night. For over-watching is not good, if she may be reclaimed other∣wise. When you have brought her thus far, then give her washt meat, laid in clear water half a day, and beach her in the morning, that she may always have somewhat in her gorge. Cause her to feed in company, giving her about Sun-rising the wing of a Hen or Pullet, and at Evening take the foot of a Hare or Coney, chopt off above the joynt, and flay it, cutting away the Claws; steep the skin in fair water (pressing and wringing it a little) the which you shall give her with the joynt of the pinion of a Hens wing. Give your Hawk no feathers till she be throughly reclaimed: For till then she dares not cast on the fist: and on the fist you must bear her till she be through∣ly manned. When she makes semblance to cast, unhood her gently by the tassel of the hood. [You may give her two days washt meat, and the third Plumage, as she is clean or foul within.] When she hath cast, hood her again, giving her nothing to eat till she hath gleamed after her casting; but when she hath cast and gleamed give her a beaching of hot meat in company, by two or three bits at once: And at Evening make her plume a Hens wing, being in company also.

If the feathers of her casting be foul or slimy, and of a yellowish colour, be sure to cleanse her with washt meat and casting: If she be clean within, give her not so strong casting as Hares feet, but the pinion of an old Hens wing, or the neck-bone chopt four or five times between the joynts, washed and steeped in fair water.

§. II. How to lure a Hawk lately manned.

HAving well reclaimed her, throughly manned her and made her eager and sharp∣set, then you may venture to feed her on the lure.

But before you shew her the lure you must consider these three things: 1. That she be bold and familiar in company, and no ways afraid of Dogs and Horses. 2. That she be sharp-set and hungry, regarding the hour of the Morning and Evening when you will lure her. 3. That she be clean within. The Lure must be well garnished with meat on both sides, and you must abscond your self when you would give her the length of the Lease. You must first unhood her, giving her a bit or two on the Lure, as she sitteth on your fist: Afterwards take the Lure from her, and so hide it that she see it

not; and when she is unseized, cast the Lure so near her that she may catch it within the length of her Lease; use your voice according to the custom of Falconers, and feed her upon the Lure on the ground, with the heart and warm thigh of a Pullet. Having so lured her at Evening give her but a little meat, and let this luring be so time∣ly that you may give her Plumage, and the jack of a joynt.

In the Morning betimes take her on your fist, and when she hath cast and gleamed give her a little beaching of warm meat. Afterwards when it is time to feed her, take a Creance, and tie it to her Lease, and go into some pleasant field or meadow, and give her a bit or two on the Lure; and if you find that she is sharp-set, and hath seized eagerly on the Lure, then give her some one to hold, to let her off to the Lure. Then unwind the Creance, and draw it after you a good way; and let him which holds the Hawk hold his right hand on the Tassel of the Hawks hood in readi∣ness, so that he may unhood her as soon as you begin to lure: And if she come well to the Lure, and stoop upon it roundly, and seize it eagerly, then let her eat two or three bits thereon. Then unseize her and take her off the Lure, hood her, and deli∣ver her again to him that held her, and going further off lure her, feeding her as be∣fore with the accustomed voice. Thus lure her every day further and further off, till she is accustomed to come freely and eagerly to the Lure. After this lure her in company, but have a care that nothing affright her and when you have used her to the Lure on foot, then lure her on horseback, which you may effect the sooner, by cau∣sing horsemen to be about you when you lure her on foot: Also you may do it the sooner by rewarding her upon the Lure on horse-back among horsemen. When this way she grows familiar, let some body on foot hold the Hawk, and he that is on horse∣back must call and cast the Lure about his head. Then must the holder take off the hood by the Tassel: And if she seize eagerly upon the Lure, without fear of man or horse, then take off the Creance, and lure her loose at a greater distance. And if you would have her love Dogs as well as the Lure, call Dogs about you when you feed her, or give her Tiring or Plumage.

§. III. Of bathing a Falcon lately reclaimed, and how to make her flying, and to hate the Check.

HAving weaned your Hawk from her ramageness, she being both ways lured, throughly reclaimed, and likewise in good case, offer her some water to bathe her self in, in a Bason, wherein she may stand up to the thighs, chusing a temperate, clear day for that purpose. Having lured your Hawk, and rewarded her with warm meat, in the Morning carry her to some bank, and there hold her in the Sun till she hath endewed her gorge, taking off her hood, that she may preen and pick her self: That being done hood her again, and set her near the Bason, and taking off her hood let her bathe as long as she pleases: After this take her up, and let her pick her self as before, and then feed her. If she refuse the Bason to bath in, shew her some small Ri∣ver or Brook for that purpose. By this use of bathing she gains strength and a sharp appetite, and thereby grows bold: But that day wherein she batheth give her no washt meat.

If you would make your Falcon upwards, the next day after she hath bathed get on horse-back, either in the Morning or Evening, and chuse out some field wherein are no Rooks or Pigeons: Then take your Lure well garnished on both sides, and having unhooded your Hawk give her a bit or two on the Lure, then hood her: Af∣terwards go leisurely against the Wind, then unhood her, and before she bate, or find any Check in her eye, whistle her off from your fist fair and softly. As she flieth about you trot on with your horse, and cast out your Lure, not suffering her to fly long about you at first: Continue thus doing Morning and Evening for seven or eight days. But if you find your Hawk unwilling to fly about you, or stoop to the Lure, then must you let her fly with some Hawk that loves the company of others, and will not rove at any Change or Check: And that must first be done at a Partridge, for they will not fly far before the Hawk. If she hath flown twice or thrice, cast out the Lure, and reward her on horse-back, feeding her up to a full gorge, on the ground, with good hot meat, to make her more couragious and resolute in flying, and to return to you with a better will. If the fowl you flew her at be killed by another Hawk, let her feed with him a little, and then further reward her on the Lure.

If you would have your Hawk prove upwards and high-flying, you must let her fly with such as are so qualified. If she love the company of others, and is taught to hold in the Head, then if the Fowl be in Pool, Pit, or Plash, cast off your high∣flying Hawk, and let him that hath your new-lured Hawk get under the Wind, and when he seeth his advantage let him unhood her, and if she bate, it is out of desire to get up to the other Hawk. Let him then cast her off, and before she get up to the other, now near his full pitch, lay out the Fowl. If she kill her Game reward her with the heart, and let her partake of the Breast with the other Hawk.

To take your Falcon from going off to any check, thus you must do. If she hath killed a check, and hath feed thereon before you could come in, rebuke her not severe∣ly at first, but take her down to the Lure, give her a bit or two, hood her, and fly her not in three or four days; and if you do, let it be where no checks are: But if you come in before she hath tasted the check she hath killed, then take the Gall of a Hen and anoint the breast of the fowl she hath killed [any other bitter thing will do, but you must not put on too much] and this will make her hate to go at Check again, hving little list to fly at such a fowl.

§. IV. How to enseam and make a Falcon, with her castings and scowrings, &c.

THe longer a Falcon hath been in the Falconers hands the harder she is to be en∣seamed: Because a Hawk that preyeth for her self feeds cleaner and better ac∣cording to her nature; and hath the benefit of open air, and more exercise. When you draw your Hawk out of the Mew, if she be greasie, (which you shall know by the roundness of her thighs, and fulness of her body, the flesh being round, and as high as her Breast bone,) and if she be well mew'd, and have all her feathers full sum∣med, then give her in the Morning a bit or two of hot meat: at night give her but little, unless it be very cold. If she feed well and freely, then give her washt meat thus prepared: Take the Wings of a Hen or Pullet for her dinner, and wash them in two waters; and if you give her Hares flesh or Beef, let it be washed in three wa∣ters: On the morrow give her the Leg of a Hen very hot, and at Noon meat tempe∣rately warm, a good gorge, then let her fast until it be late in the Evening; and if she have put over her meat, then give her a little warm meat, as you did in the Morning, and thus let her be dieted till it be time to give her Plumage: Which you shall know by three tokens. 1. By the tenderness and softness of the flesh at the end of the pi∣nion of the Wing, above what it was before she eat washt meat. 2. By the mewts being clean and white, the black thereof being right black, and not mingled with any foul thing or colour. 3. If she be sharp-set and plume eagerly. You may give her casting of a Hares or Conies foot, as was before prescribed, or the small feathers on the pinion of an old Hens Wing.

Having set her on the Pearch, sweep clean underneath, that you may see whether the mewt be full of streaks, or skins, or slimy: If it be, then continue this sort of casting three or four nights together; but if you find the feathers digested and soft, and that her casting is great, then take the Neck of an old Hen, and cut it between the joynts; then lay it in cold water, and give it your Falcon three nights together: In the day-time give her washt meat after this casting or plumage, as you shall see re∣quisite: And this will bear all down into the pannel.

When you have drawn your Falcon out of the Mew, and her principal feathers be not yet full summed, but some in the quill, do not give her washt meat, but quick birds, and good gorges thereof, and set her as much as may be in open places, for otherwise her feathers may chance to shrink in the quil and come to nothing.

When you feed your Falcon call and lure as if you called her to the Lure, and eve∣ry day profer her water, and every night give her castings accordingly as she en∣deweth. Take off her hood frequently in company, that you may hinder her from bating, holding the hood always ready by the Tassel in your hand.

In the Evening by Candle-light take off her hood among company, till she rowze and mewt; then set her on the Pearch, and not before, setting a light before her.

Every Falcon ought to have a Make-Hawk to teach her to hold in the head: If that will not do, cut off some part of her two principal feathers in each Wing, the long one, and that next to it, which will force her to hold in.

Be sure to reward your Hawk well at the beginning, and let he feed well on the Quarry, which will so encourage her that she will have no fancy to go out to the Check. When she is well in bloud and well quarried, then let her fly with other Hawks.

If you would make your Falcon to the Crane, her Lure should be a counterfeit Crane. If you would make her to the Hare, her Lure should be then a Hares Skin stuft with some light matter: When she is well lur'd, and you would enter her, tie the Hares Skin so stuft to the end of a Creance, and fasten it to your Saddle-pummel, by which means when you gallop it will resemble a running Hare: Then unhood your Hawk, and cry, Back with the Dogs, Back with the Dogs. When you find she hath seized it, let go your Creance, and suffer her to fasten thereon; then instantly reward her upon it, and encourage her as much as is possible.

When she is well entred after this manner, take a living Hare and break one of her hinder Legs, and having before well acquainted your Falcon with your Dogs by cou∣tinual feeding among them, I say then put your Hare out in some fair place with your Dogs, and the Falcon will stoop and ruff her until the Dogs may take her; then take the Hare from the Dogs, and cast her out to the Falcon, crying, Back, back there.

If you would make your Hawk flying to the Partridge or Pheasant after she is re∣claimed and made, then every time you lure her cast your Lure into some low Tree or Bush, that she may learn to take the Tree or Stand: If she take the Stand before she sees the Lure, let her stand a while, and afterwards draw the Lure out before her, and cry with what words you have acquainted her to understand you by, and then re∣ward her well. After this manner she will learn to take stand.

Feed her always on the ground, or in some thick place, for in such places she must incounter with the Pheasant at Pearch.

At first fly with her at young Pheasant or Partridge, to encourage her by advantage, and afterwards at the old.

If a Falcon will not take stand, but keep on the Wing, then must you fly her in plain places where you may always see her upon you.

Draw your Falcon out of the Mew twenty days before you enseam her: If she truss and carry, the remedy is to cope her Talons, her Powlse and petty-single.

Never reward your Hawk upon River-fowl, but upon the Lure, that she may the better know, love, and esteem thereof.

The Crane ought to be flown at before Sun-rising, for she is a slothful Bird, and you may cast off to her a Cast or Lease of Falcons, or a Goshawk from the Fist, without Dogs. You must fly but once a day at the Crane, after which you must reward your Hawk very well, ever succouring her with the Greyhound, which is the best of Dogs for that purpose.

Give your Falcon a Beaching very early in the Morning, and it will make her very eager to fly when it is time for it.

If you would have her a high-flying Hawk, you must not feed her highly, but she should be fed nine days together before Sun-rising, and at night late in the cool of the Evening.

The Falcon will kill the Hern naturally if she be a Peregrin or Traveller: Yet you will do well to give her Trains.

A Falcon may fly ten times in a day at a River, if the Season be not extreme, but more is inconvenient.

A Hawk ought to have forty Castings before she be perfectly made. And indeed all Hawks ought to have Castings every night, if you would have them clean and sound: For Hawks which have not this continual nocturnal Casting will be surcharged with abundance of superfluous Humours, which ascending to the Brain, breed so great a disturbance that they cannot fly so high as otherwise they would. And it is good to give them Tiring or Plumage at night, especially Field-Hawks, but not Ri∣ver-Hawks, for fear of weakning their Backs.

When your Hawk hath flown or bated, feed her not so long as she panteth, (but let her be first in breath again;) otherwise you may bring her into a disease called the Pantas.

If a Falcon or other Hawk will not seise nor gorge, take the Quill of a Wild-goose, and tie it under her long-Single; then will she seise and gripe. When she beginneth to seise, take away the said Quill, and she will seise long afterwards.

If you cannot give Covert to your Falcon or Goshawk, then cast her off with the Sun in her back.

CHAP. IV. How to man, hood, and reclaim a Falcon according to an Italian Falconer, quoted by Turbervile.

LEt his Jesses and Bewets be of good Leather, having Bells big and shril according to the proportion of the Hawk, with a Hood that is bossed at the Eyes, and sizable for the Head.

He must use his Hawk in such manner that he may make her grow familiar with him alone, or in company, and to that end he must often unhood and hood her again.

In nine nights the Falconer ought not to let his Hawk jouk at all, nor suffer her to pearch, but keep her during that time continually on his Fist.

When the Falconer would call his Hawk, let him set her on the Pearch, unhood her, and shew her some meat within his Fist, call her so long till she come to it, then feed her therewith: If she come not, let her stand without food till she be very sharp set. Observe this order for about nine days.

When you would lure her, give her some man to hold, and call her with a Lure well garnished with meat on both sides, and give her a bit: Use her to this six or se∣ven days, then cause her to be held farther from you, and cast the Lure about your head, and throw it on the ground a little way from you: if she come to it roundly, reward her bountifully, walking softly about her while she is feeding on the Lure, and using your voice. Having used her to this some certain days, take your Lure gar∣nished as aforesaid, and every day call her to you as far as she may well see or hear you, and let her be loose from all her furniture, without Loins or Creance. If she come free∣ly, reward her, and stop her now and then in her feeding, for that will make her come the better. Call her also sometimes on horseback. After you have thus used her a month, or till she will come freely to you, you may do well to stop the Lure upon her sometimes, and let her fly upon you. Here note, it is requisite to bathe her before you take this course, lest when she is at liberty she rangle to seek water, and in the mean time you lose your Hawk; wherefore bathe her every seven or eight days, for her nature requireth it.

