The Natural History of Selborne

Mr White of Newton spring a pheasant in a wheat-stubble, & shot at it; when, notwithstanding the report of the gun, it was immediately pursued by the blue hawk, know by the name of the Hen-harrier, but escaped into some covert. He then spring a second, & a third in the same field, that got away in the same manner; the hawk hovering round him all the while that he was beating the field, conscious no doubt of the game that lurked in the stubble. Hence we may conclude that this bird of prey was rendered very daring, & bold by hunger; & that Hawks cannot always seize their game when they please. We may further observe that they cannot pounce their quarry on the ground, where it might be able to make a stout resistance; since so large a fowl as a pheasant could not but be visible to the piercing eye of an hawk, when hovering over a field. Hence that propensity of cowring & squatting till they are almost trod on, which no doubt was intended as a mode of security; tho’ long rendered destructive to the whole race of Gallinae, by the invention of nets, & guns.