When you have thus manned, reclaimed, and lured your Hawk, go out with her into the Fields, and whistle her off your Fist, standing still to see what she will do, and whether she will rake out or not: But if she fly round about you, as a good Hawk ought to do, let her fly a Turn or two, and fling her out the Lure, and let her foot a Chicken or Pullet, and having killed it, let her feed thereon.

Unhood he often as you bear her, continue so doing till she hath endewed and mewted sufficiently.

Your Hawk being thus made and mann'd, go abroad with her every Morning when it is fair, and let the place where you intend to fly her be plashy, or some narrow Brook; and when you cast her off, go into the Wind so far that the Fowl may not discover you. When she is cast off, and beginneth to recover her Gate, make then to the Brook or Plash where the Fowl lie, always making your Hawk to lean in upon you: And when you see her at a reasonable pitch, (her Head being in) lay out the Fowl, and land it if you can; and if you cannot, take down your Hawk, and let her kill some Train, to which end you must always carry some live Fowl with you, as a Duck, &c. And having slipt one of her Wing-feathers, thrust it through her Nares, and cast her up as high as you can underneath your Hawk, that she may the better know your hand. Never fly a young Hawk without some Train, that if she fail to kill the wild Fowl, you may make her kill that.

If you would have your Hawk fly at one particular Fowl more than at another, you wust then feed her well upon a Train of the same kind, as thus: Take a Creance and tie that Fowl you would accustom her to fly to by the Beak, with meat on her back, and cause one to stand close that shall hold the Creance; then standing a far off unhood your Hawk, and let the Fowl be stirr'd and drawn with the Creance until your Hawk perceive it stir; and if she foot it, make another Train thus: Take a living Fowl that can fly, half seel it, and cast it out; then let your Hawk fly to it; and if she kill it, reward her well upon it.

CHAP. V. How to man and make a Falcon according to Carcanus the Vicentine, abbreviated.

§. I. Of the Eyass or Nyass Falcon.

THese, he saith, seldom prove well, and require much pains and patience to make them kill and stoop a Fowl well, or fly to a high pitch.

But if any one will needs be doing with them, he advises him, first to make them to the Heron from the Fist, or to other such great fowls; for that they are bold and hardy birds, and good seisers.

After they are entred to these and well in bloud, you may make them to the River going into some large field, where there be Crows, or some other great Fowl, with your Hawk on your fist; loose her hood in a readiness, drawing as near the Fowl as you can; and the first fowl that springs unhood her and let her fly from the fist to it; that it may draw the Hawk upwards. When she is at a reasonable pitch, throw her out a Duck or Mallard seel'd, with a feather through the Nares, and if she kill it, then reward her well, and feed her upon it with as much favour as you can, always luring and crying to her to encourage her.

§. II. Of the Ramage-Falcon.

IF a Falconer chance to recover a Ramage-Hawk that was never handled before, let him immediately seel her, and at that instant put on her Jesses made of soft Leather, at the end thereof fix two Varvels, the one may bear your Coat of Arms, the other your Name, that if she chance to be lost, they that take her up may know where to return her: Put her on also a pair of Bells with two proper Bewets. Ha∣ving thus furnished her, you must begin her manning by gentle handling. To avoid the danger of her Beak, you must have a smooth stick about half a foot in length, with which you must stroak your Hawk about the Pinions of her Wings, and so downwards thwart her Train. If she offer to snap at the Stick, withdraw not your hand, and let her bite thereon, the hardness whereof will soon make her weary of that sport.

If you would man her well, you should watch all the night, keeping her continually on your Fist.

You must teach her to feed seel'd; and having a great and easie Rufter-hood, you must hood and unhood her often, seel'd as she is, handling her gently about the Head, coying her always when you unhood her, to the intent she may not be displeased with her Keeper.

Let her plume and tire sometimes upon a Wing on your Fist, keeping her so day and night, without perching, until she be weary, and will suffer you to hood her with∣out stirring.

If your Hawk be so rammage that she will not leave her snapping or biting, then take a little Aloes socotrina, and when she offers to snap, give it her to bite; the bit∣terness whereof will quickly make her leave that ill quality. Garlick I have heard will do the like, the strong sent thereof being equally offensive.

§. III. How to hood a Hawk.

HAving seel'd your Hawk, fit her with a large easie Hood, which you must take off and put on very often, watching her a night or two, handling her frequent∣ly and gently about the Head as aforesaid. When you perceive she hath no aversion to the Hood, unseel her in an evening by Candle-light, continue handling her softly, often hooding and unhooding her, until she takes no offence at the Hood, and will pa∣tiently endure handling.

Take this Observation by the way, that it is the duty of a Falconer to be endowed with a great deal of Patience; and in the next place he ought to have a natural love and inclination to Hawks: without these two qualifications all the Professors of this Art will prove Mar-Hawks instead of good Falconers.

But to return where I left off: If your seeled Hawk feeds well, abides the Hood and handling without striking or biting, then by Candle-light in an Evening unseel her, and with your finger and spittle anoint the place where the Seeling-thread was drawn through; then hood her, and hold her on your Fist all night, often hooding, unhooding, and handling her, stroaking her gently about the Wings and Body, giving her sometimes a bit or two, also Tiring or Plumage. Being well reclaimed from striking and biting at your hand, let her sit upon a Pearch; but every night keep her on the Fist three or four hours, stroaking, hooding, and unhooding, &c. as afore∣said: And thus you may do in the day-time, but in a Chamber apart, where she may see no great light, till she feed surely and eagerly without dread.

§. IV. How to make a Hawk know your Voice, and her own Feeding.

HAving mann'd your Hawk so that she feeds boldly, acquaint her with your Voice, Whistle, and such words as Falconers use: You may do it by fre∣quently repeating them to her as she is feeding on your Fist, &c. But I think the best way of making her acquainted with them is by your experience and practice. If your Hawk be not eager or sharp-set, wash her meat sometimes in fair water, and other whiles in Urine, wringing it a little, and feeding her with it for two or three gorges, intermitting a day or two.

When she feeds boldly, and knows your Voice and Whistle, then teach her to know her Feeding, and to bate at it, in this manner. Shew her some meat with your right hand, crying and luring to her aloud: if she bate or strike at it, then let her quickly and neatly foot it, and feed on it for four or five bits. Do thus often, and she will know her Feeding the better.

After this give her every night some Casting either of Feathers, or Cotton with Cloves or Aloes wrapt up therein, &c. These Castings make a Hawk clean and eager.

§. V. How to make your Hawk bold and venturous.

IN the first place, to make her hardy, you must permit her to plume a Pullet or large Chicken in a place where there is not much light: Her Hood in a readiness, you must have either of the aforesaid alive in your hand; then kneeling on the ground, luring and crying aloud to her, make her plume and pull the Pullet a little; then with your teeth drawing the Strings, unhood her softly, suffering her to pluck it with her Beak three or four times more; then throw out the Pullet on the ground, and encourage her to seise it. When you perceive she breaks it and takes bloud, you must lure and cry aloud to her, encouraging her all the wayes imaginable: Then hood her gently, and give her Tiring of the Wing or Foot of the said Pullet.

§. VI. How to make a Hawk know the Lure.

YOur Hawk having three or four times thus killed a Pullet or large Chicken in some secret place, then thus teach her to know the Lure.

Having fastned a Pullet unto your Lure, go apart, giving your Hawk unto ano∣ther, who must draw loose the strings of her Hood in readiness: Being gone a little way, take half the length of the String, and cast it about your Head, luring with your voice at the same time; then let your Hawk be unhooded as you are throwing your Lure a little way from her, not ceasing luring all the while. If she stoop to the Lure and seize, suffer her to plume the Pullet, still coying and luring with your voice; then let her feed on the Pullet upon the Lure: After that take her on your Fist toge∣ther

with her meat, then hood her and let her tire as aforesaid. And thus you may teach her to come by degrees to a very great distance.

§. VII. How to make a Hawk flying.

WHen your Hawk or Haggard-Falcon will come and stoop to the Lure round∣ly without any fear or coyness, you must put her on a great pair of Luring∣bells; the like you must do to a Soar-Hawk: By so much greater must the Bells be by how much your Hawk is giddy-headed, and apt to rake out at Check.

That being done, and she sharp set, go in a fair morning into some large. Field on Horseback, which Field must be very little incumbred with Wood or Trees: Having your Hawk on your Fist, ride up into the wind, and having loosned her Hood whi∣stle softly, to provoke her to fly; and then you will observe she will begin to bate, or at least to slap with her Flags and Sails, and to raise her self on your Fist: Then suffer her until she rouze or mewt: When she hath done either of them, unhood her, and let her fly with her Head into the wind, for thereby she will be the better able to get upon the Wing; then will she naturally climb upwards, flying in a circle.

When she hath flown three or four Turns, then cry and lure with your voice, casting the Lure about your head, unto which you must first tie a Pullet: And if your Falcon come in and approacheth near you, then cast out the Lure into the wind; and if she stoop to it, reward her as before.

There is one great fault you will often find in the making of a Hawk flying, and that is, when she flieth from the Fist she will not get up, but take stand on the ground; a frequent fault in Soar-Falcons. You must then fright her up with your Wand, ri∣ding in to her; and when you have forced her to make a Turn or two, take her down and feed her. But if this do no good, find out some Chough, Starling, or such like bird, and making ready your Hawks Hood, draw as near them as you may till they rise. Then unhood your Hawk, and no doubt if she will fly them, they will train her well upwards. Then you must have in readiness a Duck seel'd so that she may see no way but backwards, and that will make her mount the higher. This Duck you must hold by one of the Wings near the body in your right hand, then lure with your voice to make your Falcon turn the head: When she is at a reasonable pitch, cast up your Duck just under her, that she may perceive it: If she strike, stoop, or truss the Duck, permit her to kill it, and reward her, giving her a reasonable Gorge. Use this custom twice or thrice, and your Hawk will leave the Stand, de∣lighting on the Wing, and will become very obedient.

Here note, that for the first or second time it is not convenient to shew your Hawk great or large Fowl, for it often happens that they slip from the Hawk into the wind; the Hawk not recovering them, raketh after them, which puts the Falconer to much trouble, and frequently occasions the loss of his Hawk.

But if it so chance that your Hawk so rake out with a Fowl that she cannot reco∣ver it, but gives it over, and comes in again directly upon you, then cast out a seeled Duck; and if she stoop and truss it, cross the Wings, and permit her to take her plea∣sure, rewarding her also with the Heart, Brains, Tongue, and Liver. For want of a quick Duck, take her down with the dry Lure, and let her plume a Pullet, and feed her upon it.

By so doing your Hawk will learn to give over a Fowl that rakes out, and hearing the Lure of the Falconer, will make back again to the River, and know the better to hold in the Head.

§. VIII. A flight for a Haggard.

WHen you intend a Flight for a Haggard, for the first, second, and third time make choice of such a place where there are no Crows, Rooks, or the like, to take away all occasion of her raking out after such Check.

Let her not fly out too far on head at the first, but run after and cry, Why lo, why lo, to make her turn Head. When she is come in, take her down with the Lure, unto which must be fastned a live Pullet, and let her tire, plume, and feed as aforesaid.

Sometimes a Haggard out of pride and a gadding humour will rangle out from her Keeper: Then clog her with great Luring-bells, and make her a Train or two with a Duck seel'd, to teach her to hold in and know her Keeper: Take her down often with the dry Lure, and reward her bountifully, and let her be ever well in bloud, or you may whoop for your Hawk to no purpose.

§. IX. How to make a Soar-Falcon or Haggard kill her Game at the very first.

IF she be well lured, flieth a good Gate, and stoopeth well, then cast off a well quarried Hawk, and let her stoop a Fowl on Brook or Plash, and watch her till she put it to the plunge; then take down your Make-Hawk, reward her, hood her, and set her: So you may make use of her if need require.

Then take your Hawk unentred, and going up the wind half a Bow-shot, loose her Hood, and softly whistle her off your Fist, until she have rouzed or mewted: Then let her fly with her Head into the wind, having first given notice or warning to the company to be in readiness against the Hawk be in a good Gate, and to shew water, and to lay out the Fowl.

When she is at a good pitch, and covering the Fowl, then notifie that all the com∣pany make in at once to the Brook upon the Fowl, to land her: If your Falcon strike, stoop or truss her Game, run in to help her, and crossing the Fowls Wings, let her take her pleasure thereon.

If she kill not the Fowl at first stooping, give her then respite to recover her Gate. When she hath got it, and her Head in, then lay out the Fowl as aforesaid, until you land it at last; not forgetting to help her as soon as she hath seized it, giving also her due Reward. You shall do well always to have a quick Duck in readiness, that if the Hawk kill not the Fowl stooped you may seel and throw it up to her being at her pitch.

§. X. Remedy for a Hawks taking Stand in a Tree.

IN the first place you must chuse such places where are no Wood or Trees, or as lit∣tle as may be. If you cannot avoid it, then have two or three live Trains, and give them to as many men, placing them conveniently for to use them. When there∣fore your Hawk hath stooped, and endeavours to go to Stand, let him to whom the Hawk most bends cast out his Train-Duck seel'd: If the Hawk kill her, reward her therewith. If this course will not remedy that fault in her by twice or thrice so doing, my advice is then to part with the Buzzard.

§. XI. How to help a Hawk forward and coy through pride of grease.

THere is a scurvy quality in some Hawks proceeding from pride of grease, or be∣ing high kept, which is a disdainful Coyness. Such a Hawk therefore must not be rewarded although she kill: Yet give her leave to plume a little; and then let the Falconer take a Sheeps Heart cold, or the Leg of a Pullet, and whilst the Hawk is busie in pluming, let either of them be conveyed into the body of the Fowl, that it may savour thereof; and when the Hawk hath eaten the Brains, Heart, and Tongue of the Fowl, then take out your Inclosure, and call your Hawk with it to your Fist, and feed her therewith: After this give her some Feathers of the Neck of the Fowl to scour and make her cast.

§. XII. What must be done when a Hawk will not hold in the Head.

IF you find your Hawk rake after Checks, and lean out so far that neither Whooping, Luring, nor casting of the Hawks Glove is any way available, but she rather gads out more and more, and at last flies away; I know not how to advise otherways, than to follow after with Whooping and Luring: If she turn and come to the Lure, shew her all the kindness imaginable. This fault is frequently found in Soar-Hawks, or Hawks of the first Coat.

§. XIII. How to keep a Hawk high-flying.

IF your Hawk be a stately high-flying Hawk, you ought not to ingage her in more Flights than one in a morning: For often flying brings her off from her stately pitch. If she be well made for the River, fly her not above twice in a morning; yet feed her up though she kill not.

When a high-flying Hawk, being whistled to, gathers upwards to a great Gate, you must continue her therein, never flying her but upon broad waters and open Rivers; and when she is at the highest, take her down with your Lure; where when she hath plumed and broken the Fowl a little, then feed her up; And by that means you shall maintain your Falcon high-flying, inwards, and very fond of the Lure.

Some will have this high-flying Falcon seldom to kill, and not to stoop: Yet if she kill every day, although she stoop from a high Gate, yet if she be not rebuked or hurt therewith, she will, I can assure you, become a higher Flier every day than other; but she will grow less fond of the Lure. Wherefore your high-flying Hawks should be made inwards, it being a commendable quality in them to make in and turn Head at the second or third toss of the Lure, and when she poureth down upon it as if she had killed.

And as the teaching of a Falcon, or any other Hawk, to come readily to and love the Lure, is an Art highly commendable, because it is the effect of great labour and industry: So it is the cause of saving many a Hawk, which otherwise would be lost irrecoverably.

Mark this by the way, that some naturally high-flying Hawks will be long before they be made upwards, still fishing and playing the slugs: And when they should get up to cover the Fowl, they will stoop before the Fowl be put out. And this may pro∣ceed from two causes. In the first place, she may be too sharp set; and in the next place, it may be she is flown untimely, either too soon, or too late.

When you see a Hawk use those evil Tatches without any visible cause, cast her out a dead Fowl for a dead Quarry, and hood her up instantly without Reward, to dis∣courage her from practising the like another time: Half an hour afterwards call her to the Lure and feed her, and serve her after this manner as often as she fisheth in that fashion.

Besides, to correct this error, the Falconer ought to consult the natures and disposi∣tions of his Hawks, and should carefully observe which fly high when in good plight, and which best when they are kept low, which when sharpest set, and which on the contrary in a mean between both, which early at Sun-rising, which when the Sun is but two hours high, which sooner, and which later in an evening.

For know that the natures of Hawks are different; so are the times to fly each one: For to fly a Hawk in her proper time, and to fly her out of it, is as disagreeable as the flight of a Gerfalcon and a Buzzard. Therefore the Ostrager must fly his Hawks ac∣cording to their natures and dispositions, keeping them always in good order.

Where by the by take notice, all Hawks, as well Soar-Hawks as Mew'd-Hawks and Haggards, should be set out in the evening two or three hours, some more, some less, having respect to their nature as it is stronger or weaker; and in the morning also according as they cast, hooding them first, and then setting them abroad a weathering, until you get on Horse-back to prosecute your Recreation.

§. XIV. To make a Falcon to the Heron.

THis Flight hath less of Art in it than pleasure to the beholders; and to say the truth, the Flight is stately and most noble.

As it is less difficult to teach a Hawk to fly at Fowl than it is to come unto and love the Lure, the first being natural, and not the last; so there is less industry to be used in making a Hawk fly the Hern than Water-Fowl. To the first she is instigated by a na∣tural propensity and inclination; to the latter she is brought with Art, pains, and much diligence.

At the beginning of March Herns begin to make their Passage: If therefore you will adapt your Falcons for the Hern, you must not let them fly longer at the River, and withal you must pull them down to make them light: which is done by giving them Hearts and flesh of Lambs and Calves, also Chickens: But give them no wild meats.

To the intent you may acquaint them one with the other, so that they may the bet∣ter fly the Hern and help one another, you must call a Cast of them to the Lure at once; but have a care they crab not together, for so they may endanger one another in their flight.

When your Hawk is scoured and clean and sharp set, you must then get a live Hern, upon the upper part of whose long sharp Bill you must place a joynt of a hol∣low Cane, which will prevent her from hurting the Hawk: That being done, tie the Hern in a Creance; then setting her on the ground, unhood your Hawk, who will fly the Hern as soon as she sees her. If she seise her, make in apace to succour her, and let her plume and take bloud of the Hern: Then take the Brains, the Marrow of the bones, and the Heart, and laying it on your Hawking-glove give it your Fal∣con. After this rip her Breast, and let your Hawk feed thereon till she be well gorg'd: This being done, hood her up upon the Hern, permitting her to plume at her pleasure; then take her on your Fist, and let her tire on the Foot or Pinion.

Because Herns are not very plentiful, you may preserve one for a Train three or four times, by arming Bill, Head, and Neck, and painting it of the same colour that the Hern is of: And when the Falcon seiseth her, you must be very nimble to make in; and deceive by a live Pigeon clapt under the Wing of the Hern for the Falcon, which must be her Reward.

The Hawk having thus several times taken her Train without discovery of the de∣lusion, you may then let the Hern loose in some fair Field without a Creance, or with∣out arming her: When she is up of a reasonable height, you may cast off your Falcon; who if she bind with the Hern and bring her down, then make in apace to rescue her, thrusting the Herns Bill into the ground, and breaking his Wings and Legs, that the Hawk may with more ease plume and foot him. Then reward her as before, with the Brains, Marrow of the bones, and Heart, making thereof an Italian Sop.

Thus much of a Train-Hern. Now to fly the wild Hern it is thus: If you find a wild Hern at Siege, win in as nigh to her as you can, and go with your Hawk under the wind; and having first loosed her Hood in a readiness, as soon as the Hern leaveth the Siege, off with her Hood, and let her fly. If she climb to the Hern and bring her down, run in (as I said before) to rescue her, thrusting her Bill into the ground, breaking her Wings and Legs, and rewarding her as aforesaid on your Hawking∣glove.

Now if your Falcon beat not down the Hern, or do give her over, then never fly your Falcon again at a Hern unless with a Make-Hawk well entred; for the coward by this means, seeing another fly at the Hern and bind with her, takes fresh courage. And if they kill the Hern flying both together, then must you reward them together while the Quarry is hot, making for them a Soppa as aforesaid. This is the only way to make them both bold and perfect Herners.

§. XV. Of mewing of Hawks.

FAlcons may be flown with till St. Georges day; then they must be set down: And be sure to search them for Lice, and if they have any pepper them well. Scowr them also before you cast them into the Mew.

There are two sorts of Mewing: 1. At the stock or stone. 2. Loose, or at large.

1. For the Stock, the place should be a ground-room, far from all noise or concourse of people. Place therein (upon Tressels two or three foot high) a Table, for length according to the number of your Falcons, and five or six foot broad, with little thin boards of four fingers high nailed along the sides and ends. Fill the Table with great sand, that hath small pebble stones in it, and in the middle place some great free-stones, a cubit high, made taper-wise, but plain and smooth above. Then take a Cord of the bigness of a large Bow-string, put it through a ring, and bind it about the stone, in such sort that the ring or swivel may go round the stone without any let: And thereunto tie the Lease of the Falcon. If you mew more Hawks than one, you must set your stones at that distance, that when they bate they may not reach one an∣other, for crabbing. The great stones for their coolness the Hawks will delight to sit on: The little gravel-stones are for them to swallow. The sand is of use, that when they bate they mar not their feathers, and for the better cleansing their mewts: The Cord and Ring, that when the Hawks bate this way or that way they may never tan∣gle, the Ring still following them. All day let your Falcons stand hooded upon the stone, only when they would feed you must take them on the Fist. At night off with their Hoods. To avoid and remedy all ill accidents and inconveniences it were well that the Falconer had his bed in the Mew.

2. If you would mew at large you can mew but one in a room, unless it be so big that you may divide it into several partitions. Twelve foot square is scope enough for one Falcon, with two Windows a foot and an half broad apiece, each fitted with its shut, one toward the North, for cool air, the other toward the East, for the heat and comfort of the Sun. If your Hawk be a great bater your Mew were best be a ground∣room, which if it be, you must cover the floor with gross sand four fingers thick, and thereupon set a stones as aforesaid. Besides, you must make her two handsom Pearches, near each Window one, that sitting on the one she may have the comfort of the Sun, on the other the benefit of the fresh air.

Every Week, or at least every Fortnight, set her a Bason of water, that your Hawk may bathe if she desire it, and if she doth, then take it away the night fol∣lowing.

Your Mew must also have a Portal with a little hole below, to convey in the de∣vice whereon their meat is served, called among Falconers the Hack. And that must be made on this fashion. Take a piece of thick board, a foot and half long, and a foot broad or thereabout, under the which fasten two little Tressels, three or four fingers high. Let them be fast pinned or nailed to. Then bore two holes on each side thereof, and through each of these put a short. Cord of the bigness a Bow∣string, with the ends downward, and knots fast knit on them under the button of the board, so streight that you cannot raise the Cord above the board above a fingers breadth or thereabouts. And when you would give your Hawks meat, take a little stick somewhat longer than the Hack, and as big as your finger, but let it be of strong wood, as Crab-tree, Holly, or such like, and upon that stick bind your Hawks meat, and put the ends of the stick under the cords upon the Hack, and so convey it into the Mew to your Hawks, that the Hawk may not truss or drag away her meat into the Mew, but, and as soon as she hath fed and gorged her self, take it away again. It is good to keep one set hour of feeding your Hawk, for so she will mew sooner and better.

This Author prefers mewing at the stock or grate before mewing at large. His reason is, because in that kind of mewing we take our Hawks on the Fist every day, and so may see in what state they be; and if they fall into any sickness or infirmity, may give them proper medicines, which cannot be done when you mew at large. Be∣sides, if we happen upon Hawks that have preyed for themselyes, it will be needful to bear them often in the cool air in the morning till mid July or thereabout, yea, and to call them to the Lure, and to ride abroad with them sometimes an hour or two.

Mr. Latham is of opinion, that it is better to mew at large, and disapproves mew∣ing at the stock. For (saith he) when she is at large she hath the exercise of her Wings in flying up and down, which must needs be good for her. Also she may go to the water if she be disposed, and takes stones at her pleasure. She may do all things at her own liking, whereas she can do nothing at the stock when she would: Neither can you give her that is fitting to her own content but by guess and imagination, where∣in we are many times deceived. And truly upon these considerations I am of his opinion, that it is better to mew at large, than at the stock or stone.

CHAP. VI. Of the Haggard Falcon.

§. I. Something of the name and nature of the Haggard Falcon.

HE makes the Haggard Falcon to be the same with the Peregrine; and is of opi∣nion, that the Falcon-gentle and Haggard are also of one and the same kind, the only difference being, that the former is the Eyass or Ramage Hawk, the latter the same taken wild after she hath preyed for her self, making the word Haggard to signifie as much as wild, opposite to gentle or tame. The word Haggard is borrowed of the French, Hagar, and signifies (as Robert Stephen interprets it) an old Falcon of five or six years, having its pens worn short, or otherwise harmed, and so taken for a price set on its head. Aldrovandus makes the word Hagar to be originally Dutch, and to signifie a bunch, whence the Germans call this Falcon Ein Hager-falck, or rather Hoger∣falck, that is, a gibbous or bunch-backt Falcon. But this gibbous Falcon he makes to be a species distinct both from the Falcon-gentle and Peregrine. For my part, being not wil∣ling unnecessarily to multiply species, I incline to Mr. Lathams opinion, that all these are names of one and the same kind of Hawk.

The Haggard-Falcon is now-adays most esteemed, not being (as some write) a choice and tender Hawk to endure wind and weather, but for hardiness far before the Falcon-gentle. It is a bird of great spirit and mettle, like a Conquerour in a Coun∣try, keeping in aw and subjection most Fowl that flie, in so much that the young ones will venture upon Brants and Wild-geese, till being soundly brusht and beaten by those strong birds, they learn their error, and desist to meddle with such unwieldy game.

She rests no day, but toils continually, unless hindred by extremity of weather. Hence he infers that it is an error in Falconers after a day or two's flying to give their young Hawks a day or two's rest, and concludes that whosoever can fly his Hawk every day, shall have every day a good and perfect Hawk, but he that covets to fly upon rest shall seldom have a good and staid Hawk.

When she hath slain and seised her prey, if it be a Dove, as soon as she hath broken its neck she presently goes to the place we abhor our Hawks should so much as touch, which is the Crop, and takes her pleasure of what she finds there, especially mu∣stard or carlock seed, which he conceives she uses by way of Physic to preserve her health.

§. II. How to reclaim a Haggard Falcon.

HAving taken or purchased one of these birds, whether she be full or empty, set her down as soon as you can, and let her rest quietly the first night, either seeld, or in a rufter-hood. The next day taking her up gently, carry her continually on your Fist, using a feather to stroke her withal instead of your hand. When she will en∣dure to be toucht without starting, pluck off her Hood, and quickly and gently put it on again, holding this course till she begin to feed. Then profer her meat, but suffer her to take but little at a time, never hooding and unhooding her without a bit or two to quiet her, and win her love to the Hood and your self. Use your voice

to her before you take off her Hood, and all the while she is feeding, and no longer, that as she reclaims she may learn to know, that when she hears your voice she shall be fed.

When you have brought her to feed boldly, then teach her to jump to your Fist in this manner. Set her on a Pearch breast-high [if it be lower, you must be on your knees; for being so high above her at first, till she be better acquainted, will be apt to fright her.] Then unstrike her Hood, and lure her, using your voice, with a bit or two of meat bestowed on her as she is unhooded, which will make her to love your voice, being careful that she take no sudden fright or dislike; for it is hard to work such impressions out again. Be sure to keep her stomach perfect, sharp, and well edged. For venter magister artis, it is that only that guides and rules her; That is the curb and bridle that holds her in subjection to the man, and it is the spur which pricks her forward to perform her duty.

By this time you may pull off her Hood, and let her sit bare-faced, keeping your self as yet close by her. And as you perceive any untoward humour in her, profer her a bit of meat with your hand, and use your voice to her, to draw her to you, till you have brought her boldly to attend, willingly to receive bits at your hand, and jump readily to your Fist: Then set her to the Lure garnisht with meat, to which when she will readily come in the Creance: stay not long in that kind, for she will soon be∣gin to scorn it, and look another way: But let her see a live Dove at the Lure, and lure her to it: Which when she hath killed, and eaten up the head, take her up very gently with a bit of meat, and put on her Hood: Then lure her again to the dead pelt, and so use her two or three times, and no more; for she will quickly grow loth to be ta∣ken off, and her desire to keep the pelt will cause her to drag and carry it from you, than which there cannot be a worse quality in a Hawk.

Often luring at one time at her first entring is good to make her perfect quickly; but use it not longer than I have directed, especially to a Field-hawk: For the reason given.

Now it is full time to lure her loose to live Pigeons, which you must let her see at your Lure (to draw her you with love and courage) and also let her seize on them, and kill them at your foot, one after another, for six days together, being sure that he that holds her have skill to let her in with her head right towards you; and lure not far till her stomach be perfect, for otherwise she may spy something by the way which she hath more liking to, and so for that time be lost, which would be very hurtful to her though she should be recovered again.

Likewise forget not all this time of her making (while she is on the ground either pluming or feeding) to walk round about her, using your voice, and giving her many bits with your hand, till you have won her even to lean and bend her body to your hand, and to bring what she hath in her foot toward you. By this time it will not be amiss to spring her up some live Doves, as she comes unto you between the man and the Lure: And be sure they be given in a long Creance, that she may not kill them far from you, but that always she may truss them over your head, and fall near you: For otherwise it may strike a timorous conceit into her, making her sit and stare at you, or carry from you, and sometimes forsake what she hath got, and go her way, when she shall see you coming so far from her.

By this time you may be bold (at a convenient hour in the Evening, when she hea∣reth your voice, and hath you in her sight) to hold in your Lure, and suffer her to fly about you, holding her with your voice and lure as near you as may be, to teach her to do her business, and work it on your head. Then cast her up a Dove with a loud voice, &c.

§. III. How to remedy carrying in a Hawk.

THe reason of the Hawks carrying is not the lightness of the Dove, as some pre∣tend, but the unskilfulness or negligence of the Keeper in not dealing gently and kindly with them in their reclaiming, or giving them little or no content in their luring, giving them for a reward only the pelt of a Pigeon, or some other dead thing, whereas their delight is in such as are living. For the prevention of this coyness or fugitive desire in your Hawk, at her first luring unto live Doves, you must restrain her, and draw her gently to you with your Lure or Creance, not suddenly or rashly, but

by degrees, and give her some bits of meat with your hand, being on your knees, to please and content her: And by this loving usage you shall find your first Dove to be the worst Dove, and the oftner you use her to them, the quieter she will be: And she did not drag so fast from you at the first, but she will soon come to bring it with as much speed toward you, yea, meet you with it, and be willing to exchange it with you for a bit of meat at your hand.

§. IV. Of giving stones and casting.

WHen your Hawk is grown so gentle that she will endure to sit bare-fac'd in the evening or night amongst company, then it is meet to give her stones. Every night, when she hath put away her supper from above, before you go to bed, give her half a dozen small stones. Give them above hand if you have the art, if not, then other∣wise as you like best to cast her. This do till you find her stomach good, and then you may profer her Casting; but be sure at your first giving it be with her liking: For otherwise I have seen divers Hawks beaten out of love with it, so that they would ne∣ver take it willingly after. Add to the ink of a Dove as much clean-washt flannel as will make her a reasonable casting, bearing in mind this old Proverb,

As wash't meat and stones make a Hawk to fly, So great castings and long fasting maketh her to die.

These stones given at night you shall be sure to have again in the morning: But given in the morning she will either cast them before they have done their work, or keep them all day and the next night. I have learnt by experience that stones given once by night do more good to a Hawk than twice by day, for speedy inseaming, or removing any glut or evil humour.

He makes account that stones serve to cleanse the stomach, &c. others are of opinion, that their use is to cool the body: I rather think, that they are of the same use to Hawks as to other birds, viz. to help grind their meat in their stomachs, though I confess there may be difference in this respect between Hawks and other birds; Hawks having rather a mem∣branous than musculous stomach or gizzard.

§. V. Of bathing your Hawk.

I My self (saith my Author) have had very few Haggards that would ever bathe at all, so long as they continued sound: But whensoever I proved them bare-fac'd abroad, having fitted them with a reasonable gorge, they did themselves more harm by bating, than bathing would have done them good. Therefore if you find your Hawk not disposed to bathing, you were better keep her on your Fist. But after two or three mews, in their declining age, through unnatural heats and surfets they will desire bathing; and then you are not to neglect the occasion; but when the weather will permit, shew her the water, and if she do bathe, let her dry her self abroad if it be fair, and the weather temperate; otherwise let her have the air of the fire with measure, and come no more abroad that day nor night, but set her upon a very warm Pearch, and from the air.

Note. This kind of Hawks though you labour them carefully the first year in their making, having brought them to be so familiar, that they will sit abroad bare-fac'd hard by you when they are empty; yet if you shall absent your self for trial, you shall find when you come to them again they will be unquiet, and by bating and striving do themselves much harm, if they be full.

§. VI. How to weather your Hawk.

EYas Hawks are much subject to heat, and therefore much addicted to weathering and bathing, and will almost never refuse the water. You may boldly set abroad these Hawks at any time of day unhooded to take the air: For in regard of their fondness of, and familiarity with the man, they will take no occasion to bate, thereby to hurt themselves when they are full-gorged.

But your Haggard Falcon, if you intend to weather her, you must do it in the morning, or else in the evening before she be fed, also you must remain close by her with meat clean and ready drest, to take her to your Fist withall. But I rather ad∣vise all Falconers to weather her in her Hood, which can do her no harm, but is ra∣ther a means to prevent her bating and striving, by which her spirit and courage is taken away.

§. VII. When it is convenient to set down, and leave flying of your Haggard.

ABout Lady-day, or somewhat before, is the time when these Hawks leave ours and other strange Countries. They begin to draw together, and to dispose themselves thereunto a month before: The reason is, because at that time of the year being moved by their lust they repair to their breeding places. Therefore the old Haggard must needs then be set down, and fed up with hot and bloody meat: The in∣termewed Haggard is more able to resist the course of nature, being not so violent in her, therefore you may fly her somewhat longer. The Passenger-soar-Falcon may be flown a month longer than any of the other. All of them will upon a small occasion be apt at that time to fly quite away; the inclination to cawking and procreating Young, being then so strong in them, as to deface and obliterate, or at least over-rule all artificial impressions of subjection and obedience.

§. VIII. How to diet and prepare your Hawk for the Mew.

YOu must beware, when you purpose to feed up your Hawk, and put her in flesh, that she be not her own carver in her diet, and that you do not give her too great a gorge your self: For if you do. it is ten to one but she will over-feed, and surfeit of the same. The reason is because she wants exercise to digest it. Your best way therefore is, to keep your Hawk all the flying time as clean as you can; and at her setting down, keep your wonted course of feeding twice a day, and as near as you can with hot and bloudy meat, and no more in quantity than you find her well able to endue and put away: And if after a week or fortnights space you find she is mended, then you may be bold to begin to feed her once a day; and if it be possible at first let her have young Pigeons: But if you give her old birds, her first gorges must be less. Thus observing how she mends by feeding once a day, and the eagerness of her stomach doth abate, you may order her accordingly, and you will find her shortly rai∣sed in her flesh, and setled in her health, and fit for the Mew.

§. IX. How to order your Hawk while she remains in the Mew.

BEfore you put her in, be sure she be free from Mites and Lice: Which else will in∣crease upon her there, and hinder her thriving.

Also take off her old Jesses, and put her on a pair of new and strong ones, that may last till the time of her drawing, that you be not forced to hold her, and strive with her too long, to heat her when she is in the prime of her grease, which may do her much harm.

Keep your Mew aways sweet, and clean with sweeping.

Observe how your Hawk thrives by her castings and mutes, for so you may know how to diet her, continuing or altering her usage accordingly.

You must not fail to let your Hawk have fair water always standing by her, which must often be shifted.

Be sure never to let her be without stones lying by her in gravel. He advises also to gather up the stones she casts, and wash them, and lay them for her to take again: But I suppose it would be better to give her fresh stones. For those stones which she hath taken and cast up, are by mutual attrition in the stomach worn smooth, and so become less fit for the grinding of the meat, which is the reason why she casts them up. Wherefore (as we have noted before) Poultry before they swallow stones try them with their tongues whether they be rough or not.

That meat which you do kill for your Hawk with a Piece be sure to search, and cut out the black and bruised flesh, which proceeds of the Gunpowder. For there is no Gun but after one shot or two, (especially in wet weather) sends forth the shot as black as ink.

§. X. How to take your Hawk from the Mew, inseam her and make her ready to fly.

WHen you draw your Hawk, be careful not to strive long with her, or heat her by strugling and bating, but with all possible expedition set her down upon a Pearch, to rest quietly, till her anger and turbulent humour be asswaged; and so let her sit among company, and in their hearing, without any occasion of disturbance as near as you can. Then when you think it convenient, take her gently upon your Fist, and carry her up and down, stroaking her with a feather lightly and gently: And if you perceive her begin to stir or grow unquiet, set her down again, and thus use her until by degrees you have drawn her to some reasonable familiarity, and that she will begin to feed: Then give her more carriage, and use her to it more and more, and be sure still to keep her as quiet as may be, and by all means prevent bating. For there is more danger in some one Hawk that is to be reclaimed and inseamed from the Mew, than in many other Hawks that have been newly taken in England, or from the Cage: The reason is, because by reason of her ease and full feeding, and want of exercise in the Mew, no crammed Fowl will be more fat and full than she, and so she will be apt to receive much harm by bating or any sudden heat: Whereas the wild Hawk, coming from the labour of her body, and exercise of her Wings: And the Cage-Hawk being tossed and tumbled in her voyage, are seldom over-fat, and so in less danger of over-heating themselves by bating or otherwise.

When you have brought her to eat, you must feed her twice a day, and so order and diet her continually, and it must be with new and good meat, which you must dress and wash clean, wringing out the bloud with fair water, that so she may sooner come to a stomach: And for the quantity thereof let it be as much as the Wing of an old Dove at once, or as you shall find her, to put away the one meal, and make her self fit and ready for the other. And for the first week or ten days after she begins to feed, give her neither casting nor stones, but the week after give her half a dozen stones every night, after she hath put away her supper from forth her gorge, which you shall find she will cast you up again in the morning very early. The third week approaching you must give her every night a casting, continuing your former manner of diet till your Hawk be flying, and all her flying time, only adding unto her meals somewhat in quantity, and forbearing to wash altogether so hard, with respect to the mildness and hardness of the weather, &c.

Then prepare your self to lure her, and let her exercise and have the benefit of her Wings.

If you give your Hawk a piece of Flannel or Cotton for casting, he adviseth that it be perfectly clean washt; and that when you give the lightest and easiest suppers, and some Plumage with it, but never upon a great gorge to the soundest Hawk that is. Also in a morning, when your Hawk makes a loose and unwrapped casting of Plu∣mage, it is good to give a little knot with stones, to bring away loose or straggling feathers out of the Pannel. Many sound Hawks will never brook a woollen casting; and therefore my Author advises not to give your Hawk any such, unless it be some∣times for trial, but to give her only casting of Plumage; and so you shall be sure to preserve and keep her safe, and in continual case to do her business.

Here my Author enters into a long discourse about giving of stones, giving many reasons why it is better to give them over night than in the morning; which, because I am not of his opinion concerning the use of stones, and think that they may be indifferently given either at night or in the morning, when the Hawk is willing to take them, and that it matters not much how long she keeps them, I shall omit. Only I shall set down some of his experi∣mental observations. I have (saith he) seen a Hawk in the time of her flying, that hath taken a dozen or more stones of her self in a morning, and hath kept half of them till next morning: The same Hawk when they were given her would not miss at her feeding time, or at the sight of meat to cast half of them, and keep the rest till the next day. This he observed many Hawks to do.

Another Hawk when I came into the Mew with her dinner did cast up some few stones at the sight of the meat, and when she had eaten up the same (being a young Pigeon) she presently took above a dozen more, which she kept till the next day. The like story he relates of a Tarcel gentle, that after he had eaten a whole young Pi∣geon took presently fifteen or sixteen stones, and made it something late the next day before he cast them. This Hawk also at the sight of his meat would not fail to cast some of his stones.

No such Physic (saith he) for a Hawk as to give her stones in due time. Here he takes a great deal of pains to prove that stones do not, according to the commonly re∣ceived opinion, cool, but rather at present heat, their use being in his judgment to melt and waste the glut and fatness, and to empty and evacuate those gorgitive and stuffing humours, and so to inseam and make her clean. But this I omit, because, as I said before, I think the main use of the stones is to assist the stomach in comminution and grinding of the meat, thereby causing a more speedy and perfect concoction, and so they conduce much to the preservation and recovery of health; the stomachs not performing its office well being the foundation and original of most diseases in Hawks and other animals, sith an error in the first concoction is not amended in the subsequent.

One remarkable observation he hath, which may seem to argue that stones have a purgative quality in them, which is this, That upon giving stones after forbearance a while, a Hawk will oftentimes at her beginning to cast before the stones, in the midst, and at the end of them, gush out abundance of waterish, and yellowish greasie slime and glut from forth her body: Which before, though she had casting daily, flow∣ed not forth.

He advise at the beginning to make your Hawk perfectly clean, and so to keep her without pampering with great meals, and to have her empty, and with a good stomach when she flies: For if she be flown full, it may endanger her life; and besides, she will never fly with regard and attention to her Keeper, if her stomach be not per∣fect. For proof whereof, Take any young Hawk out of the Nest (though newly disclosed) and breed her up as familiarly as you can devise: Yet when you shall come afterwards to fly her, she must be altogether governed by her stomach. For let her fail of that never so little, and every puff of wind will blow her from you; nay, if there be no wind stirring, yet she will wheel and sink away from him and from his voice, that all the time before had lured and trained her up. Contrariwise, if it be his hap to find her again when she is hungry, though she would starve before she would prey for her self, yet then will she own him or any other man: Nay, she will be ready to take his Cap from him before she will either leave or lose him.

Note well, that what shew of cleanness soever you find in your Hawk by her cast∣ing, mutes, or otherwise, although you have taken never so much pains with her, by casting, clean feed, and stones to purge and cleanse her inwardly; yet will she not be perfectly inseamed till she come to the exercise of her Wings, and labour of her body, after which she will break grease, and by degrees inseam throughly. And be sure that her labour at first be not immoderate, for if it be, it will ingender grief. Also you must give her liberty by degrees to stir her Wings, and use her body, that there may be no heat excessively taken, until she be throughly inseamed, and then she may be weary with flying, but she will never take harm.

§. XI. How to alter some ill qualities and conditions in a Falcon.

YOu shall sometimes meet with a Hawk, that when you have well lured her, and given all the good content you can devise to her, yet upon the least scope and liberty that shall be offered, she will not tarry with you, but go her way. To reclaim her from so bad a condition you must take this course.

Abate her pride somewhat, yet with reason and respect to the weather. Then get you a Make-hawk, and taking a fit hour in the Evening, upon a convenient and easie place, and one couple of Fowl with your Make-Hawk flown and stooped once or twice, or as you see cause in managing your flight to your best advantage in landing, but when she is coming for the last to kill it overland, be sure to stand under the wind with your Hawk, and let her see the Fowl overthrown, and go in to the quarry; and if you perceive she flieth in with a courage, and seiseth with love and heat on the Fowl, make in apace and cross the Wings of the Fowl, and make that safe,

suffering them a while to take their pleasure together; which done with meat cleanly drest take up your old Hawk, but gently, lest you fray your young one, and let her have the Quarry to her self, and take her pleasure thereon, with your own help on your knees to please her, and beware she take no pill or pelf to glut her withal, and so reward her with * 1.1 cleanly feed, giving her supper unto her as she sits upon the Fowl: Use her thus three or four times together, but let it be with good meat, clean washed and well drest from your hand.

When you have used this course, at your next coming to the brook, let your Make-Hawk be flown, and when she hath stooped and is wrought to her place again, at your next shewing, let your Hawk see the Fowl thrown in, and fly for the killing of it her self with the other Hawk. Mark the manner of that flight; For if she hotly and kindly entertains the advantage offered her, and with attentive eagerness follows the Fowl she saw thrown in, flying round upon that and your self, and with good hap enjoys the Fowl she may make you a good Hawk: But if this course stay her not, there is no hope of her for the River.

But to enter a gently and lovingly disposed Hawk, having a couple of Fowl that lie sit for your purpose, throw off your Make-Hawk, and when she hath once stooped them upon her point or before at the setting in of the Fowl, let in your young Hawk: If she fix her Eye on the other Hawk and work her, then need you not doubt, but suffer her to fly till she hath almost reacht the other, but then be sure to shew the Fowl; and then if she stoop with the other Hawk, and work it again with her, then if it be possible let them kill it at the next down-come. For the only content you can give to these kind of Hawks is to let them have their desires speedily, before they be weary, while their courage is in them. For nothing puts a young Hawk sooner out oflove with the man, and drives her sooner away, than suffering her to fly too long before she be served.

He lays great stress on this as an excellent rule, That in the time of her making no scope be given to the Haggard, neither to fly high nor wild, but that she be held down and near to you.

CHAP. VII. Of the Ger-falcon.

THe Ger-falcon, Turbervile saith, is of a fierce and hardy nature, and therefore difficult to be reclaimed, but being once won, proves an excellent Hawk-Latham saith, that Ger-falcons are for the most part very kind and loving Hawks, and will suddenly be reclaimed and made to love the man. Their Tercels or Males are called Jerkins. These Hawks do not fly the River, but always from the Fist they fly Herons, Shovelers, forked-tail'd Kites, &c. In going up to their gate they hold not that course which other Falcons do. For they climb upon the Train when they find any Fowl, and as soon as they have reacht her, they pluck her down, if not at the first, yet at the second or third encounter. The Haggard of this kind is most commendable, and easiest to be made for any pleasure. To reclaim and make her fit to be set to the Lure, you must take the same course as is prescribed for the Haggard sleight Falcon.

When she shall come to be lured loose, then would she first of all be taught to come unto the Pelts of Hens, Herons, or any such like thing, so it be dead; for thereby she will not be over-hot or eager of it, neither must you suffer her to touch any part of the flesh, to draw her love from your voice and your hand, but to spend only her time on it in pluming. All this time you must be close by her, and on your knees using your voice to her, with her dinner or supper clean drest and washt, giving still unto her some part thereof in bits with your hand, that from thence only she may be sa∣tisfied, and her whole delight be in that, accounting the other in her foot but as a stand or means to stay her by you, while she receives her full reward at your hands. And in using this course often to her, she being a Hawk of never such strength and ableness to carry, it will in the end so reclaim and win her to your self, that she will quite forget the same: And after if you list to train her with Doves, she will not carry one feather from you, but draw towards you, and ever desire to have her con∣tent at your hand.

It is a special point in a Falconer to take good time at the first making of his Hawk, and not post her to another thing till she be perfect in one.

Before you spring her up any Doves, it is meet you let her kill half a dozen at your Lure, close by your foot, having a pair of short Creances at your Lure: For it may be at the first seeing of the Dove to stir and flutter, she may come roystingly to twitch or take it away, so far as she is able: Which if she should do, you have a remedy by restraining her gently with your Creance, so that there shall be no offence commit∣ted: Then ought you to get gently into her, and as beforesaid with bits of meat clean∣ly drest and bestowed on her you shall please her at the full, and take her to the Fist again.

The Heron and the stately flight and mountee thereto is the thing for which these Hawks are most desired and accounted of: For which purpose your intermew'd Hawks are fittest and most esteemed. N. B. Remember to be favourable to them the first year of their making, [and not to put them to any toil, but to train them gently with such Herons as you are sure cannot go from them, nor cause them to labour much before they master them,] and ever after at the drawing: And take good time with them in the inseaming: For these times as yet have ever shortned their lives and de∣stroyed them. No man (he saith) can make one of these Hawks from the Mew rea∣dy to be lured under six weeks at the least, but he shall hazard her life if she take any heat at all. They are prepared for the Mew, and mew'd in like manner as the sleight Falcon. Let her have in the Mew Sods or Turfs to stand on, and those often shifted, that they grow not too hard and dry: For she is a very heavy Hawk, and very subject to infirmity on the bottom of her feet. He disallows mewing of them at the stock, and approves of mewing them loose. She ought also to have very often given to her Plumage, bones, and stones, to purge and cleanse her.

Turbervile saith, they covet to keep their castings long through sloth; and there∣fore advises not to give them casting of Cotton, but of Tow, Hazel or hard things.

When she is mew'd, Latham saith, that you ought at the least three weeks before you take her to your Fist, to inseam her with washt meat and stones: For then is the danger of shortning her life, whereas by good ordering they are as hardy as the Lanner, and will last as long: He saith, he hath known one hold out and continue her goodness twenty years.

CHAP. VIII. Of the Lanner.

THe Lanner is not over-dainty of her feeding, but can better brook gross or coarse diet than any other Falcon.

Lanners of all Hawks are fittestfor young Falconers, because they will hardly take surfeit, and seldom be over-flown, or melt their grease.

Mew'd Lanners [and Sacres] are hardly known from the Soar-hawks, because they do not change their plume.

Turbervile saith, that with this Hawk you may fly the River. Latham saith, he hath not known any Lanner made for the River, yet prescribes a way to make them.

They are very slothful and hard-metled, so that unless you keep a hard hand over them they will do littlegood.

You shall not lightly see a Lanner lie upon the Wing, after she hath flown to mark, but after one stooping she maketh a point, and then waits for the Fowl after the man∣ner of the Goshawk, she is so slothful and dull; and therefore doth commonly use upon the questing or call of the Spaniels to attend very diligently, and so to prey at her pleasure. As the Eyass of this kind exceeds other Hawks in gentleness and love to her Keeper, so the Haggard passes all others in wildness, and is very hard to be reclaimed. She must be managed and ordered in all respects like the Haggard sleight Falcon.

The Ramage Lanner is also a coy Hawk, and must be ordered as the Haggard Fal∣con; only her diet must be with hard-washed meat and stones more or less as you shall find her natural inclination.

Above all you must use your utmost skill and pains to keep her from dragging or carrying any thing from you; which ill quality no Hawk is more subject to than she. To prevent which, first you must beware, that if she but once only knoweth the Lure, that you lure her no more than once at one time, though you take the more time to make her: Else you hazard the spoiling of her. For as soon as she knows the Lure she will settle her love on it, and desire to hold it, and be loth to be taken up from it to be lured again; and out of fear lest you should deprive her of it, will quickly fly you, and drag and carry it from you. Secondly, During the time of her luring and training let her have her reward at your hand for the most part in bits, reserving some small quantity to take her to your Fist withal. Thirdly, All this while have your Spaniels by you as she is on the ground: For these be Hawks of all other most coy and fearful to have any Dogs come near them: And therefore at her first entring you ought to have but few Dogs, and they such as be both cool and gentle, till she be well entred and acquainted. For if she should chance to take any sudden fright with a Dog, she would never abide them again: And so she will be for ever married; for being able to carry away her prey, whenever she shall have a Patridge in her foot, she will suffer neither Man nor Dog to come near her, but carry it away, and prey upon it. Which if she do but once, it is as good as an hundred times, for she will ne∣ver be reclaimed from it.

Of the Merlin.

She is a couragious and hardy Hawk, flying with greater fierceness and more hotly than any other bird of prey; so that she will venture to fly the Partridge, Heath∣powt and other birds bigger than her self, and pursue them eagerly even into Villages and Towns.

They are such busie and unruly things, as oftentimes they eat * 1.2 off their own Feet and Talons very unnaturally, so as they die of; which is the true cause why you shall seldom or never see an entermew'd Merlin: For that in the Mew they so spoil themselves.

A Merlin may be made both to the Fist and to the Lure. When you have made her to the Lure in manner † 1.3 before described, make her a train with a Partridge, or other livebird: If she foot and kill it, reward her, suffering her to take her pleasure on it. This done, fly her at the wild Partridge, if she take it at the first flight, or if she take it at the second flight, being retrived by the Spaniels, feed her upon it with a reasonable Gorge, chearing her with your voice, that so she may know it. If she prove not hardy at the first train, prove her with another before you fly her at wild Game. If at the second train she prove not hard, it is a sign she is nothing worth.

It is very good sport to fly with a cast of Merlins at the Lark or Linnet; for be∣sides that they love to fly in company, it is pleasant to see the one climbing to the mountee above the Lark, and the other lying low for her best advantage, the one striking the bird at the stooping, the other at her down-come. When you have found the birds go as near as you can into the wind to the bird; and as soon as the bird riseth from the ground unhood your cast of Merlins, and cast them to fly until they have beaten down the Lark or Linnet, and let them feed on her for their labour indifferently. He advises not to fly your Merlin at Cut-Larks, because they not mounting upward, but flying streight foward, they afford you but little sport, and besides endanger the loss of your Hawk.

CHAP. IX. Of the reclaiming and manning of short-winged Hawks, and first of the Goshawk.

§. I. Of the Goshawk, in general.

HAwks of all Creatures are most fearful of man, and the Goshawk as coy, nice, and hard to be dealt with as any. She may be won by gentle usage; and will as soon perceive and unkindly resent any rough or harsh behaviour.

The Ostringer must bring his Hawk to love and be familiar with the Spaniel.

Some Goshawks are swift of flight, which in pursuing and catching their prey trust to the swiftness of their Wings, others fly slow, and win what they get by policy: None of them but by industry may be trained up to, and made good for some∣what.

The Goshawk is of a hotter temper and stronger constitution than any other Hawk; the first appears, in that her mutings are always liquid; the second, in that she is sel∣dom troubled with those diseases, which be incident to most other Hawks, viz. to be liver-shotten, and to the Filanders. And though the Lanner be accounted the har∣diest Hawk in use among us, and longest-lived; yet the reason is not the firmness of her constitution above the Goshawks, but because the Goshawk in time of her pride and fulness is a froward and unruly bird, and when she is inseamed very prone to extreme bating (wherefore she requires more labour and attendance of her Keeper than any other Hawk) and by these extremes she often shortens her days: Whereas the Lan∣ner is a meek and gentle Creature, and will seldom bate or be unruly in the time of her inseaming; which is the reason she lasts longer.

§. II. How to order a Goshawk taken from the Mew.

BEcause it is likely that she will be fat and full in the highest degree with rest and frank feeding in the Mew, therefore it is necessary that she be fed in the Mew twice every day with clean drest and washt meat for sixteen or twenty days before the intended time of her drawing, that she may be well inseamed of her body, and have scoured forth of her pannel and guts all glut and fatness, and so she will be in no dan∣ger through her bating, strugling, or other forcible motion of her body at the time of her drawing. Then draw her, having a rufter-hood in readiness very sit for her, from which time she must be continually fed on the Fist, and have casting every night. This course with continual carriage on horse-back and on foot must be taken with her in her rufter-hood some eight or ten days longer; and then take it off, when you shall find her to be well reclaimed and inseamed, and free from all danger, and ready to be called; and with diligence and pains she will be next week as ready to fly: And after two or three flights at her first entring may be put to hard flying, and she will receive no harm thereby, &c.

§. III. How to reclaim and order a Goshawk taken from the Cage.

FEw of these are so fat or full-bodied as to take harm by any reasonable bating.

Give your Hawk sweet meat, clean drest, and reasonably washt, and moderate gorges of the same: By this diet you must bring her to a good stomach before you profer her casting, and then she will not be nice or curious in taking it. Let it be no more than she may well and easily swallow, and when she hath done so, presently put on her Hood, then suddenly give her one bit or two of meat to please her withal; then make a little stay, until you perceive assuredly that she hath put it down into her Pannel, which being perceived put on her Hood again, and give her a reasonable supper. By this course taken, the Hawk will soon come to be in love with her casting, hasting to take it without niceness in expectation of her supper.

For my own part (saith my Author) when my Hawk is well inseamed, and in fly∣ing I give her Plumage every night when I feed her up: When she rests I feed her very clean, without any casting at all, and so set her up to rest, and in the morning very early give a woollen casting, fashioned and soak'd all night in fair water, which she will willingly take being used to it: And in an hour or thereabouts her appetite to her breakfast will provoke her to cast it up again. So he disapproves the giving a wool∣len casting at night: But if any will needs give it, then he advises it be with small store of meat, and some Plumage with it. Also he disapproves of stones given with Celandine, and castings of hazel, unless much undersized, because of their swelling. When ever he found his Hawk to distaste unnatural Cotton castings, he suddenly left them and betook himself to Jukes, and sometimes to Hares or Conies feet, the bones and wooll well broken together, which he never found to disagree with her, but always wrought to good purpose.

He condemns the giving of bloudy meat, because the Hawk will not therewith be reclaimed. And therefore, saith he, the unreclaimed and unclean Hawk of this or any other kind ought to be reclaimed, inseamed, and made to fly with good meat, clean drest and washed, and for these Hawks the water dried out again with a fair cloth. And this course to be held all flying time, unless there be just cause for the contrary. As to a sick and crasie Hawk, with due respect unto the eyes, or to a hot and eager mettled Hawk, as also to the soundest and hardest Hawk that is, when she shall have continual hard flying, and kills oft, you may with discretion in the quanti∣ty give bloudy rewards, and three or four times in the week suppers of the same, as Pheasants and Partridges heads and necks: Always being mindful in time of rest to feed with meat clean drest, hard washed and dried again, to hold the stomach right and sharp withal, else no subjection to be looked for abroad when she is at liberty.

All the flying time, but especially when you fly to the covert, (it being then usual∣ly cold weather) suffer not your Goshawk to be too long fasting, for it breedeth much wind in her, and is a special means, with cold adjoyned, to take down her flesh, which at that time will not very easily be put on again. Therefore for every Hawk∣ing day provide a reasonable meal of clean-drest meat, the which you must keep in a fair cloth: Then in the morning, suddenly after she hath cast, give one bit when her Hood is on. Also if you chance to spend an hour more before you find your flight, give her another bit, and so after this manner, proportioning her meat to the time of her being abroad, that she never be over-empty, and yet have a perfect appetite and good courage to fly.

When ever you feed with cold meat you need not wash it: But I would advise you to use it as seldom as you may, for a continuance of it breeds poverty and many diseases.

Whenever you have set down your Hawk off your Fist hooded or unhooded, come not to take her up again without using your voice in whistling or chirping to her, also without some bit of meat, or a stump to please her withal; for so you shall work in her an everlasting love and desire of your coming and company.

Also when you set her on your Pearch hooded, let her not know where it standeth, if she do, she will have a longing to be there, and will not rest quietly on the Fist after she is once within doors: Whereas till she be throughly reclaimed and flying, and till she hath been well flown, your Fist for the most part must be her Pearch, and she must know no other. For these be Hawks that in their first making with a little rest will quickly forget what they were formerly taught, and return to their wildness again.

When she is untowardly or frowardly disposed, endure her unquietness with pa∣tience and gentleness, and evermore have some stump in a readiness to appease her anger.

In the time of her inseaming and reclaiming give her not her dinner at any time all at once, for thereby you shall prolong the time of her making: For her stomach once full she will mind you no more, therefore divide it in the forepart of the day, and let her jump often to the Fist for it.

When she is first to be entred put her upon the highest pin of hunger, and then she will shew all the mettle that is in her, and when she hath once taken her prey rather die than forsake it: Whereas if her stomach be imperfect, the least occasion that may be, as the approach of her Keeper, or any other man, the appearance of either Horse or Dog, &c. will be sufficient to cause her to forsake it and go her way.

§. IV. How to make a Goshawk like the Hood, that hath with ill usage been beaten out of love with it.

CArry a Hood of some notable colour on your finger, that may well be seen and viewed by her as it hangeth there, and so as she may feed close by it for a week together, but beware you do not as yet shew it her with your other hand. But then take it gently in your other hand, and move and stir it about her meat, that she may touch it as she eats. This do another week, still letting the Hood rest on your little in her sight between feeding times. Use this course till without fear she will but thus endure it. Then you must hold your meat in the hand she sits on, and with the other hand hold the Hood by the Tassel upon the meat, moving and stirring it as though you would keep her from feeding; but it must be done softly and gently: When you shall perceive that she will strive to feed beside it, you shall hold it by the Tassel just over the meat, so that she must needs eat clean through it. Do thus so long as till you see that she will feed and search boldly through the hood for her meat, and eat it without any snatching or fear. Then as she is feeding, and doth thrust through the Hood for her meat, do you bear the Hood a little against her, and she will hood and unhood herself as often as you would have her. When she hath with your assistance put on her Hood, let her eat freely until she hath done, and take it off no more till feeding time again. In this manner, within a month and less she will be brought to hood her self with the least stump you carry about you, as often as you shall have occasion.

Practise not this till she be come to a perfect stomach, for if you do, you mar your Hawk for ever.

§. V. To reclaim a Goshawk from the Cage.

GIve her a fortnights carriage or more in her rufter-hood, always stroaking her with your hand or a feather. Be careful to feed clean with washed meat, for so she will be the sooner brought to a good stomach, and be gentle and well pleased to be handled. This obtained (which you shall perceive by her listening to your voice, or eager feeding) some evening wash and pepper her well. Then take off her rufter-hood, having another ready to put on: As she grows to be a little dry put on her Hood, and give her a bit of good meat upon it to please and refresh her. Hold this course to hood gently, and unhood now and then, not forgetting her reward ever after it is on, untill she be throughly dried, and afterwards the most part of the night: Then you may set her down bare-faced to have two or three hours rest; and be sure it be in a special warm place, and on a dry and warm Pearch on high, for these kind of Hawks are very subject to take cold, and apt to have the cramp on such occasions.

When she and your self have taken a little rest, go softly to her with shew of meat in your hand, withal chirping or whistling to her, and take her gently on your Fist, and dividing her meat into several parts bestow it on her for the most part when her Hood is put on: This will make her love and look for the Hood expecting to be fed; if she be nice in suffering your hand or the Hood to come near her head, you must seldom do it in the day time, but at her feeding, and late at night, when she will be more willing to take it.

Next teach her to jump and come to the Fist. For though other Hawks are used to come to the Lure thrown some distance from the man; yet she being a Hawk of the Fist, must be taught and used to come boldly to the hand, and without fear to seize and sit upon it during your pleasure, which she will never be brought to do with all the Art in the world, if her stomach be any way imperfect.

This obtained, let her be called a little further off, viz. twenty or forty yards at most: By dividing one meal (as I said) let her come oftentimes in a day if it be pos∣sible: Which will quickly make her perfect, that she will never check at the Fist, but will come and draw at any time of the day: Whereas using her to one hour for her meal, causes her not to come or draw till that time; which is an ill quality.

[He wishes not to be too hasty in flying Goshawks before they be throughly re∣claimed and taught, but to take sufficient time to teach them. And he affirmeth, that if a Hawk be too much impoverished and her flesh taken off, she will lose her spirit and mettle, how good soever she was, and will neither fly well, nor ever last healthful.]

Now it will be good time to call her loose. In doing which shun all places near Houses and Towns, to avoid the inconveniences of her being tempted aside by Poul∣try, Dove-houses, and such like places, which all these Hawks are subject to; and having once caught such an ill property they will seldom or never be reclaimed from it, how far soever from any Town they shall be flown: Walk therefore with her to the young Woods betimes in the afternoon, having before prepared her stomach, and there put her up into a tree, walking along from her, using your voice softly as though you had Spaniels with you, but chiefly to her in chirping and whistling: By which means no doubt she will draw and follow after you with little noise, Then suffer her not too long, but call her to your fist again, and reward her with some bit of meat, or Leg of a Pigeon, &c. to please her. Then put her up again, and by your softest voice or whistle draw her after you again. To use a loud voice would be a means to make her sit and loiter behind you so far as she can hear you, which is an ill quality: And besides, to make your Spaniels range far off, and spring out of the way far from you, which must needs be much displeasing both to Man and Hawk.

To make your Hawk familiar with your Dogs, first feed her amongst them all very oft upon your Fist: Then throw oftentimes from you among the thickest of them the dead Pelt of a Pullet or Hen in a short Cruce, that she may fly from your Fist, and eagerly chop among them, and seise upon the same, suffering her to plume a while: then take her to your Fist with a stump. This course you must use every day often, till you find that she will venture boldly among them all. She will soon perceive and understand by the Dogs giving way with fear unto her, that she hath even got the upper hand of them, and so will never fear them in the field or covert, or be beaten off her Game by them, as otherwise she would.

§. VI. To enter a Goshawk to fly to the field.

PRovide three or four hand-Partridges, with a companion, and one couple of staunch Spaniels; then go into the field, having prepared your Hawk with ap∣petite and courage to fly. Then one of you shall go near hand from the other unto some bushes or other covert, whereas he shall spend his voice to the Dogs after the accustomed manner, and using some blows with his Pole, he shall secretly let the Par∣tridge spring as from forth the same, with such judgment in the delivery as that the Hawk may see it, crying with a loud voice, Howe, Howe, Howe, that she may learn to know the word of warning, when she should at any other time look about her, and be watchful at an instant to take her advantage. This done, and your Hawk flying after it with spirit, and taking it, be sure with all expedition to get in to her, that no Dog or other thing may fright her, or deprive her of it: But suffer her to plume and take her pleasure on it, and further to take bloud thereon, still having the Spaniels in sight close by her. Then you must teach her to take the head in her foot, and eat it on the ground: And when she hath so done, and looketh about her, having your Spaniels by you, through the Partridges pelt (as before in her first teaching) once among the Dogs, and let her take it being in her Leash, that she may not carry it from you: And whilst she sits there and plumes make her supper ready; take her gently to your Fist, and there content her. By thus ordering and using of her, you will without doubt very suddenly have an excellent Hawk: And by all means fly her to the field all the first year, and let her not see the Pheasant at all, for that will draw her love from the Partridge, and make her give them over; being a shorter flight.

When you have thus entred and blouded her, and also killed three or four Par∣tridges more from the mark at the retrive, and perceive that she knows a Partridge by sight, and the accustomed terms, and will go readily from the Fist thereto; be sure, that all the fore-part of the year you let her go no more one flight in ten, near to the rising of her Game, for that will make her slothful; the Partridge being then weak,

and she taking them easily at the sowce in a short space, she will afterward remember it, and look for the same order, and without it will not fly towards the latter end of the year, but if the Partridge be sprung far from her, will make as if she saw it not, and fly to the next tree she meets with.

Some Hawks have an ill property, that when they have flown a Partridge hard to any covert, and take it not at the first flight, there will they sit still on the ground, and not get up to any stand for their better advantage. To amend which fault, when your Hawk hath flown a Partridge, make after her with all the speed you can, taking your Dogs with you by your command, and when you have found her, be sure to take her up, but not on your Fist by any means, if there be either hedge or tree near hand, but take her by the body or shoulders suddenly with both your hands, and throw her upon either hedg, bush, or tree, and then beat for the Partridge, when as it is impossible but she must see it; if it doth spring then, and she fly after and kill it, well. This course being well followed will certainly reclaim her from that fault, and teach her to rise her self; for she will quickly understand that else she shall be caught and tost up, and also that thereby she shall enjoy some pleasure and content. This is a common and lasting fault of the Eyas Hawk or brancher, seldom of the Haggard, and therefore you need not fear frighting or angring her by so doing.

It is in my opinion the most commendable and safe way after one of these Hawks is first entred, and only knows a Partridge, then immediately to teach her and use her to fly from forth the Hood. Often bating at Partridges sprung to other Hawks discom∣forts and discourages her: Besides, she will, if carried bare-fac'd, be very stirring and unquiet on the Fist, not a Dog can stir, or bird rise, but she will offer to be gone. Let her also sit and weather in the Hood, and never take it off but when she shall either fly, feed, bathe, or is to take her rest at night.

§. VII. How to enter your Goshawk to the Covert.

NO man is fit to order and manage a Goshawk to the covert but he that hath a strong and able body, and a good spirit and courage to follow her, for in this sport, and with this Hawk he must altogether trust to his feet.

Here because the man cannot follow by view to succour the Hawk, you ought to be chary of what place you enter her in, especially that she may be there well guarded and kept from taking any mislike or offence at the Dogs, the which if she should do at the beginning she will never indure them again: For it is the sudden rushing of the Spaniels upon her, (their sight by means of the covert being obscured) that breeds this offence. The best time to enter her is early before the leaf do stir; for then the Pheasant flies not far. Also afterwards the nature of them is to leave the young shoots and small groves, and draw to the high and thickest woods.

Having made good choice of your place, and let your Hawk go unto her flight, you must be sure to command your Dogs to you till you have found her; then if she have killed, you have your desire; if not, and that you chance to find her on the ground, (as it may well be you may, for many of them at their first entring will be very hot and eager of that sport, and oftentimes seeking for it on the ground) if there be any tree near hand, that she may well see from it, put her up into the same, otherwise keep her on your Fist and beat for it again. Then if she do fly and kill it, you must be sure to make stay of the Dogs till you have found her: Which done you shall get gently in to her, and if you dislike the place for the uneasiness or thickness, draw her gently to another more open, where she may with more ease and quiet en∣joy her prey; and there suffer her to plume and take her pleasure on it a while. Then call your Dogs to you, and walk and stir gently about her, with some moderate rusling and bustling in the bushes, the better to acquaint her with the same noise. Then when you see it convenient stoop to it on your knees, and rending the Chaps give her bloud in the throat, where it will issue abundantly, to her great content. Then covering the body with your hat, pluck of the head, and give it her in her foot, to eat on the ground: And having your Spaniels close by you, when she hath done, and beginneth to look about her, throw the Pheasant as it were in their very mouths, that she may, together with some words of rebuke from your self, make them give way with fear unto her, yet drawing them into her sight again, so long to remain as she is on the ground, and till you make ready her supper. And when you see she

hath taken her sufficient pleasure, exchange that artificially with her, and let her eat it on the ground where the quarry lay, only reserving some little thing to take her to your Fist withal: And then put on her Hood, not forgetting to bestow some re∣ward on her afterward, which she will be well pleased withal.

To make your Goshawk with boldness take a Pheasant from the Pearch, before you offer to fly her thereto, provide a young Capon or brown Pullet, and take it with you to the Wood, and when you call her to her supper, as she is drawing and at∣tending after you, having a Pole fit for the purpose provided, call your Spaniels about you, to make them bay, and suddenly breaking the neck of the Poultry, lift it up on a bough, so high as the Hawk may well have sight of it, there stirring it, and withal crying, Abay, abay to her: At which noise, and seeing it flutter, no doubt she will come in, and pull it down: Which if she shall do, be sure that the Dogs may with some rebuke from your self, make way for her descending, and then suffer her to plume and take her pleasure thereon, &c. as was before directed: And in using this course but a while, she will become so bold and venturous, as that the Pheasant shall no sooner go to Pearch, but she will have him by the ears, and pull him down.

By threatning words and blows, with reason, you may bring your Spaniels into such subjection, as to trust them alone with your Hawk in your absence: taking care there be no strange Dogs among them: For one strange unruly Dog is sufficient to mar all the rest, and the Hawk too.

Be careful to enter your Goshawk first to the Cock-Pheasant, for the veriest dastard that is will kill the Hen; which if you enter her first to, it may be afterward with all your Art and Skill you shall never force her to fly at the Cock. If you find that at first she is afraid to buckle with him, then with two or three days rest prepare her sto∣mach soundly, and put her to him again.

§. VIII. Of the Haggard-Goshawk.

THis being the wildest Hawk of all, and so requiring more labour, care, and at∣tendance in her reclaiming and perfect making than any other, he advises not to deal hastily with her by peppering, watching, and the like: For many Hawks have so been spoil'd and lost; their bodies being unfit for such sudden changes.

It is the nature of these Hawks when wild to feed on their prey in covert places, where they may not be descried by such other birds as love them not: Wherefore also being reclaimed, whensoever they take it in any Plain or Champain place, they will be apt to carry it to the next harbour or covert: To reclaim her from this ill quality you must take this course. Though you do call and draw her along after you by your chirping and whistle through the thick and covert places, yet do not there take her to your Fist to be fully satisfied, but let her still wait on you, till you come to some plain place, and there entertain her to the Fist, and let her feed a little there∣on, then put to her Leash, and let her eat the rest on the ground close by you, and having reserved some stump, take her to the Fist. Remember that you sometimes stoop gently on your knee, and quietly and softly convey some bits unseen afar off to her, that she strike not at your hand with her Talons, &c. Thus doing daily with gentle usage so long as you call her, you will embolden her, and make her so familiar as never to offer to carry any thing from you.

When she kills, be sure to get in gently to her, having before provided her a meal ready drest, and as she sits on the Partridge, bestow the same on her in bits with clean∣ly conveyance, which will prolong her time in pluming, and stay the sharpness of her appetite, and desire to feed, which she must not do, for it would cause her to love the Bird better than your self, and to be loth afterwards at any time to be bereaved of it, and thereby take occasion to carry it from you, hoping to enjoy it to her self more quietly and secretly: Whereas this course will so please her, and draw her love so certainly to you, as she will never after offer to carry one feather from you. All this while give her no bloud at all, but with some reversion take her to your Fist again. By this means she will never break the Prey so long as there is one feather left on it, * 1.4 but still attend for your coming, and to have a reward only at your hand. When you have well nuzled up and inured her herein, afterward when you find her with a Partridge in her foot; then after a good time spent in pluming, take off the head and

neck, and give it unto her with the most part of her supper together, and so take her to your Fist.

He prescribes how to teach a Goshawk to fly to the Wild-duck, which is by pro∣viding three or four hand-fowl, and letting her fly and foot them out of your hand one after another, day after day, and letting her plume and be well rewarded on them: And afterward getting another like bird, and letting a companion carry it in∣to a close place or plump of bushes, and there throw it up in sight of your Hawk be∣fore prepared with a good stomach, &c. In like manner he teaches, how to enter a Hawk to the Rook, Heron, Wild Goose, Mew, &c. with a train-Rook or two, &c. which who desires to be particularly informed in, may consult the Author.

§. IX. Certain Observations for an Ostreger in keeping a Goshawk.

A Goshawk that was good in her soarage, many times proves worse after mewing: Because in her soarage she was not cherished to make her take delight in her flight. For the chief skill of an Ostreger consists in coying and cherishing his Hawk, so as she may take pride in her flight. Wherefore it were good at her first entring to have always a train-Partridge in his Bag, to serve her withal if need be, and so win her love.

Ply your Hawk with Tiring and Plumage morning and evening; for that will open her head; and cast out the moist humours, wherewith Goshawks are naturally trou∣bled. Let her Tiring be a Rump of Beef, or the Pinion of a Wing, or a Chickens Leg, given by the fire, or in the warm Sun, which will not only open her head but keep her in exercise.

Give her every night casting either of feathers or Cotton, and in the morning mark whether it be wrought round or not, whether it be sweet or not, whether it be moist or dry, and of what colour the water is that drops out of it: For thereby you may judge in what case your Hawk is. You must also have regard to the mewts, whether they be clean or not.

In Winter and cold weather set your Hawk warm, in some place where fire is made, and roll your Pearch with Cotton, or some such like thing. Set your Pearch far from the wall, that your Hawk hurt not her feathers when she bateth. If it be not cold, set her every morning in some place where the Sun hath power for an hour or two.

Let no Hens or Poultry come near the place where your Hawk shall pearch.

In the Spring offer your Hawk to the water every week, or else she will soar away when she fleeth, and make you seek her. If any time she bathes of her own accord after her flight, if it be Winter, go presently to the next house, and weather her by a fire with her back to it, and not her gorge, for that would make her sick: Like∣wise dry her if you have carried her in the rain.

Keep her lusty and high, and yet her stomach so sharp, that she may fly eagerly. The plucking down a Hawk mars her, and makes her cowardly; and liable to sickness and infirmity.

Keep your Hawk clean, and her feathers whole, and if a feather be broken or bruised imp it presently.

The first year it is best to fly your Goshawk to the field, and not to the covert, for so they will learn to hold out and not turn tail in the midst of their flight: And when they are mewed Hawks you may make them do what you will; it is better to let them be a littleramage than over-manned.

Her feeding is best on hot meats: And if you would breed her to kill great fowl, make her trains thereof: And if you would have her continue those flights never fly at less, for that will take her off from them and spoil her.

If you would make her to fly with a Dog to assist her, feed her with great fowl, and your Dogs with flesh tied under their Wings. If you train your Hawk with them, reward her upon the train, and your Dog with her: This will make them acquainted together. Thus continue doing till your Dog throughly knows his duty: And be sure to keep your Dog tied up, for if you let him go loose, it will spoil the best Dog that is: And never give him a reward but when he makes in at such Fowls to rescue the Hawk.

CHAP. X. Of the Sparrow-hawk.

THe Sparhawk (saith Latham) though a demy-creature, yet for her spirit and mettle is worthy to march in the best company: Nay, there is no better Hawk than she, if she be kept, as she ought to be, lusty and strong. Besides, he that knows how to man, reclaim and fly a Sparrow-hawk, may easily know how to keep and deal with all other Hawks.

And herein lieth an excellency in the Sparrow-hawk, she serves both for Winter and Summer with great pleasure, and will fly at all kind of Game more than the Falcon. If the Winter Sparrow-hawk prove good, she will kill the Pie, the Chough, the Jay, the Woodcock, Thrush, Blackbird, Fieldfare: Latham adds the Rook, Mew, Lapwing, Ring-dove, House-dove. To be kept strongly in the Hood and flown from it, she is a most excellent Hawk, and will kill more Partridge in one day than the best long∣winged Hawk will do in two.

Her diet should be of the daintiest meat, unless in times of rest, and then also well washt and dried again, especially if she be mewd.

Against she is to fly she must be prepared with a short cut, to put a perfect edge upon her, and then she will fly after the best manner. Also she should not be flown in the Morning, unless she be prepared over night with a short and clean supper for the purpose.

Likewise you ought to have always about you a little box full of fresh Butter, mixt with a little Saffron and Sugar-candy, to give with her meat now and then; or let her eat it out of the box: Which she will do with great delight, and it will keep her head evermore loose, and in good temper, and also prevent the Cray, and keep her proud and full of spirit.

For the Eyas or Nyas Sparrow-hawk (which is of greatest difficulty to bring to perfection) you must first feed her in some cool room, which hath two Windows, the one to the North, and the other to the East, which must be open and barred over with Laths, not so wide for a Hawk to get out, or Vermine to come in: Strow the Cham∣ber with fresh leaves, and do in every respect to this Room, as was ordered for the mewing of the Falcon.

You must feed your Eyas with Sparrows, young Pigeons, and Sheeps hearts. Whilst she is very young and little, you should cut her meat, or shred it into small pellets, and feed her twice or thrice aday, according as you find her endew it or put it over.

When she is full summed and flieth about, then give her whole small Birds, and sometimes feed her on your Fist, suffering her to strain and kill the Birds in your hand; and sometimes put live Birds into the Chamber where she is, that she may learn to foot and to kill them; and let her feed upon them in your presence: By this course you will not only neal her, but take her off from that scurvy quality of hiding her Prey when she hath seised it, a natural property belonging to all Eyasses. Likewise every morning go into the Room, call her to your Fist, whistle and use such terms as you would have her hereafter acquainted with. When she hath put forth all her Fea∣thers and is full summed, then take her out of the Chamber, and furnish her with Bells, Bewets, Jesses, and Lines.

It will be altogether requisite to seel her at first, that she may the better endure the Hood and handling: And let it be a Rufter-hood, that is large and easie, which you must pull off and put on frequently, stroaking her often on the Head, till she will stand gently.

In the evening by Candle-light unseel her, giving her somewhat to tire upon, handling, and stroaking her feathers gently, hooding and unhooding heras often as you think fit.

Before I proceed any farther, I shall inform you how to seel a Hawk after the best manner. Take a Needle threaded with untwisted Thread, and casting your Hawk, take her by the Beak, and put the Needle through her Eye-lid, not right against the Sight of the Eye, but somewhat nearer the Beak, that she may have liberty to see backward; and have especial care that you hurt not the Web: Then put your Needle through the other Eye-lid, drawing the ends of the Thread together, tie them over the Beak, not with a streight knot, but cut off the Threads near to the end of the knot, and so twist them together, that the Eye-lids may be raised so upwards that the

Hawk may not see at all, but as the Thread shall slacken, she shall be able to see back∣wards only, which is the cause that the Thread is put nearer the Beak.

When your Eyas is well won to the Hood and to the Fist, let her kill small Birds thereon; then call her two or three days or longer, till she will come far off; then take a live Pigeon tied by the foot with a Creance, and stir it till your Hawk will bate at it and seise it, but not far off, that you may quickly help her at the first, lest the Pige∣on struggling with her she prove too strong, and so discourage your young Hawk: Then let her plume and foot her, and feed her thereupon, whistling the while, that she may know it another time: Then hood her, and let her plume and tire a little.

You may use her to Trains of Chicken and Quail: And when she will seise readily by often Training, ride out with her in the morning into the Fields, where calling your Sparrow-hawk to your Fist, and giving her a bit or two, go with your Spaniels to seek some Beavy of young Quails, advancing your Fist aloft, that your Hawk may see them when they spring, flying her at advantage: If she kill, reward her, &c. if she miss, serve her with a Train of a Quail.

Let your Dogs hunt on your right hand when they range, but especially when they quest and call, to the end you may the better cast off your Hawk. When your Hawk is throughly entred and well nouzled, you may then hold your hand low, for she will now bate at the Whurr: But whatever you do, have a quick eye and a good regard to the Spaniels, not coveting to be too near them, but a little above them, that you may let your Hawk fly coasting at the advantage when the Game springeth.

§. II. Of the Brancher, Soar, Mewed, and Haggard Sparrow-hawk.

HAving spoken of the first kind of Sparrow-hawks, viz. the Eyas, the other four in the title of this Chapter must consequently be discoursed of.

I shall give you but few instructions, for in effect the same precepts that serve for the Eyas will serve also for the Brancher, Soar, Mew'd, and Haggard Hawks; only this, these four last require not so much pains to be taken to make them know their Game as the Eyas, because they have been accustomed to prey for themselves.

Above all things the Falconer must take them off from their ill custom of carrying, and that may be done by serving them with great Trains, whereby they will learn to abide on the Quarry.

Be very mindful of coying them as much as you can, for they will remember a kind∣ness or injury better than any other Hawk.

If the Hawk be newly taken, and will not feed, then rub her Feet with warm flesh, whistling to her, and sometimes putting the flesh unto her Beak: If she will not yet feed, rub her Feet with a live Bird; if at the crying of the Bird the Hawk seise it with her Feet, it is a sign she will feed; then tear off the Skin and Feathers of the Birds Breast, and put the Bird to her Beak, and she will eat.

When she will feed upon your whistle and chirp, then hood her with a Rufter∣hood, and feed her betimes in the morning; and when she hath endewed, give her a Beaching in the day-time, and every time you hood her give her a bit or two; at evening give her the Brains of a Hen for her supper: and in every thing else order these Hawks aforesaid as you do the Falcon and the rest.

§. III. How to mew Sparrow-Hawks.

SOme use to put their Sparrow-Hawk into the Mew as soon as they leave flying her, cutting off both her Bewets, Lines, and knots of her Jesses, and so leave them in the Mew till they are clean mewed.

If you will have your Sparrow-Hawk to fly at Quail, Partridge, or Pheasant Powt, then you must draw her in the beginning of April, and bear her on the Fist till she be clean and throughly enseamed.

Others keep their Sparrow-Hawks on the Pearch until March, and then throw them into the Mew, peppering them for Lice if they have any. Her Mew should be a Chamber aloft from the ground, eight or nine foot long, and about six foot broad: Her Windows and Pearches must be like the Goshawks.

Her Mew being thus provided, in May go in to her in an evening by Candle-light, and taking her up softly, pull out all her Train-Feathers one after another: This shall make her mew the faster, especially if you feed her with hot meat and Birds, observing a certain hour to feed her in.

Once in fourteen days set water before her in the Mew: If you perceive she hath any Feathers or Down which stand staring upon her Back, sitting as if she would rouze, then set her water sooner. If you put water by her continually, it delays her Mewing; and to keep it always from her causeth her to mew her Feathers uncleanly: But water once in a fortnight is the best medium for her Mewing between those two extremes.

PART II. Of Diseases and dangerous Accidents incident to Hawks, and their several Cures.

IT is necessary for a skilful Falconer not only to know how to man, reclaim, keep, fly, imp, and mew his Hawks, with other things pertinent to that purpose, but also to know their Diseases, with the proper Cures of them, and other Acci∣dents frequently befalling Hawks, both in their Flights and otherways.

Before we shall characterize their Maladies, and prescribe rules for their Cures, it will be requisite to tell you that Hawks, as well as men, (which seems somewhat strange) have four complexions, the true Indicators of their natures: And as in man his natural Complexion and Constitution is known by his Skin, so is the Temperament and natural Disposition of a Hawk by her Coat and Plume. This opinion hath not been only averred by the Ancients, but confirmed by the modern experience of the skilful in the noble Art of Hawking. Take it in this manner.

Falcons that are black are Melancholic, and are to be physicked with hot and moist Medicines, because their Complexion is cold and dry; for which purpose Aloes, Pep∣per, Cocks-flesh, Pigeons, Sparrows, Goats-flesh, and the like, are very good.

Falcons blank are Phlegmatick, and must have Physic hot and dry, because Phlegm is cold and moist; to which purpose Cinnamon, Cloves, Cardamum, Goats-flesh, Choughs, &c. are very good.

Falcons russet are Sanguine and Cholerick indifferently mixt, and their Physic must be cold, moderately moist and dry, as Myrtles, Cassia fistula, Tamarinds, Vinegar, Lambs-flesh, and Pullets.

Thus much for the Complexions: now for the Diseases and their Cures.

CHAP. I. Of Castings and Mewtings, either good or bad, according to their several Complexions and smells.

CAstings are of two sorts, Plumage, or Cotton: The latter is most commonly gi∣ven in Pellets, which must be about the bigness of an Hazel-nut, made of fine soft white Cotton: After she hath supt you must convey this into her Gorge.

In the morning diligently observe how she hath rolled and cast it, whereby you shall know whether she be in a bad or good condition: For example, if she cast it round, white, not stinking, nor very moist or waterish, you may conclude her sound; but if she roll it not well, but cast it long, with properties contrary to the former, then she is unsound and full of Diseases.

Besides, if her Casting be either black, green, yellowish, slimy, or stinking, it de∣notes your Hawk to be diseased. The former Casting is remedied by hot meats; the latter by feeding her well, and washing her meats in cool water, as of Endive, &c. and give her one or two Castings of Cotton, incorporating therewith Incense and Mummy. But if she continue notwithstanding in this condition, give her an upward Scowring made thus: Take Aloes pulverized one scruple, powder of Cloves four grains, powder of Cubebs three grains, incorporate these, and wrap them in Cotton, and give it your Hawk empty, having no meat in her Pannel.

Casting of Plumage is to be observed as the former Casting: That is, if in the morning you find them round, and not stinking, it is a good sign; but if long, slimy, with indigested flesh sticking to the same, and having an ill sent, it is very bad. Here note, that by how much the more sweet or stinking the Casting is, by so much is the Hawk in a better or worse condition.

Mewts must be observed as well as Castings, in this manner: If the Mewt be white, not very thick nor clear, having no black spot in it, or but very little, it is a sign of the healthy constitution of the Hawk; but if it be white and very thick in the mid∣dle, though it doth not import sickness, yet it sheweth her to be too gross and over∣full of grease, which you must remedy by giving her moist meats, as the Heart of a Calf or Lamb, &c. and for two mornings after give her some Sugar-Candy, or else the Gut of a Chicken well washt, and filled with Oyl-Olive: Either of these will scour her, and make her to slise freely.

It is a very bad and mortal sign to see your Hawks Mewt full of variety of co∣lours: therefore you must speedily prevent ensuing mischiefs by giving her Mummy purified and beaten to powder, wrapping it in Cotton.

If the Mewt be more yellow than white, then doth she abound with Choler pro∣ceeding from great Flights in hot weather, also from much Bating. This is remedied by washing her meat in Bugloss, Endive, Borage, and such like cold waters, wringing the said meat after you have so washed it.

The black Mewt is a most deadly sign, and if it continue four days she will peck over the Pearch and die. If she mewt so but once, there is no great danger, for it proceeds either from the Bloud or Guts of the Fowl in tiring, or else from being gorged with filthy meats: In this case give her good warm meat and Cotton-casting, with the powder of Cloves, Nutmeg, and Ginger, or Mummy alone.

If the Mewt be green, it is a bad sign, and denotes her troubled with an infected and corrupt Liver, or with some Aposteme, unless she be a Rammage Hawk, and then that sign holds not good. Her Cure is, by feeding her with meat powdered with Mummy; if she will not take it with her Food, then give it her in a Scouring or Casting: But if this ill-coloured Mewting continue still, then give her a Scouring of Agarick, and after that another of Incense pulverized to comfort her.

The dark sanguine Mewt with a black in it is the most deadly sign of all, and dif∣fers but little, if any thing, from the former black Mewt. A Hawk mewting after this manner is irrecoverable, and therefore it is needless to prescribe a Cure.

Lastly, The grey Mewt like sour milk is a mortal token, yet curable, as shall be shewn hereafter.

Thus you see how requisite it is for a Falconer to observe diligently every morning his Hawks Castings and Mewtings, that knowing thereby their Maladies, he may time∣ly find out their Remedies. Let us now proceed to their particular Diseases.

CHAP. II. Of the Cataract.

THe Cataract in the Eyes of a Hawk is a Malady not easily removed, and some∣times incurable, when it is too thick, and of a long continuance.

It proceedeth from gross Humours in the Head, which frequently do not only dim, but extinguish the Sight: and sometimes the Hood is the cause of this mischief.

The Cure must be effected by Scouring her two or three days with Aloes or Aga∣rick: Then take the powder of washt Aloes finely beaten one scruple, and two scruples of Sugar-Candy; mingle these together, and with a quill blow it into your Hawks eye afflicted as aforesaid three or four times a day. This is the gentlest and most sovereign medicine of any yet I have tried. But if this will not do, you must use stronger medicines, as the juyce of Celandine roots, bathing her Eyes often with warm Rose∣water wherein hath been boyled the seeds of Fengreek.

CHAP. III. Of the Pantas or Asthma.

THe Pantas is a dangerous Distemper, and few Hawks escape which are afflicted therewith. It happens when the Lungs are as it were so baked by excessive heat, that the Hawk cannot draw her breath, and when drawn, cannot well emit it again. You may judge of the beginning of this Distemper by the Hawks la∣bouring much in the Pannel, moving her Train often up and down at each motion of her Pannel: and she cannot many times mewt or slise, or if she do, she drops it fast by her. It is known likewise by your Hawks frequent opening her Clap and Beak.

The best Remedy is, to scour your Hawk with good Oyl-Olive well washed in several waters till it become clear and white; which you must do after this manner: Take an earthen pot with a small hole in the bottom thereof, which you must stop with your finger; then pour therein your Oyl with a quantity of water, and coil these together with a spoon till the water grow darkish, after which remove your finger, and the water will run out, but the Oyl remain behind floating on the top; thus do seven or eight times, till you have throughly purified the Oyl: Then take a Sheeps Gut above an inch long for a Falcon and Goshawk, but of a less length for lesser Hawks, and fill it with this Oyl, and fasten it with thread at both ends. Your Hawk having first cast, convey this Gut into her Throat, holding her on the Fist till she make a Mewt; an hour after she hath done mewting feed her with a Calves Heart, or a Pullets Leg, giving her every third or fourth day a Cotton-casting with Cubebs and Cloves. I shall only add one Receipt more for the Pantas or Asthma, and that is the Oyl of sweet Almonds poured into a washt Chickens Gut, and given the Hawk; which is of great efficacy in the cure of this Disease.

CHAP. IV. Of Worms.

THere are a sort of Worms an inch long which frequently afflict Hawks, pro∣ceeding from gross and viscous Humours in the Bowels, occasioned through want of natural heat and ill digestion.

You may know when she is troubled with them by her casting her Gorge, her stinking Breath, her Trembling and writhing her Train, her croaking in the night, her offering with her Beak at her Breast or Pannel, and by her Mewt being small and unclean.

You may cure her of them with a Scouring of washt Aloes Hepatic, Mustard∣seed and Agarick, of each an equal quantity; or the Powder of Harts-horn dried; or lastly, a Scouring of white Dittany, Aloes, Hepatic washt four or five times, Cu∣bebs, and a little Saffron wrapt in some flesh, to cause her to take it the better.

CHAP. V. Of the Filanders.

THere are several sorts of Filanders, but I shall speak but of one sticking to the Reins. They are Worms as small as a Thread, and about an inch long, and lie wrapt up in a thin Skin or Net near the Reins of a Hawk, apart from either Gut or Gorge.

You shall know when your Hawk is troubled with them by her poverty, by ruffling her Train, by straining the Fist or Pearch with her Pounces, and lastly by croaking in the night when the Filanders prick her. You must remedy this Malady betimes, be∣fore these Worms have inlarged themselves from their proper station, roving else∣where to your Hawks ruine and destruction.

You must not kill them as other Worms, for fear of Impostumes from their cor∣ruption being incapable to pass away with the Hawks Mewt; but only stupefie them, that they may be offensive but seldom: And that is done thus; Take a head of Gar∣lick, taking away the outmost rind; then with a Bodkin heated in the fire make holes in some Cloves, then steep them in Oyl three days, and after this give her one of the Cloves down her Throat, and for forty days after she will not be troubled with the Filanders. Wherefore a Falconer will shew himself prudent, if, seeing his Hawk low and poor, he give her once a month a Clove of this Garlick for prevention of the Filanders.

CHAP. VI. Of Hawks Lice.

THese Lice do most infest the Head, the Ply of a Hawks Wings, and her Train. In the Winter you may kill them thus: Take two drachms of Pepper beaten to powder, and mingle it with warm water, and with this Lotion wash the places infested with these Lice or Mites: Then set your Hawk on a Pearch with her Back and Train against the Sun; then hold in your hand a small stick about a handful long, with a piece of soft Wax at the end of it, and with that (whilst the Hawk is weathering her self) take away those Vermin crawling upon the Feathers. You may do well to add to the Pepper and Water some Stavesacre.

In the Summer-time you may kill the Lice with Auripigmentum beaten to powder, and strowed on the places where they lie.

CHAP. VII. How to keep and maintain all manner of Hawks in health, good plight, and liking.

IN the first place, never give them a great Gorge, especially of gross meats, as Beef, Pork, and such as are hard to be endewed and put over.

Secondly, never feed them with the flesh of any Beast that hath lately gone to Rutt, for that will insensibly destroy them.

Thirdly, if you are constrained to give your Hawk gross food, let it be well soaked first in clean water, and afterwards sufficiently wrung; in Summer with cold water, in Winter with luke-warm water.

Ever observe to reward your Hawks with some good live meat, or else they will be brought too low: However by serving them with washt meats is the way to keep them in health.

I shall conclude how to keep Hawks in perfect health with this most excellent Receipt. Take Germander, Pelamountain, Basil, Grummel-seed, and Broom∣flowers, of each half an ounce; Hyssop, Sassifras, Polypodium, and Horse-mints, of each a quarter of an ounce, and the like of Nutmegs; Cubebs, Borage, Mummy, Mugwort, Sage, and the four kinds of Mirobolans, of each half an ounce; of Aloes Succotrine the fifth part of an ounce, and of Saffron one whole ounce. All these you must pulverize, and every eighth or twelfth day give your Hawks the quantity of a Bean thereof with their meat. If they will not take it so, put it into a Hens Gut tied at both ends, and let them stand empty an hour after.

CHAP. VIII. Of the Formica.

THis is a Distemper with commonly seiseth on the horn of Hawks Beaks, which will eat the Beak away: And this is occasioned by a Worm, as most men are of opinion.

You may perceive it by this, the Beak will grow rugged, and it will begin to sepa∣rate from the Head.

To remedy this Malady, you must take the Gall of a Bull, and break it into a dish, and add thereto the powder of Aloes Succotrine: Mingle these well together, and anoint the Clap or Beak of your Hawk therewith, and the very place where the For∣mica grows, twice aday; but touch not her Eyes or Nares: continue thus doing till your Hawk be perfectly cured, and bath her with Orpiment and Pepper to keep her from other Vermin.

CHAP. IX. Of the Frownce.

THe Frownce proceedeth from moist and cold humours which descend from the Hawks Head to the Palate and root of the Tongue, by means whereof they lose their appetite, and cannot close their Clap. This by some is called the Eagles-bane; for she seldom dieth of age, but of the over-growing of her Beak.

You may know if your Hawk be troubled with this Distemper by opening her Beak, and seeing whether her Tongue be swoln or no: If it be, she hath it.

There are several ways to cure this Distemper, but the best that ever yet I could find for it is, only to take the powder of Allum reduced to a Salve with strong Wine∣vinegar, and wash the Hawks mouth therewith.

CHAP. X. Of the Pip.

THe Pip frequently troubleth Hawks, as it doth Chickens, and proceedeth from cold and moistness of the Head, or from feeding on gross meat not well washt in warm water in the Winter, and cold water in the Summer.

The Symptoms of this Distemper are the Hawks frequent Sniting, and making a noise twice or thrice in her Sniting.

For the Cure hereof, you must cast your Hawk gently, and look upon the tip of her Tongue, and if you find the Pip there, you must scour her with a Pill made of Agarick and Hierapicra given two or three days together with her Casting at night; this will cleanse her Head, and the sooner if she be made to tire against the Sun in the morning: Then bind a little Cotton to the end of a Stick, and dipping it in good Rose-water wash her Tongue therewith: After this anoint it three or four days with Oyl of sweet Almonds and Oyl-Olive well washed as before said. Having so done, you will find the Pip all white and soft: Then take an Awl, and with the Point thereof lift up the Pip softly, and remove it, as women pip their Chickens, but remove it not till it be throughly ripe; and wet her Tongue and Palate twice or thrice a day with the aforesaid Oyl, till she be throughly cured.

CHAP. XI. How to remedy that Hawk which endeweth not, nor putteth over as she should do.

THis happens either by being foul within, or by a Surfeit; or else when she was low and poor her Keeper over-gorged her, by being too hasty to set her up, and she being weak was not able to put over and endew, and furfeited thereupon.

The Cure whereof is this: You must feed her with light meats, and a little at once, as with young Rats and Mice, Chickens or Mutton, dipt in Goats milk or otherwise; or give her a quarter of a Gorge of the Yolk of an Egg.

If you feed her with the flesh of any living Fowl, first steep it well in the bloud of the same Fowl, so shall your Hawk mount her flesh apace; if you also scour her

with Pills made of Lard, Marrow of Beef, Sugar, and Saffron mixt together, and given her three mornings together, giving her also a reasonable Corgo two hours after.

CHAP. XII. How to make a Hawk feed eagerly that hath lost her Appetite, without bringing her low.

A Hawk may lose her Appetite by taking too great Gorges in the Evening, which she cannot well endew; or by being foul in the Pannel; or sometimes by Colds.

To remedy which, take Aloes Succotrina, boil'd Sugar and Beef marrow, of each alike, only less of the Aloes, incorporate these, and make them into Balls or Pills as big as Beans, and give of them to your Hawk, and hold her in the Sun till she hath cast up the filth and slime within her, then feed her not till noon, at which time give her good meat; and three days after for the same Disease it is good tiring on Stock-doves, small Birds, Rats or Mice.

CHAP. XIII. How to raise a Hawk that is low and poor.

THe Poverty of a Hawk happens several ways: either by the ignorance of the Falconer of some later lurking Distemper; or by her soaring away, and so being lost four or five days, in which time finding little or no Prey, she be∣comes poor and lean.

To set her up you must feed her, a little at once, and often, with good meat and of light digestion, as small Birds, Rats, Mice, &c. Or thus: Take two spoonfuls of Honey, four of fresh Butter, and boil them together in a new earthen pot of water; then take Pork well washed, and steep it in that water, giving your Hawk a reasona∣ble Gorge thereof twice a day, warming the said water when you intend to feed your Hawk: And get some Snails that breed in running waters, and give them her in the morning, and they will not only scour away the gross slimy humours which are with∣in, but also nourish her exceedingly.

CHAP. XIV. How to remedy a Hawk that is slothful, and is averse to flying.

A Hawk frequently hath no mind to fly, either by reason of her ill keeping, that is, when she is kept by those who know not how to give her her Rights, as bouzing, bathing, &c. or because the Hawk is too high and full of grease, or too poor and low: By the first she becomes proud and coy, and by the latter so weak that she wants strength and spirit to perform it.

For the curing of which Distemper, she ought to be throughly viewed by some skilful Falconer, by whom such Remedies should be administred to her as are needful for her: But above all there is nothing like giving her in a morning three or four Pills of Celandine well washt.

CHAP. XV. Of Swoln Feet in a Hawk.

HAwks have Swelling in their Feet upon several accounts: Sometimes by chasing their Feet in flying their Prey, striking it, and taking cold thereupon; some∣times for want of rolling or lining the Pearch with some soft warm cloth; or else through gross Humours and Foulness within, which through exercise drop down into their Feet, and so cause them to swell; lastly, this Swelling happens by pricks when they fly fiercely into Bushes after Game.

For a Remedy, you must scour your Hawk three mornings together with the Pills of Lard, Marrow, Sugar, and Saffron, and set her in the Sun; two days after this feed her with good meat; then take Bole-Armoniack, and half the quantity of San∣guis Draconis, and having made them into powder, temper them well together with the white of an Egg and Rose-water, and anoint her Feet twice a day three or four days together, setting her on some Cloth to keep her Feet warm.

CHAP. XVI. How to scour Hawks before you cast them into the Mew.

WHen Mewing time is come, you must scour and cleanse your Hawks; for in luring and flying-time by foul feeding they engender Filanders and other Distempers, whereof they die for want of timely care and cure.

The best way is, (when you mean to cast a Hawk into the Mew) first to scour her well according to former directions, to cope her, and set her up well in flesh, to dis∣charge her, as near as you can, of all Diseases, also to free her from Mites and Lice to set her water, sometimes to feed her with young Rats, Mice, Dogs-flesh, Pigeons, Rabbets, and now and then with some liquid thing and meats laxative.

Take notice of this special Observation: A Haggard is not to be cast in loose to the Mew, but is to be mewed on the Fist, for otherwise she will become too coy and strange: And if she fall to bating and beating her self for heat, then must you hood her up, or bespout her with cold water, which is the readiest way to make her leave Bating.

You must continue her on the Fist till she begin to shed her Feathers, then set her down and tie her to a Stone or Pearch, as you do the rest; and after she hath mewed and comes to fly, then let her stand on a Block or Billet cased or rolled. In the same manner mew Goshawks, Tiercels, and Sparrow-hawks; only they will not be born on the Fist, but be at liberty in the Mew, and very clealy served.

Fifteen or twenty days before you draw your Hawk out of the Mew you must be∣gin to abate her of her diet, the sooner and better to enseam her.

Many more Diseases there are incident and Accidents hapning to Hawks, of which with their Cures there are large discourses written in Italian, French, and English, and therefore I thought fit to insert in this place no other Maladies than what most usually occur: If you desire to be farther satisfied, I shall refer you to those larger Volumes.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Be careful to feed clean, the benefit whereof few take notice of.
• * 1.2

  This my Au∣thor upon his own experi∣ence denies.
• † 1.3

  For the Falcon.
• * 1.4

  I speak this by experience and on my credit.